Today's Long Drive Around and Hanging With Germans

I'm starting to feel some travel fatigue. Can one sightsee for too many days? I'm guessing this is a common thing among intrepid adventurers like myself. Especially for those traveling with young kids with no apparent end to their energy.

Anyway, today I wanted to check out the "biggest department store in Europe!" or the KaDeWe, for short. I got it into my head that driving would be more fun, as I may have several bags when leaving and it's a much more comfortable ride than the train. That, and Dave stole the last 5 euros from my wallet this morning.

The drive over was fine but the destination wasn't. The department store is in the middle of all this commercial hubbub, which included a lot of pedestrians. There was also a massive amount of construction -- this being Berlin, I shouldn't have been surprised. And when the parking lot (which the website promised was conveniently located) didn't make itself known, and Alice was slowly falling asleep in the back, I decided that the train was a much saner approach. So I reset the navigation system to send us home. (Is walking around a department store really worth all the trouble of navigating hundreds of pedestrians and surly construction workers?)

Besides, here I was about to benefit from motorized narcolepsy -- a charming trait passed down to the kids from their dad -- so who was I to fight it?

It was a nice scenic drive home. But, deciding that wasn't enough, I pointed the Benz toward an outlying neighborhood called Prenzlauer Berg -- roughly the "Brooklyn of Berlin," meaning the place with all the hip little shops and cafes. I tooled around while the kids snoozed (finally, a naptime I didn't have to fight for!) and decided it was worth a return visit.

Sometimes, it's nice to be a tourist from the comfort of inside a car. No?

In the afternoon, we returned to our favorite sandy park for well-earned playtime. The newsworthy part of our playground trip is I got into an conversation with three girls from the nearby school. They must have been 10-years-old. They spoke the barest amount of English and one girl spoke Spanish. So between the three languages we managed to share some information. One girl called Alice and Leah "So Sweet!" and could say "Ohmigod, Ohmigod!" (Hilarious.) The other girl had a cousin who works at Dave's company. And the third girl has a cousin who plays soccer professionally. Finally, some German interaction! I was starting to feel a bit isolated.

They shouted to some of their classmates that we were American. And as the last boy was running back to school he shouted at me, "What kind of ice cream is your favorite?" -- maybe the only sentence in English he knew. It made me laugh.