SILVESTER (NEW YEAR’S EVE) IN BERLIN
We spent the day napping and watching TV to save our energy for the night’s festivities. We managed to see “Dinner for One” in color for the first time. For those who do not know, “Dinner for One” is a one-act play that was recorded, in English, for German television in 1963. The story is of a 90-year old woman who has her four closest friends over for a multicourse dinner served by her butler, James. The problem is that her friends have been dead for 25 years. James must play the part of each of the friends, and drink a toast from each of them for each of the three courses that are served. The drunker he gets, the funnier the physical comedy and lines get. The classic line is when he asks, “same procedure as last year, Miss Sophie?” “The same procedure as every year, James.” Ironically, nobody in England knows this play. But it’s as traditional in Germany as the ball dropping in Times Square in New York.
Anyway, we went to dinner around 7:30 p.m. at the Hotel Alt Berlin, a newly restored hotel near Potsdamer Platz. It was a small restaurant decorated with old photos and appliances (a plus for Peter who collects them). The servers were dressed in flapper dresses or tweed pants, suspenders, and caps in the style of the 1920s. The dinner was a buffet of fine deli meats, cheeses, canapés, soup, mayonnaise-based salads, two main entrees with sides, and three desserts. It also came with a complimentary rum punsch as well an aperitif. It was overpriced at 48 Euros each, but it was probably the best deal we could get for a dinner at a nice restaurant in Berlin on New Year’s Eve. And anyway, it was quiet and clean and we could relax and stay as long as we wanted there.
Around 10:30, we left the restaurant and walked up Potsdamer Strasse, past the modern glass towers that were the new homes to Deutsche Bahn (German Rail) and Sony and other fine businesses, towards the Brandenburg Gate to see the fireworks at midnight. Reportedly there were 1,000,000 between the gate and the Victory Column (Siegessaeule) for the concert and fireworks. Frankly, we never got close enough to count. We simply walked up Ebertstrasse until we ran into a crowd. Occasionally we could catch a glimpse of the Brandenburg Gate, but as it got closer to midnight, the crowd got thicker until we could barely breathe let alone see anything. Peter was shocked that people were setting off their own fireworks near the crowd up to an hour before midnight.
The official display was not as impressive as I thought it would be, but what there was we were in a great position to see through the barren winter tree in front of us. And maybe just being there was impressive enough. We enjoyed some champagne that Peter had brought in his backpack. The crowd dispersed remarkably quickly, the walk back to the U-Bahn was relatively easy, and the U-Bahn was not as crowded as I’d expected based on experiences in similar crowds in D.C. after fireworks and Presidential inaugurals.
Tags: Berlin, Germany, New Year's Eve, Travel
admin
Leave a Reply