Prague.The chocolate box capital...

If that sounds a little dismissive it's not meant to.It is a beautiful city of which nobody can deny,however when you turn every corner and see yet another medieval tower you start to expect a stage Rapunzel,only without the issues,to be hanging her hair down for any drunk stag party to climb up.It's Disney but with an undercurrent...

Maybe I'm just being a bit churlish or maybe it's because I'm right in the middle of the tourist zone( oh the horror!) but I'm just not feeling it here.Don't get me wrong everyone has been fine with me.The hostel is like a top class hotel & all the bars I have visited have been as good as gold.So on reflection I think it's probably me struggling to adjust after nine days in Germany.I'm sure Prague will survive....

But man alive the tourists! Yes yes yes I know I'm one and that I also live in a town that's almost a cliche of tourist exploitation but it's more evident here.Possibly because it's centered around a small area where in London it's mostly spread out...mind you I baulked at being charged to visit the Jewish cemetery and copped out.A massive hypocritical act on my part as I'll pay to visit Dachau when I'm in Munich.But hey, nobody suggested I was perfect...I went to cross Charles Bridge yesterday but could'nt physically fight my way through them so went for a beer instead( and yes it is as good as everyone says) 

You know what I think, it's the language that's got me rattled,not Prague...I was getting on well with the German,we share a common tongue basically,But Czech is totally foreign to me,which is ironic as my dad was Czech.I really should have taken more notice of my heritage when younger...I'm feeling embarrassed by not having any of the lingo.

Good lord I'm having a right old moan are'nt i? Which I really shouldn't as I'm sitting in a beer garden sipping wonderful cold beer in 30c and I'm not due back in Blighty for another eleven days!

Ok things I'm loving about Prague!( only been here a day mind) Naturally the beer,yes it's as good and cheap as everyone says.The beer I'm having at the moment is 38k which in our terms is about,hold on let's work this out...Yep,nothing.

The tram system.All Central European cities should have this kind of tram system,Especially with some olde worlde trams thrown in,if only to satisfy my 1930's black & white fantasy of these places before it all went tits up...

The architecture.What can you say? Yes it's over the top Disneyesque but unlike the well known anti semite's magical kingdom at least this is real.Imagine if it had been blown to hell & back by either the Nazi's,British of Soviet's in WW11 or the Cold War? Travesty...

You know what Prague's ok,it's just me being a whiny old Brit....I'm gonna carry on drinking and tomorrow I'll plough through those damn tourists and get on that fucking bridge!

Nashledanou!

It's the little differences...

As I leave Germany for fours days to go to Prague I want to highlight the little differences I have noticed between our nations...I not saying they're better or worse just different.

Bars; They don't really have as many pubs as we do in the UK.Most of them are cafe bar type affairs.In the ones that are just bars without food then smoking is allowed,indeed it seems to be actively encouraged as everyone seems to smoke!

The waitress service takes a bit getting used to for us Brits I think as we're used waiting at the bar to be served.I say waitress Service because from what I have seen in the many bars I have been to the women do all the work while the men talk shit at the bar with their mates...and boy barmaids in Germany work bloody hard!

Having a bar tab is handy too,at least you don't go home with £17.36 of change in your pocket after a night out.but keep an eye on it as it's easy to get out of hand...Stimmt so is also a nice thing for the bar staff too.It's basically a keep the change scenario but you get to stipulate how much change.If your bill was €6.40 and you wanted to round up to seven you say " Stimmt so sieben" and hope  the ravishingly beautiful barmaid will see you're a man made of the right stuff and take you home for a night of unbridled passion...sorry,drifted off for a bit there,where was I? Oh yea stimmt so is good as all the staff share it out at the end the day or week.

Another thing I noticed in all the bars is no glass washing machines.They have a washing sink,a rinsing sink and a drying area.I can see the advantages as glasses are readily available when the bar is full and staff & punters alike don't wait for the bloody two minute cycle to finish before putting your cold beer into a glass that's about as hot as the sun...the downside of course is it's more work for the staff and gives the ravishingly beautiful barmaid less time to talk to her customers..." sigh"

Cyclists...yea let's talk about those horrible gobshites who take liberties with their holier than thou sanctimony...as I'm one myself I find it interesting how they're treated abroad.Well in Germany they're gods & goddesses I can tell you.Riding on the pavement at will and even given their own lane on this pavement( I was furiously " belled" by one in Hamburg whilst walking on it) they even get their own little toy town traffic lights!

The spoilt brats...

Finally the traffic lights...yes there's the jaunty little Ampel man who brighten up everyone's life.But jaywalking is taken seriously in this land and I can see why.Nobody jaywalks. I have seen men who look like they've just cooked their mothers entrails in the microwave wait paitiently for the little green Ampel man to do his stuff even though no traffic was in sight...I even caught the bug the otherday in Wannsee.I found myself  bridling with righteous indignation as a couple strolled across the road despite red Ampel's obvious displeasure.Bloody foreigners...

Anyway I'm in Prague for a few days before going back to Germany.No pesky cyclists here.Hills & cobbles not a good combo for my breatheren...

Tschuss!

Fuck me it's Immanuel Kant!

