Last day in Berlin

Today was our last day in Berlin. We spent a fair amount of time running errands (laundry, printing confirmation pages and boarding passes), etc.

We also went to the Neue Synagogue, which was right around the corner from our hostel and has an amazing gold dome on top of it. The other day, we could see the dome from the top of the Reichstag. The building opened in the 1860s and was ransacked in 1938, then re-openned before it was hit by a bomb in 1943. In 1957 it had to be destroyed because the bomb's damage made it unsafe. Part of the building, including the dome, was re-constructed in 1989-90. The main prayer room was not part of the reconstruction because it was too badly damaged. Only the entrance foyers were rebuilt. The building was in the style of the Alhambra in Granada. It was also not built at a right angle to the street. The entrance is, but the main part of the building is on an angle because that made it easier to have the arc face Israel. Inside we walked through an exhibit about the history of the building and Jewish institutions around it (hospital, orphanage, stores, etc.). The exhibit included artwork by children who had seen Marc Chagall's "I and the Village." It was obvious which were painted by little girls (lots of pink and purple), but the more interesting one was painted by a boy who included Super Mario and Star Wars in his painting.

We walked around the back of the building where the main part of the synagogue used to be. Instead of rebuilding this part (they didn't have any remnants left over from the rubble), pillars were placed to show where the building used to be. The arc is represented by some columns across the grassy space. After seeing that space, we climbed up to the dome which had a pretty great view of the city. Unfortunately we could not take pictures from up there, or anywhere in the complex.

Afterwards we stopped in a park to eat some lunch. Then we walked through the trendy areas towards Jess's neighborhood (which was outside the city). In the trendy area we stopped into an alleyway. The building used to be owned by a man who hired Jews to work at his factory. He hired them to try to protect them from deportation. Now, it's a grafitti-covered area filled with cafes and an exhibition of Anne Frank.

Continuing along we walked through hipster neighborhoods filled with trendy cafes, stores and the like. We stopped at a cafe to wait for a quick rainstorm to end. Then we walked back stopping in deisgn stores and a clothing store where Jess bought a patch with the TV tower on it. The street we walked was the one Jess used to walk on her way home from classes and she enjoyed seeing how much it had changed in the two years since she had been there.