Reality Mind Games at Illuseum Berlin

I remember how after being to an illusionist show as a kid, how much I wanted to understand the tricks of the showman. When my mother finally decided to buy us a 'magic box', with tissues and some cubes and a pack of cards and even a magician stick, I was the happiest human in the world for at least one day. As I would have learn later in school, there is more science to 'magic' and the lack of knowledge is what usually makes the excitement bigger. However, there is excitement in pursuing scientific research too and the brain games could offer high rewarding for those dedicated to intellectual endeavourings. 

My recent visit to Illuseum Berlin was a kind reminder that curiosity is a gift for all ages and it keeps our brain alive when we need it the most.

I might be biased right now, but out of all the Berlin museums I've visited - and there is a big bunch of them -  this is one of the most Instagramable I ever seen. It invites you to share your selfies and visual finds and there are plenty of them at every corner. You can find them here on Instagram, and use the hashtags #illuseumberlin.

Besides the visually entincing aspects, the explanatory part is also worth mentioning. For every 'magical' experiment, there is detailed information shared in Spanish and Italian besides English and German.

Recently renovated and rebranded, Illuseum Berlin is targeting a wide range of public: from small children to retired people, which made its offer even more generous - from children parties to team buildings.

When I visited, on a mid-day Monday, it was busy enough to wait for a couple of minutes the moment when you can experience directly one or the other of the 'illusions' available.

Here, for instance, you can put your lovely head on a plate and share the outcome on Instagram. No one is harmed during the experiment and you can soberly meet the rest of your body soon after. 

You can get hipnotized, see how your companion(s) is growing or just disappearing, don't believe your eyes when you reveal the hidden secrets of the holograms or get really dizzy in the tilted room (it actually happened to me; just another occasion to think about how fragile our brains are).

When life is more or less an illusion, travelling through the fragments of the mirror is a normal escapist solution. 

Here, you can play cards with yourself in a multiple version. Just take care to not get annoyed too much! Keep thinking about that's only one of 'you' who will always win! Win-win!

As the world looks upside down, you can always keep playing the fool, although knowing that in the end, the change is one click away.

Illuseum Berlin -  discretely located opposite the famous TV Tower - makes you think about all the options and get into the mood of the everyday science of 'magic'. It's the healthiest brain game you can offer yourself and to your family too. 

Tip: Don't forget to take your precious cell phone with!

Disclaimer: Gifted visit but the opinions are, as usual, my own

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Biesdorf, Berlin's Hidden Gem of a Castle

Marzahn is not necessarily a place on the map of Berlin travels. Usually associated with high unemployment  and communist-style blocks of houses, it is one of those areas that you rather avoid during your short or long stay in Berlin. Among my expat friends, I can hardly find one single enlightened person that ever went to this part of the city, unless I dragged them with me to visit IGA 2017 Flower Exhibition.

However, there are a couple of things that are worth seeing in this part of the city too, among which the natural diversity with a multicultural touch of the Gardens of the World to which IGA Show is nowadays part thereof.

I am not someone to give up that easy a travel adventure, no matter where though, and although a visit to this part of Berlin might take over an hour from my Western side of the world, I know from my extensive travel experience in the most remote and off-the-map locations that there is always something worth seeing everywhere, even it might be only some samples of Soviet-style architecture. But there is more to Marzahn than the stereotypes we - not necessarily expats - label with. 

For instance, the pink beautiful castle of Biesdorf.

Before the intensive expansion of the city of Berlin that took place at an aggressive pace starting with the end of the 19th century, Biesdorf used to be a small village area. There are only a couple of traces of that anti-urban life left now, especially around the S-Bahn Biesdorf area, where you can still find small houses and partly cobblestone streets. Around the S-Bahn, there are also some small fast food points, just to get some supplies before a long ride through the 4-hectare park of the castle.

Directly from the train station, you only have to follow the Albert-Brodersen Allee to make your entry into a world which is completely out of time. The rows of trees bordering the long alley are your key to a different kind of urban kingdom.

Oh thou, searchers of solitude, you have a garden where you can find your peace with a book on your lap. This time, it was a disruption into the daily peace and happiness program, as a group of teenagers were looking in the garden for their peace while listening to loud Goth music rhymes. Maybe the next visitors will have more luck at this chapter.

Not bothered by the musical background, which was fading away more and more as I was moving forward on the alleys anyway, I took a big breath of fresh air and admired the natural surrounding, with the discrete traces of human creativity. The meditative pose of this massive stone statue is in complete sync with the mood you are turning on while walking and walking around the park.

Then suddenly, while overwhelmed way too much by the nature - after all, we are just visitors in the Kingdom of Nature and although we may proclaim our love of it, we are rarely able to fully understand what this beautified and mystified natural life is all about - the pink castle of Biesdorf, with its careful planned Italian architecture angles interrupted the revery. 

