Colin and Lorraine Visit (part 2)

Dear Gran,

Two Sundays ago we celebrated Mother’s Day (flowers from the market and cake by Julie) , and we then walked to the Soviet War Memorial in Treptower Park where the 60 years after the end of the war was being commemorated at the graves of 5000 Soviet soldiers.

This huge statue is supposed to represent a Soviet soldier with a rescued a child under one arm, a really big sword in the other and a smashed swastika under his foot. Apparently the word subtlety didn’t translate very well into soviet-era Russian.

Last Saturday, we cycled along the charming Wannsee Lake and, as you might remember from the December 12 Blog, the island in the background is Pfauen Insel (pronounced Pfoofie Island by Lorraine, who had otherwise been doing a good job all week with her pronunciation).
As you can see, these rented bikes are built for cruising in comfort and style (particularly if you include novelty bike horns under the heading of style) because our previous tour customers had complained about the hard seats and lack of brakes on their borrowed bikes.

On Sunday we wandered along the green streets of Prenzlauerberg, regularly ducking into cafes to avoid the frequent torrential downpours of Berlin’s spring weather. Colin and Lorraine have returned safely back home now, so we have once again put up the Zimmer Frei* sign outside the building.

much love,

Brendan

*actually Wohnzimmerboden Frei would be more accurate.