Berlin/Leipzig – Train Travels

Our trip to Berlin was quite the adventure, we began unsure of how much the tickets would cost and arrived at our first station to realize that they were 184 Euro – not quite in the budget. So we started train hoping paying little fares here and there hoping to reach the German boarder where we were under the impression that we could buy a weekend ticket at about half the prize. Which turned out sort of being true as we arrived learning we could buy a weekend pass for 39 Euro but only on Saturday and Sunday. It was Friday.



We arrived in Berlin a few hours later and with a few less euros in our pockets, but along the way had an array of train travel adventures. Everything from surly ticket salespersons to random stops in Holton and beautiful picturesque Netherland and German landscapes.




We then had the adventure of getting to Leipzig – home of two of my fraternity sisters and the reason for our trip. Way back in November when I first learned that I would have the opportunity to go to the castle, a Zeta-Alumnus and one of my co-employees in Institutional Advancement mentioned that there were Zetas in Germany and encouraged me to get in contact with them. Kat and I have been emailing back and forth since then and finally have met up. She opened up her home to Cher, Michael, and myself and we enjoyed a delicious homemade meal and conversed about the differences between Emerson now and then (just over 10 years ago!). We talked about everything from changes in campus location to the disappearance of Bennigians. It also turns out that through lines of bigs and littles (sorry if that is confusing for the non-greek readers) that Kat and I are directly related and even have the same colored Zeta sweatshirt. It also turns out that Kat attended the Castle program and we were able to compare all the differences and similarities of the Castle as it is now and as it was when she attended.

The following morning Cher and I went back to Berlin where we took an amazing free 3-hour walking tour of the city. We had a wonderful guide who had a joke and story for every fact and each stop along the way. We got to see remains of the Berlin Wall, Brandenburg Gate, the Holocaust Memorial, the site of Hitler’s bunker, Checkpoint Charlie, and all sorts of other nooks and crannies of Berlin.





One of the best parts of the tour for me personally was at the Holocaust Memorial when our guide connected the memorial to the Jewish graveyard we had seen in Prague. I felt extremely well-traveled when I knew exactly what she was talking about and was able to see the connections myself.




After our walking tour we traveled up to the top of the parliament building, which was absolutely beautiful.





We then walked around the city a little bit and caught an early morning train back to the Netherlands. The time changed messed us up just a little so we ended up taking 7 different trains back which took us about 13 hours. But now we can say we have fully experienced train travel in Europe.