Biesdorf Castle is one of the 25 castles, manors and villas left to the city of Berlin after all the tragedies of the last century. Compared to other massive German castles, it rather look like a villa. It's history started at the end of the 19th centry, when it was first built for the Baron Hans Hermann von Rüxleben. Later, it was acquired by Werner von Siemens and stayed in the family until the beginning of the 20th century. In 1919, the villa was hosting various apartments. The owners changed little from the outdoor look, with most interventions being rather aimed at the gardens. 

The city of Berlin purchased the castle in 1927, and when it was re-opened to the public, in 1933, it was fast taken over by the National Socialist party.

Destroyed completely in 1945, it was rebuilt and opened during the communist Germany time in the late 1950s as a leisure center.

The ambiance around is typical for the early spring: many people - especially those accompanied of children of all ages - prefer to run around the gardens and enjoy the chill. Some are enjoying the view while sipping a coffee from the elegant large terrace. As usual, I prefer to have the best of both worlds and intensively exploring the gardens with a long stop indoors.

The octogonal tower is a landmark of this castle - besides the colour - and I am dreaming of being able to have a look over this part of the city from the top, but unfortunatelly such a chance is not being given to this demanding writer. The chance to admire every angle and corner of the building are lessons good enough in terms of architecture and for such an architecture lover as me, it is enough for now.

The indoors area brings to this journey to the unknown part of Berlin a human touch I was longing for. The free-of-charge exhibitions hosted here offer the chance to explore the works of local artists, some of them featuring visual life stories about the inhabitants of Marzahn. And it is much more to it than Cindy of Marzahn, as the photo exhibition where random people living in this area are sharing their interesting stories.

In other hall, a piano is taking a well-deserved break before a new concert will be offered to the visitors.

After changing hands so often in less than 100 years, after the reunification of Germany, Biesdorf Castle went through massive renovation works and in 2016 was finally reintroduced in the public circuit. Nowadays, it is managed by a foundation running various local projects and its exbitions are aimed to raise awareness about local problems and identity.

As usual, my successful trips are ending on a sweet-tasty note. After more than an hour journey to this part of Berlin, followed by a long historical and nature exploration of the castle itself, I reward myself with a delicious hot-chocolate and poppyseeds cake - Mohnkuchen - from the castle eatery. It might not be real castle food, but it has a local touch and a very friendly customer service so it is a happy ending of a trip that would love to repeat again in the near future. 

Against all odds, it seems that Marzahn has a lot to offer to the curious eyes and mind.

For more travel stories, follow my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@ilanatravels

A Walk Through Hansaviertel

Hansaviertel is considered Berlin's smallest district, caught between the River Spree and the Tiergarten. Dramatically damaged after the WWII bombings, it was slowly redesigned and reshaped at the end of the 1950s, beginning of the 60s, thanks to the active involvement of architects belonging to the Bauhaus movement, such as Alvar Aalto, Egor Ereimann, Walter Gropius or Oscar Niemeyer.

The name - Hansaviertel - was as its main streets are named after the big independent trade cities in Northern Europe, a network created from the beginning of the 12th century, such as Hamburg, Anklam, Greifswald or Lüneburg.

I started my walk from the U9 Hansaviertel train station, that was open only in 1961 - when the reconstruction of the area was almost finished. From outside, it is shaped as a rectangular long box, looking like painted in a haste during some creative hobby art workshop. 

Opposite, there is the Hansabibliothek, one of the first open access libraries in Berlin. It is also rectangularly shaped, and has an interior garden - closed as for now for reconstruction works - where during the summer the visitors can read outside. 

On the other side of the road, on Altonaerstr., GRIPS Theater displays another playful visual outlook. The choice of the graphic representation is not random, as it is a theatre mostly focused on a young and adolescent audience. Most of the plays are exploring the ways in which the public shall be directly involved in the creation of art. Sounds like a place I should come back soon for understanding better this aesthetic perspective.

For the next minutes am mostly surrounded by anonymous over 10-storey high blocks of apartments, until I arriving on Flensburgerstr., with its freshly painted classical building, hosting at their ground level small art galleries or children-friendly caffés.

But wandering through this small island of classical old flair doesn't last longer, as I am again kept company by Tetris-like structures, made of relatively affordable materials, aimed at hosting as many families as possible in comfortable yet space-limited apartments.

The splashes of colours create a little diversity in a mass of grey buildings. After the war, West Germany needed to offer affordable accommodation to its middle class, and such real estate projects were the solution. Similarly, in the extreme West side of the city, Gropiusstadt was a offering a much larger alternative, aimed especially at the working class and low-income families.

Happily, there are also couple of human-scale - 2-storey small constructions, that remind me of some part of Siemensstadt that I recently explored.

