Sights—The Reichstag and its dome; Brandenburg Gate; Potsdamer Platz; the Memorial Church and Kurfurstendamm; Charlottenburg Palace; the Russian Memorial in Treptower Park; remnants of the Wall; a day trip to Potsdam's Schloss Sanssouci; the city views from the Fernsehturm.
Museums—The Pergamon Museum with its famous altar; the Skulpturensammlung and Museum for Byzantine Art; art at the Gemaldegalerie (old masters), Alte Nationalgalerie (19th-century paintings and sculpture), and the Neue Nationalgalerie and Hamburger Bahnhof (modern and contemporary); the famous bust of Nefertiti at the Altes Museum; the stunning architecture and thought-provoking exhibits at the Jewish Museum; a trip through time at the History of Berlin Museum.
Memorable Meals—The highly acclaimed international fare at VAU; avant-garde cuisine at Restaurant 44; lamb chops at Borchardt; Alsatian specialties at Gugelhof.
Late Night—Cabaret or a revue show at the Wintergarten or Bar jeder Vernunft; a cocktail at Newton Bar or Greenwich; a beer on a summer night in the garden at Cafe am Neuen See; dancing to the rhythms of house and funk at Sage Club; enjoying the Spree River view in the Watergate Club.
Walks—Strolling down Unter den Linden or around the trendy Oranienburger Strasse and Hackescher Markt areas; walking through the vast Tiergarten; shopping along Friedrichstrasse or Kurfurstendamm; along the shores of the Spree River behind the Reichstag.
Especially for Kids—Interactive displays and demonstrations at the Deutsches Technikmuseum; plenty of fish and reptiles at the aquarium; a huge variety of animals at Zoologischer Garten in Berlin's west; lots of newborn animals at the Tierpark Zoo in Berlin's east.
Berlin lies in northeastern Germany. The Spree River snakes through the city, and the Havel River runs near its western border. Forests and lakes are predominant features of the landscape, making up close to 25% of the city's total area.
The city is divided into districts called bezirke. The oldest district is called Mitte, and it stretches from the Brandenburg Gate to Alexanderplatz. Unter den Linden, Friedrichstrasse, Museumsinsel and other historical sites are located there. Encircling Mitte, in clockwise fashion, are the districts of Prenzlauer Berg, Friedrichshain, Kreuzberg, Tiergarten and Wedding. Charlottenburg, Wilmersdorf and Schoneberg, to the west of Mitte, are also considered part of central Berlin.
The city doesn't have just one center where its attractions and entertainment can be found. Breitscheidplatz, with the Memorial Church, is generally thought of as the main western center. The zoo and Zoogischer Garten station (referred to simply as Zoo), the boulevard Kurfurstendamm (often called Ku'damm) and the Europa Center are all nearby. Alexanderplatz (or simply Alex) in Berlin Mitte is an important transportation hub and the main eastern center. Where the Wall once divided east and west is Potsdamer Platz, the city's high-profile entertainment, retail and office center.
Berlin actually began as two trading settlements, Colln and Berlin, in the mid-1200s, though transient settlements date much earlier. It took almost 500 years before the two towns were officially merged into one city, which retained the name Berlin. However, Berlin's rise to prominence began in the mid-1400s when Hohenzollern princes, the rulers of surrounding Brandenburg, named it their official residence. Its importance and size grew, and in 1701, it became the Kingdom of Prussia's capital.
Prussia's power and Berlin's prestige grew significantly during the reign of Friedrich II (Frederick the Great) in the mid-1700s. Many of the prominent buildings on the eastern end of Unter den Linden were built during that time. Although Prussia gained much of its strength and prestige through military might, Berlin, meanwhile, became a center for the Enlightenment.
Initially, political and social change came about slowly. As citizens' movements swept Europe in 1848, a revolt by the middle class took place in Berlin in March of that year, but the monarchy was able to quash the uprising and hold on to power. In 1871, following Prussia's triumph in the Franco-Prussian war, the various German principalities united to form imperial Germany under the rule of the Prussian Kaiser Wilhelm I, who then ruled a unified nation. Spurred on by massive industrialization, Berlin went through one of its biggest boom periods. Its population and area doubled repeatedly, reaching 2 million around 1900, and 4 million by 1920.
After World War I, which caused little physical damage to the city but left all of Germany reeling, Berlin saw dramatic political and social change. Although followers of the left and right staged bloody battles in the streets and inflation and unemployment soared, the economic situation began to stabilize in the mid-1920s, and Berlin developed into a vibrant cultural and intellectual center. The Weimar Republic, never stable, faltered with the depression. The brief period of democracy came to an end in 1933, when Hitler was named chancellor and granted emergency powers, and the Nazi party established a dictatorship. A boycott of Jewish businesses began soon after, and in 1935, the Nuremberg laws further stripped German Jews of their rights. On the night of 9 November 1938, synagogues and other Jewish properties were burned. Germany invaded Poland in 1939, setting off World War II. The mass deportation of Berlin's Jewish population began in October 1941, followed a few months later by the Wannsee conference, at which Nazi officials committed themselves to the "final solution" for Jews. By the end of World War II, one-third of Berlin's buildings had been destroyed, its overall population had decreased by more than 1 million, and its Jewish population had fallen by more than 150,000 as a result of emigration and extermination in death camps.
After World War II, Berlin was split into four occupation sectors divided among Great Britain, France, the U.S. and the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union blockaded the three western sectors for 11 months in 1948 and 1949, which sparked a massive airlift by the Western powers. The German Democratic Republic was proclaimed in East Berlin, its capital, in October 1949. The three western sectors, although officially under occupation by the Western allies, became a city-state linked to the Federal Republic of Germany, which had its capital at Bonn. The Berlin Wall went up in August 1961 and sealed the division of the city into east and west for three decades.
On 9 November 1989, the Wall surrounding the western sector was opened, setting the stage for the reunification of Germany on 3 October 1990. In June 1991, the united German Parliament voted to move itself and parts of the federal government from Bonn to Berlin, which occurred gradually through the end of the 1990s. Since the fall of the Wall and reunification, Berlin has experienced dramatic physical and social change as the reborn capital and cultural center of Germany.
Following reunification, an anticipated economic boom didn't happen, and many company headquarters left the city. What Berlin is lacking in capital and industry it is making up for in cultural and educational charm (the city is virtually bankrupt and styles itself as "poor but sexy"). The city is a magnet for young people. With the arrival of a younger crowd, the old center Berlin Mitte (formerly in the Eastern sector) is now bursting at the seams with eccentric shopping havens and a glittering nightlife.
Geographically speaking, Berlin is in central Europe. As the crow flies, the German capital is closer to Warsaw than it is to either Paris or London. It's also closer to Prague than it is to Frankfurt or Munich.
Berlin has the largest population of Turks of any city outside of Turkey.
In size, but not population, Berlin is larger than New York City (all five boroughs).
During the 11 months of the Berlin airlift, 250,000 flights took place, transporting 2,324,257 tons of goods. Forty-one British, 31 Americans and five Germans lost their lives.
In Berlin's Lustgarten between the Berliner Dom and the Altes Museum, Prussia's first potatoes were planted in 1649.
Marlene Dietrich, Germany's most famous actress, is buried in the small cemetery Stubenrauchstrasse in Schoneberg's Friedenau quarter (U-Bahn: Friech Wilhelm Platz).
The hat Napoleon lost in the battle of Waterloo is on display in the Deutsches Historisches Museum.
Berliners are famous for their honesty and quick wit. Germans lovingly call the straightforwardness trait Berliner schnauze (Berlin nozzle). Expect to hear an opinion, well-researched or not.
