More touring!

The group split up today, Hannah, Shelia, Jessica, Chris, Victoria, and Morgan (The SIFE USA Representative) went to the Bauhaus early in the day. It was beautiful. We looked at two exhibits, one was on the Bauhaus its self and the other was on a famous French architect. The Bauhaus is a modern art museum, but it used to be a school and some of the most famous modern artists in the 1920s. None of us really knew what the Bauhaus was until we went to Berlin, much less the impact that it had on modern art, architecture, clothing, and furniture. Almost everything that we consider "modern" today was originally designed by Bauhaus artists in during the 1920s. It was incredible! When we left there were lines literally wrapped around the building with people waiting for a chance to see the largest Bauhaus exhibit in history. Good thing we went early!

We walked to a brautwerst stand and got currywerst, a specialty in Berlin. The stand we went to had a line around the corner thank goodness we had Chris or else we would have never gotten our food.

After lunch we tried to get into the Unification Celebration but the celebration was so crowded that the police were forcing people to leave to make room for the event. The other group: Katherine, Kameron, John, and Jaclyn were able to get into the festival earlier in the day and said it was incredible! The group was able to get stamps from all of the countries represented during the Unification Celebration-including the United States and France. As Katherine said the day was incredible but "unbelievably crowded," yet worth it.

For those of us who were unable to get into the celebration we did get to experience a bit of the Unification Celebration. We followed a German marching band dressed in red, white, and blue as the played the American National Anthem and other traditionally American songs. Then we walked to the Holocaust memorial, what a beautiful yet somber place. There we met a group from SIFE Puerto Rico. It was incredible to learn that SIFE Puerto Rico celebrates their champion by sending representative from all of the other teams in the territory to support the champion. This was one of the support teams, they were excited to meet us and we spoke for a while.

As the group rushed back to the hotel for our practice presentation we were able to see another aspect of the Unification Celebration. A theatre group from France brings giant puppets-one from East Berlin and the other from West Berlin- which unite on Unification day at the Brandenburg Gate to celebrate France's roll in uniting Berlin after the WWII. The entire team was able to see and talk about this unique event. The streets were teeming with people from countries across Europe all celebrating this momentous occasion. How lucky were we to be here?!

After a practice presentation we went to an alumni dinner with two alums ate venersnitzel and pasta with truffles We also had our first taste of German chocolate in Germany...fantastic! After dinner we met a German girl who just returned from two months in Jacksonville. For those of you who know about our team superstitions with signs we agreed that this was the second sign for the World Cup. (At Nationals we thought we had "signs" indicating that we would win: a fortune cookie, hat, and others that the team couldn't quite agree upon.)

We will spend today practicing and will also move to the competition hotel. Tonight is the culture fair, opening ceremony, and introduction of the teams. We are all so excited to start the World Cup and meet teams from around the world. That's all for now, we will update this evening after the events.

Thank you for following our blog and supporting us.

We miss and love you,
Jessica, Hannah ,and the Flagler SIFE Team