The brutalist - read ugly - style of the Akademie der Künste might be discouraging a visit, but the concerts and literary events held there - especially on the occasion of the Literature Festival - are high class. I've been here a couple of years ago at a concert by the very talented Sanda Weigl and was impressed by the high technical quality of the sound.

Works of art are spread around the building, adding a creative note to the sober, unfriendly outlook.

When feeling overwhelmed by so many constructions and grey colours, a walk to the small park nearby saves the day, especially when you are too lazy to walk as far as Tiergarten.

Walking the empty alleys give a peaceful, almost poetic feeling.

After a short but welcomed meditative break, I am back in the concrete jungle, trying - unsuccessfully to understand the meaning - technical mostly - of the right side concrete giant tetraeder. Cannot be an elevator or an emergency exit and if it was supposed to be an aesthetical adornment, it went completely wrong. Made a not to self to try to go inside the building one day.

The enormous green spaces surrounding the buildings are well planned, therefore when the concrete is too mentally overwhelming, you have the blue sky to spend your summer days. I can only imagine how everything looks beautified when the trees are getting back their green leaves.

With its welcoming monotony, Hansaviertel taught me some interesting lessons about urban living and Bauhaus architecture and although without the mesmerizing effect the view of beauty instantly produces, it shares the feeling of a silent wisdom and sometimes it might be just enough. 

As I am exploring more and more aspects of the Bauhaus movement, I can't wait to see what intellectual discoveries the next discovery will bring to me.

For more travel stories, follow my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@ilanatravels

Slow Sweet Life in Petershagen/Eggersdorf

This long beautiful summer that ended up suddenly into cold late autumn brought me in many beautiful, relatively unknown places in Germany. Curious to discover this country off the beaten path, I answered the challenge and spent interesting times exploring places, meeting people and trying to understand geographies and architecture. After Strausberg and Erkner, Petershagen Nord - to not be confused with the place with the same name from Nordrhein-Westfalen - was our next Sunday trip destination. Easy to reach from Berlin with the ABC ticket with the S5 from the Zoo S-Bahn station, it takes almost one hour to arrive.

When you travel to any place in Germany on Sunday and you find something open, all you can do is to have a stop, grab a cake and a coffee and enjoy the capitalistic priviledge. Near the train station, Café Noebe winked on us, offering not only a humongous strawberry bread coconut pudding, but also a slice of local life, with many people living here enjoying the sunny afternoon while taking a sip or a bit at their tables covered in plastic tableclothes.

Well fuelled, we try to stay in good shape while walking for around an hour alongside the Atlantsberger Chausée, passing rows and rows of one storey stone houses surrounded by gardens. Many are also the headquarters of small business, many in the field of house maintenance and reparations, but also hosting unusual still useful projects, such as the workshop for porcelain reparations. 

Everything around us is small size, with side streets and meows leading to narrow streets populated with small houses.

As we are fast getting tired, a new refreshment is necessary. Eiscafé Eisjunge, apparently one of the respectable institution, if only to think about the long rows in the front of the counter. The icecream sortiment is beating any serious offer in the city, with ingredients as unusual as cucumber or sweet potatoes. 

However, we have some family-oriented activities in mind: a visit at the small petting zoo - Kinderbauerhof - full with children either partying hard for the birthday of their friends or just hanging around in the grass with their parents. It is a really pleasant ambiance, and besides the chance of interacting with the animals, the children can also spend their energies in the playground. 

Although we didn't find a serious, tempting restaurant to inclue on our foodie list - spotted some Mediterranean and Greek options though - at least we've visited another small Sunday bar/coffee place where people living here usually meet: Angerscheune, open this day until 17.00 o'clock where also small local cultural events are hosted.  

Although anything special, spectacular, bubbling took place during our Sunday trip to Petershagen/Eggersdorf, leaving it was like saying too fast 'good bye' to a world where time stopped. The gracious horses taking a break outdoors were a reminder that we have to come back this autumn to admire the show of colors at the Bötzsee, and eventually use this time to be grateful to have so many options to spend a free meaningful disconnected from the busy city life.  

For more travel stories, follow my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@ilanatravels

Spring in Berlin - A Love Story

There is a children German song which says that 'April does what it wants', and it has to do with the sturmy strange sometimes hard to cope with weather that is usual for this part of the year in this part of the world. After March is done, you expect April to open up with warm temperatures, longer days and a lot of sun. Instead, this April filled the longer light hours, with minus two digit temperature and snow and wind and snow. Until two weeks, when a happy turn of weather events suddenly brought spring back into our poor sun-deprived lives.

As fast as the indecent rests of snow are melting, all the pain is forgotten and forgiven and pleasant activities like sunbathing or outdoor coffee drinking makes you feel like it is no tomorrow. And better keep this mood on, as September is only a couple of months away anyway...

