The Berlin Bears

Our second and final long excursion with our program was to Berlin, Germany. We did a lot in the 5 days that we were there so I will give you a sample of the top five things we did.

Bike Tour
Right when we stepped off the bus into the streets of Berlin, we were hurried to drop off our bags at the hotel and then meet back outside to head to our first tour, which happened to be on bikes. We were all given fat tired, three geared townie bicycles that felt like they couldn't fall over even if you tried to tip them on purpose and then started out, following our guide Sion (pronounced Sean, he was from Whales!). We went around the entire inner city, visiting museum island, parts of the Berlin Wall, Checkpoint Charlie, and even the parking lot that was built over the position of Hitler's bunker. It was a little cold, but not unbearable with the proper clothing. The bike tour was surprisingly a lot of fun as well as jam packed full of interesting information about the city. The coolest piece that we stopped by was the Jewish memorial for those who were killed and/or affected by WWII. It was a matrix of pillars in the shape of a square, columns and rows perfectly aligned  but as you moved towards the center, the pillars became taller and the ground getting there was uneven. It created the feeling of unease as you proceeded deeper into the memorial. Even though you could see a way out in every direction, you could still feel a sensation of being lost.

The East Side Gallery
There is about a mile stretch of the Berlin wall that has been kept standing on the East side of town. The wall is approximately 15 feet tall and one side has been covered with artwork. There are continuous murals, one after another, the entire length of the wall. Each one seemed to be done by a different artist, all sending a different message about reunification of the city.

Visiting the Local Medical University
At Berlin's medical school, we met with two current students of the university who showed us a few of the experiments that the school uses to train their students in diagnostic techniques. They had a machine that simulated different diseases of the lungs where you could put a stethoscope up to the dummy and hear what different diseases would sound like to the doctor. They also had a dummy for intubation practice; intubation is where the doctor inserts a tube into the patients larynx when the patient can no longer breath on their own. It is a tricky task to preform because the esophagus is so much larger and easier to reach than the larynx and so it took some of the pre med students a couple of tries to get the tube into the right hole. Strangely enough though, most of the engineers got it right on the first try, myself included. The rest of the machines simulated how hard it is to move and stand up when you fall when you get older, eye disorders, and the tremors in your hands that come with old age as well.

Pergamon Museum
The Pergamon Museum has entire buildings inside of it. OK, maybe not entire buildings, but that is only because those buildings are too big even to fit in this three to four story building. They had an entire alter building and half of a marketplace gate from the town of Pergamon, an ancient Greek city. The gate is only half because they couldn't fit the entire gate into the building, they have all of the other pieces in storage. On the other side of the market gate from Pergamon, they have a third of the entrance gate from Ancient Babylon, again only a third because of the restrictions of the building. The wall is completely blue, a beautiful sky blue covering the whole wall with paintings of lions and mystical animals to intimidate the approaching enemies. It was awe inspiring.

Going to Duderstadt and the Ottobock Company
On the final day we left Berlin and went to a town called Duderstadt. We traveled there to visit the prosthetic company, Ottobock. They create prosthetic arms, legs, feet, hands, and even wheel chairs and other movement aids. We got to tour the facility and have a lecture with an actual amputee. He had lost his leg from a motorcycle accident 9 years ago and he was now working at the company who created the prosthetic he wore. During his lecture, he opened up the floor to any questions we had about prostheses and how living with one is like. It was a very interesting experience being able to talk with and ask questions of someone who has been living with a prosthetic leg. It was amazing all of the developments that have been made. People with prosthetic legs can now walk down stairs backwards, and people with prosthetic arms can use their minds to control their mechanical hand. For the legs, there is a lot more to think about than just putting a peg on the end of the stump. You need to  create a knee, and be able to use it to lift yourself up and run, both of which would normally require muscles. But with simple electronics and even some without electronics, people can bend the knee and walk up and down stairs and even run on their prosthetic. With the "mind control" hand, they take the nerves that would have grown all the way down to your hand and reconnect them to electric transducers in your chest. By doing this, they can use the electric signals to tell the fingers to open or close, giving almost full function back to the hand.

We finished out our adventure by getting the front half of the bus to jam to the best of the oldies for the last hour and a half of our bus ride back to Bonn.