How can you not love Berlin? When the barmaid mixes cocktails like a dervish on speed then starts discussing German philosophy you know you're in a weird and wonderful town.Say Kant in an east London pub and you're likely to get a punch in the smacker..,

So yes I have fully ingratiated myself into my local bar in Charlottenburg.I have my seat at the bar and have even been invited to a barmaids leaving party tonight...

I can creep my way in almost anywhere...

All the tourists bits were done on a previous trip,I took a cursory walk round the Reichstag & Brandenburg Tor but once again I wanted to see more of the city than tourist hotspots...

Tempelhof is an old disused airport just on the edge of the city centre.Mainly used by the US military during the Cold War it was abandoned soon after David Hasselhoff single handily secured world peace and had his last hit single...There's nothing there now except the runways open to the public.No attempt has been made to jolly it up.No doubt in years to come places like Maccy D's & Starbucks will try to gain a foothold and turn it into every other abandoned US airbase in the world but hopefully not...leave it to the cyclists,joggers and picnickers...

Then I went to Wannsee.For those not Familer with Wannsee it is here that the holocaust was given clearance by all the heads of the different factions of the SS to go from summery executions to an industrial scale operation.There is a superb film called " Conspiracy " starring Kenneth Brannah ,amongst others.All of the dialogue of the meeting is taken from minutes taken by secrectaries at the time.I urge you to watch this.It is the scariest horror movie you will ever see...Oh and if any dickhead holocaust denier pops up tell them to watch it too...

Kreuzberg is a part of town you should visit.I suppose it's a bit like Hackney but a lot more so.Kreuzberg was the part of town overlooked by the Wall by the east Berlin border guards and so was allowed to be a place of debauchery in a " Let's see what you could have won" kind of way...the story has it that Bowie came here to clean up his ways,invited Iggy Pop to live with him for two years and.,,.well you can imagine what happened! ( he did also make the best music of his career too so draw your own conclusions)

If you like your rock and dirty then visit this place.

The no nonsense landlady of Wild at Heart...

At the moment I'm in a bar in Köpenick ( pronounced Coopernick,as I was told last night by locals trying to hide their smirks at my attempts to sprechen Deutsch) I'm off to Union Berlin versus Arminia Bielefeld in a few hours for some good old German Fußball fun...up the Irons!

 Tomorrow it's off to Prague.I'll be sad to leave Berlin but sure I'll be back again.Meanwhile I have a game & a leaving do. to go to...

Tschüss!

Tschüss Hamburg!

As a port Hamburg is a tough place.Not brawling in the streets tough ,apart from when Brit stag & hen parties get pissed on the Reeperbahn,as I was told last night by the stunning barmaid in a bar on that street.No it's tough in a self relient,confident,we yield to no one sort of way.

I have only been here four days and for the first two I did the touristy things: The fish market is only open on Sunday between 5-30 & 9-30. I only got there at the last knockings.Basically it's lots of shouty blokes flogging stuff( not just fish) and playing up to the crowd of tourist,who were mostly German.

The Rathaus is ok I suppose but it's only a town hall at the end of the day.When I was there a bike ride was going on so it was hard to really appreciate the place.But hey ho...

The two things Hamburg is most famous for of course are the Reeperbahn & the dockside.The Reeperbahn for those that don't know is the strip in St Pauli dedicated to sex basically( oh and getting smashed too) I was only there on a Tuesday afternoon so Obviously didn't get the full effect.It was as tacky as expected but not much else.The Bars off the main drag were much better and cheaper.The first bar I went to charged 5€ for a beer.Thought I'd been transported back to London! The Reeperbahn sort of put me in mind of what Soho must have been like in it's hayday before it went clean and corporate...

So Reeperbahn is ok for the novelty.The Hamburg people don't appear to be phased of disgruntled about it,esp as it brings in mucho tourist money.

The big thing with Hamburg though is the dockside area.For one thing it's bloody massive! If you like your buildings big & warehousesy then this is the place for you...

They have done a magnificent job on it.London should have taken note.It is of course a working port So many of the warehouses are still used for import & export.While there visit Minatur Wunderland.It's the biggest model railway in the world.You don't have to be into this kind of thing to be impressed...It's 13€ and well worth it.But get there early as it gets rammed.

The next few days I toured around the suburbs getting a feel of the place.I liked Altona a lot.It had a Hackney/Highgate vibe about it,and Schlump seemed ok too.( I only went there because of the name.Who wouldn't want to go to a place called Schlump?)

Mind you...

Fuck me I'm in Rotherham!

Overall I like Hamburg even though it took me a while to get into it.In four days the most socially unacceptable behaviour I have seen is two people jaywalking( oh and that waiting at the red lights thing is bloody hard to get used to!)

I have not met with anything other than kindness & civility,even though my grasp of the language is limited at best,everyone I have spoken to has been great.Christ we're so lucky having English as our mother tongue...

Been very lucky with the Hostel too.Run by two south East Asian women who have been superb.It also helps that it's next door to a Brot & Brötchen shop where I got breakfast daily.Oh and this helps too..,

Having an U-Bahn stop literally on your doorstep is bloody superb...

Of course I will miss my local too...

But as I'm a little whore there will be other locals...

...next stop Berlin.