My head up the cloud 9+ of happiness and the camera on my shoulder, I crossed Berlin to check what's the situation of the cherry blossom, revisiting old favorite - mostly secret places - and discovering new ones, fully enjoying the good healthy vibes that always accompany new beginnings. Early in the morning, in Prenzlauer Berg, small white flowers surrounded the Planetarium with an elegant hallow, inviting to meditation and slow life.

Hopefully, for a long time from now, this is the only snow I will see. Although, once in a while, I may miss the real snow time adventures, but for a couple of hours only. 

For the best cherry-blossom views, I have at least one secret place that I love to revisit often: Hufeisensiedlung (residential colony) built in the 1932 and since 2008 part of the UNESCO Heritage List, situated in the Britz side of the city. 

During the cherry blossom time of the year, the narrow streets between the Parchimer Allee and Fritz Reuter Allee, bordered by one-storey small colourful buildings are surrounded by neon pink puffy clouds. Life here goes always normal, without the usual invasion of selfie-takers which are common everywhere where the cherry trees are in full blossom. Only the local residents making their way to their houses, in a sea of pink fluffy small flowers. 

Those daring to spend more time on the alleys are rewarded with the addictive smell of some white magnolias, already loosing their petals covering the pavement with a hectic spread of white shells.

In the Western part of the city, there is another favorite - almost secret - cherry-blossom place of mine: the trees near Hohenzollerndamm U3 metro station. All the rest of the year, one may pass near this part of the long Hohenzollerndamm street completely indifferent, except for a couple of days when the cherries planted there are in full bloom. As the trees are in the middle of a small green park, you can even take your picnic basket and have some treats and a glass of Prosecco under the cherry trees. 

Spring bloom makes even the most anonymous and communist-looking streets into jewels of nature street art. Back in Prenzlauer Berg, the short-lived show of pink flowers on Sonnenbergerstraße (near Schönhauser Allee S-Bahn) is an entrance into a magic world. The branches covered by flowers are hardly fitting the narrow streets, aiming with a part of their top into the standard windows of the old-times buildings on the other side of the street. 

Like everything that has to do with nature, cherry blossoms are also a reminder that time is tight and the beauty of the day is as short-lived as a dream. But some dreams are good to be lived fully. As every single second of life! 

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What is Futurium?

A joint initiative of the German Federal Government, prestigious research institutions and business representatives, the spectacularly designed Futurium situated in the heart of the governmental area with its equally outstanding buildings is aimed to offer a platform about the future. Its official opening is expected at the beginning of 2019 but in the last months there were organised a couple of open house events allowing the great public to visit the precinct. 

Futurium is aimed to be a global inter-disciplinary platform where arts, research, public interest and business are coming together to discuss and understand the life developments of tomorrow. 

The building, bordered by the Reichstag and the Hauptbahnhof, both symbols of the present and the future of the new bold Germany, covers 3,200 sqm. of exhibition space spread over 3 massive floors. The main hall opens with a full view of the Reichstag and other institutional buildings part of the German government.

At the time of my visit at the open house this summer, there were many interesting art installations displayed, with a focus on creating synergies between creativity and innovative technical ideas. This installation for instance, made by the Moscow-born Berlin based artist Misha Shenbrot is called Denkraum (Meditation space) and its aimed at offering an environment for evaluation of the present needs and wishes, opportunities and needs.

For both big and small people, a meeting with a talking robot is the epitome of a journey to the future, and this little white guy is there to answer a couple of questions. Children of all ages will be an important target public of Futurium too, as potential future decisions makers and not only.

Another interesting art project displayed during my visit was Continuum, including among others harpsichordist Elina Albach, a meditation about the place of old music into the new musical trends.

It was interesting to notice the role of music and arts, in general, into the Futurium portfolio, as an universal way to communicate within different generations, ethnical and linguistic backgrounds.

The architecture of the space belongs to Richter&Musikowski, a young team of architects with an impressive portfolio of future-oriented modern architecture. The conception is build around the idea of openness and accessibility, with the transparent walls reflecting the sky and the outside environment. One of the most spectacular so far is the 'skywalk' on the top of the building, offering the best angle over both the Reichstag and the governmental area and the Charité hospital complex. 

But there is also something more than the interesting architecture: the entire building relies entirely on renewable energies. Walking on the roof reveals also a multitude of photovoltaic and energy collector installations

I never been an avid science-fiction reader and I always need some time to set up in the future-mood, but at Futurium I had the feeling that the future is all around, but it will not be created and imposed by others, eventually from the top of a colourful UFO plate, but it belongs to each and every one of us to shape it. Because human minds can create - and destroy - everything with a purpose, including an orchestra of robots playing all by themselves - and requesting a break once in a while too.