Dr. Wasser, this is
one long post for the final week of the program in Berlin.
So the program is officially over, most people have flown
home, and I am currently making my way across Europe. I am meeting up with Joanna, Austin, and
Andrea in Paris soon but for the moment I am completely on my own in
Brussels. It is certainly a big change,
going from being with 17 of your friends constantly to being surrounded by
strangers speaking a mix of French and Dutch. I know absolutely no French, but
thankfully a lot of things are in English around here.
The last five days of the program were spent in Berlin. It was a nice time, minus the whole sleep
deprivation thing, but it was a little sad to realize these were my last four
days in Germany for a long time. The
first day was a bike tour of the city, which lasted 3.5 hours! Remember that
whole sleep deprivation thing? Yeah…I actually preferred it to walking tours
though. You got to see more things, rest
your feet riding a bike instead of standing, and you got a cool squeaky toy to
play with. This was a good day to get an
overall impression of the city, which I will honestly say at first was not that
great of one. Despite the interesting
buildings and historical places that I was seeing I couldn’t bring myself to
really like the city. Vienna had been
beautiful, Munich rich in architecture, but Berlin? It almost looked used and
unplanned. Eventually it dawned on me
that what makes Berlin so special is the history and all that it
signifies. The memories of the war and
the wall are everywhere in the city, from the people to the wall remnants, to
the partially reconstructed buildings.
After this realization my overall impression of Berlin improved and I
began to enjoy my time there.
We did so many things during our time there. We visited Sachsenhausen, the concentration
camp, Otto Bock, the Charite hospital, Dresden, the zoo, and many other
places. We got to try the Döner and
currywurst for which Berlin is renowned, enjoyed a splendid dinner of Moroccan
food, and got dressed up for the Opera.
I really enjoyed all of these, except perhaps the Charite Museum tour; I
was so exhausted it was hard to focus. I
will expand on a couple of my favorites and then call it a day.
The concentration camp was depressing, as you might expect,
but it was one of those things you had to do.
It is completely different being at the actual site instead of just
reading about it in a book. Seeing the outlines
of the buildings used by the Nazis and the left over soviet monuments made it
so real. The part that brought it really
real for me however was seeing the ruins of the “exit gate”. Even though this was not a death camp, they
still had a small gas chamber and such.
Parts of the walls were still standing and you could see where the floor
had been bulldozed. It was not covered
in grass and made you realize how all of these atrocities were committed not
too long ago, and it brings the happenings back to the present.
This entire trip has been making me rethink my chosen profession. Not in a bad way, but for a slightly-stubborn
girl like me who has known she wanted be a biomedical engineer and do medical
research/get her PhD since 9th grade, it is frustrating to be
confused. After witnessing the
operations in Bonn and working with medical training dummies in Berlin (whoop
for correct intubating on the first try J
) I am starting to want to go for an MD as well. My mind keeps going from MD/PhD to just PhD
to nursing school to hospital volunteer and back again. Then again, visiting the Otto Bock Health and
Science center and enjoying Biosolid mechanics this semester make me want to go
into mechanics and industry. I guess I
should be happy that I am in a major where I can do so many cool things, and
that I at least know what major I want to be.
The good news is I still have time to decide what degrees I want to get,
but I have a lot of thinking to do.
I especially enjoyed the tour of Dresden. I had actually wanted to visit sometime
during the semester and never gotten the chance, so I am really glad we
went. We had a walking tour, so my feet
did hurt a lot by the end, but seeing the city was well worth it. Seeing the pictures of before and after the
bombing really brought home the destruction that took place in this town. What I especially liked though was how during
the reconstruction the city has used the old ruins that are left of the
buildings. For example, the church was
just a few fragments of wall and some extra stone, but they rebuilt it
completely, using the wall fragments and stones when they could. It gave it a Dalmatian effect but one you
realize why the stones look so odd you are simply in awe of the church. Having a guide who lived through the war
offered an interesting perspective on the city.
I also got to try potato pancakes which were delicious.
Lastly, I loved going to the opera. It was a chance to get all dressed up and go
out with everyone for one last time.
Unfortunately the opera was in Italian and the subtitles in German, so I
didn’t get a whole lot of what was said, but between Dr. Wasser’s preparation,
the acting, and my limited vocabulary I was able to pick up on what was going
on. After that it was back to the
hotel for last-minute packing and a few hours of sleep before I had to be up to
catch a train.
It was sad to say goodbye to everyone, but luckily most of us will have a lot of the same classes for the next two years so it shouldn't be too bad. Mostly I am excited to be out traveling on my own and looking forward to seeing my family in a week
No comments:
Post a Comment