Berlin
Berlin blogs

Berlin's Hotel Concorde has long tried to be hip with its accommodation packages, and each deal they come out with does seem to get better and better. Learning French in Berlin was a bit of a stretch; their Fall of the Wall deal was pretty good; but now comes the most sensible idea they've had so far: a Shop in the City package.
Being all very cosmopolitan and cool, yet not outrageously expensive, Berlin is an ideal place to go on a shopping splurge. The Hotel Concorde is also in the right part of Berlin for this, right on the Kurfürstendamm shopping street, and even through winter you'll be able to easily get around to
Here at Jaunted, we love us some flash mobs and all of the fun and city exploration that come with them. But this upcoming Monday, November 9 in Berlin, a flash mob will take on a somber note as up to 33,000 people gather to recreate the Berlin Wall on the 20th anniversary of the night it came down.
The "Mauer Mob"know that "mauer" means "wall" in German will happen at approximately 8:15pm on Monday, lasting for about 15 minutes so that visitors, Berliners, and even those who were there for the original tearing down of the wall can commemorate the date and capture photos of the scene. Already almost 6,000 people have registered to participate on the event's official site, and if you're in the vicinity, you should not miss this opportunity.
For tips on what to see and what to skip while you're not becoming part of a human Berlin wall in the city, be sure to check out our Berlin Field Trip series.
Related Stories:
· Temporarily Recreating The Berlin Wall [Kottke]
· Mauer Mob [Official Site]
· Walk The Path Of The Berlin Wall And Crash Into A Starbucks [Jaunted]
· Berlin coverage [Jaunted]
[Photo: Jaunted]
East Germany must have been a really nasty place to live, because so many people risked their lives to escape to the west. A creepy tour in Berlin provides a stark reminder of the lengths people will go for freedom, with walks through some of the escape tunnels under the Berlin Wall. An interesting AP story points out that about 300 people managed to escape through various tunnels in the years after the wall was built in 1961, with many continuing to work from the west to free family members.

The W Barcelona may be stealing all the headlines but its not the only new kid on the European hotel block this autumn. The Aspria Hotel in Berlin looks pretty nice and its rather more affordable, too.
Opening next month on 6 November in the posh Charlottenburg district (west of the Tiergarten), it doesnt have the most auspicious of pedigrees Aspria is a chain of health clubs in Europe - but theyre now offering accommodation at their digs in Hannover and Berlin. Original, but interesting it means that the spa and fitness area are going to be souped up no end. In fact, the Berlin spa is going to be 14,000 m sq
Back in 1997, an unemployed former hotel manager named Bertram Rohloff had a brilliant idea. Unable to obtain the necessary permits to open an outdoor sandwich stand, he found a way to circumvent the entire bureaucracy and wound up making portable food vending history. He invented a wearable propane sausage grill that requires no special permit, as neither the grill nor the food ever touches the ground. Thus, Grillwalker was born, a sausage oven with legs that can bring hot sausages to the hungry masses at some of Berlin's most heavily-trafficked urban spaces. As The New York Times points out, Rohloff's 15 sausage walkers are now fixtures at such sites as the Alexanderplatz, bustling Friedrichstrasse train station, and even outside popular nightclubs.
Fresh from our Most Shocking McDonald's Locations and Must-See Apple Stores Of The World series, we're taking requests for Subways as we begin our Most Shocking Starbucks Locations. Know of a 'Bucks randomly tucked into a curious corner of the world? This is going to be a running series, so email us your suggestions!
So let's say that you're enjoying a lovely evening out for a stroll in Berlin, Germany and you're perhaps following a brick path in the street that marks the former location of the Berlin Wall. You're walking along, eyes down at the ground as you ponder the history around Potsdamer Platz especially, when you run right into the side of a Starbucks.
For his new movie Inglourious Basterds, Quentin Taratino wanted to make a a spaghetti western that would use World War II iconography and star the world's biggest movie star. And this is how one of the biggest movie debuts of the summer was born.
The movie has all of Tarantino's usual trademarks: quick dialogue, cringe-inducing violence and creative casting, but it was filmed on location somewhere new for the Tarantino crew: one of Jaunted's favorite cities, Berlin. To slake your thirst to live it up just like Brad Pitt no doubt did while he was filming, here's our guide to partying like a rock star, or at least partying like a director who thinks he's a rock star, in Berlin:
It's hot and greasy and goopy and fatty; it's a full, heaping plate of Berlin's favorite fast food Currywurst. Only a few months ago, we found ourselves on an informal tour of the Berlin's best Currywurst stands, from Konnopke's underneath an U-bahn station to the KaDeWe's department store kiosk. Believe us when we say that currywurstsausage drowned with curry ketchup and curry powder and presented with a side of either french fries or potato saladis the shizznit.
So apparently we headed to Germany a tad too early, as Berlin has just opened the first museum devoted completely to the history and varieties of currywurst. The Deutsches Currywurst Museum, cozying up next to the tourist trap that is Checkpoint Charlie, explores the eating habits of Berliners (who consume around 70 million currywursts every year!) and doles out samples of the tasty favorite.

So it's been twenty years since the Berlin wall came down, and that's as good a reason as any to visit one of our all-time favorite cities, Berlin. To celebrate the anniversary of the Fall of the Wall, the Hotel Concorde Berlin has got an "Ich bin ein Berliner" package going through to December 28.
If you decide to be a Berliner for a couple of days, you can get two nights' accommodation, buffet breakfast, one dinner, plus the authentic Berlin part: a Palm guide, Berlin Wall map and a private guided tour in a Trabbi those old east German cars which somehow haven't fallen apart yet.
The deal starts at around $370 per person based
