The day began quite slowly (due to the beer consumption the night before) with a sleep in and a long discussion about what we should do for the day. After settling on the Stasi Prison at Hohenshoenhausen, somewhere we both thought sounded fascinating, we realised it would take three changes on public transport AND that we had no breakfast in the flat. By now it was lunch time and we set off on our trusty bikes but only reached Schleisishes Tor where we devoured a hamburger from Burgermeister under the bridge... in an old toilet block.
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| Me ordering from the toilet block... |
After a 45 minute bike ride we reached the old Stasi prison and found the only english tour of the day was scheduled for five minutes later, our timing for things is rarely that good. The tour, conducted by a thickly accented German guy took us through both the old 'submarine' underground prison building and the more modern three floored prison that had around 120 cells and 120 interrogation rooms. It is interesting to note that some of the german tours are conducted by ex-inmates, I guess there are not many places you can get such a first hand view of things. The prison was used by the Stasi from after WWII up until 1989 to house political prisoners. Often they were high profile celebrities or political figures (several former senior DDR politicians/Stasi) and were held for several years and were subjected to psychological torture and interrogation. Shocking to think it happened so recently but a fascinating inside look into one of several Stasi operations.
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| The Stasi Prison |
After cycling back to Kreuzberg it was happy hour and we sat in the fading sunlight at Salon Schmuck on Skalitzer Str. before organising some pre-dinner drinks at our place for some friends. Lena and Philip, two german friends from Australia who are now back in Germany and Isabelle, who was in Berlin to celebrate her birthday. The night was spent celebrating Isabelle's birthday at the sultry but smoky Miss Tipsy Bar in
Falckensteinstraße, Kreuzberg.
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