Back to Venice

The holidays were very successful - Ali and I had a great time travelling about Germany and the Czech Republic, learning heaps about Berlin and recent history as well as just having a fun time in museums, pubs and various public spaces. Berlin highlights included the TV tower, 6 hours in the jewish museum, tacheles artspace, the day of terror (visiting consecutively the eastside gallery, topography of terror and the memorial to murdered jews) and an awesome ramen bar just off Auguststrasse. Prague didn't offer an interesting tv tower but new years celebrations were fun and the snow was pretty. I really enjoyed visiting the jewish quarter, josefov, as well as the kafka museum and some really really well-stocked english bookshops. Cafes were plentiful and cheap, as was the beer! We spent a wonderful christmas in the company of Sonja and Stefan, their parents and families out in Gifhorn/Halberstat and were treated very well, apart from the virus - Final note is the german virus we picked up between christmas and new years, which knocked us out for two days but we were well enough to travel on the third...now it's back to work with no heating! and snow still hiding in little pockets here and there. So it's cold cold but nice, and we're looking forward to a new living situation as of next week! Ciao Paul.