Mitte

But yeah, for me, I came to Berlin in 2017, and I really think the appearance of the city is something that really sticks out for me as a big change, but it obviously reflects just the changing city in general.

I always think about Friedrichshain, the Eastside Mall, you know, all that development there and along the River Spree and some places in Mitte as well.

I think that it just looks more like there's like fancy coffee shops and museums and nice housing blocks, whereas it was always kind of a bit run down.

Even when I came in 2017, it was still like that.

But we all have our own stories, depending on when we get here.

I used to go to Taculus when it was still a squat, full of bars and kind of...

Yeah, the artist area, Mitte.

Well, it was a building, just an enormous building that was falling to pieces and full of bars and atelier and little artist studios and all sorts of...

So they all knew me.

And moving over to whatever, Prenzlauer Berg, Mitte, another district, would have been a totally new start with the authorities.

Yeah, it's extremely important to get to know your neighborhood cop and the city council and all that.

Like here in New York, they have a thing called community boards.

The first time I remember meeting him was at the 8mm bar.

It's a bar in Berlin in Mitte.

And he was doing the door.

I think he was like really young.

It's funny we, we-

Um, but then what would really suck was last week I would drive through the tunnel in the morning and on the way back the tunnel was closed so it would take so long to get home 'Cause all the traffic would just filter through different parts of Mitte, and it was just like gridlock-

Like-

... throughout the city center

An entire new draft, just like I wanted.

I was only planning on being gone for a month, and then I had someone reach out to me and request a home exchange, and it was a couple that lived in Berlin, in Mitte.

And I was just like, "I've never been to Berlin.

I don't speak German.

We were just stopping in like, we had three nights there, I think it was.

So we just stopped in like a little cheap hotel type place in, in Mitte.

And, uh, yeah.

And of course the Hauptbahnhof weren't there when I was a kid.

And if you suddenly charge, no, if you suddenly pay 2,000 euro for a flat that used to be 300, I mean, come on, right? And...

damn i mean who am i to ask you not to but maybe just keep in mind that maybe you come from a country let's say i i'm from berlin i've lived through it in berlin in london in cape town and now here mallorca and it's so annoying it's so freaking annoying people come with their us money or what and suddenly it's like oh wow you only pay a thousand euro room and I'm like only a thousand euro per room are you crazy that was in London then I went back to Berlin where like rents were very very cheap like less than 300 I paid for my apartment in Mitte and it's still to this date the biggest apartment I ever had and the cheapest isn't that crazy And people come and are like, oh my gosh, that's so cheap.

I'm going to pay $1,500 for it.

Well, I'm like, why? Why would you do that? Now everybody is going to pay more and you are never going to pay less.

Like running through Moabit, nice.

Mitte, nice.

Then you're over there in Friedrichshain and stuff.

I did my kid's mini marathon on Saturday.

I lived next to a major street in college, and my, everything in my house was covered with, like, black slime.

Like diesel-

I, I used to live in, in Torstraße in Mitte, and I, I hated summer 'cause I had to open the window.

Yeah.

Begin by choosing one base for your whole stay.

Mitte is the simplest option for a first visit, close to the main historical route.

Kreuzberg or Friedrichshain work better for a stay focused on neighborhood life.

From Berlin Brandenburg Airport, the Airport Express or a regional train reaches Hauptbahnhof, the central station, in about twenty-three minutes.

But Bernauer Straße remains the place to understand how division actually worked.

Reserve the final day for going deeper rather than adding another hurried route.

If art is your priority, head southwest from Mitte to Kulturforum near Potsdamer Platz.

Its major collections, including the Gemäldegalerie painting gallery, also explain how West Berlin created cultural institutions during division.

And if you suddenly charge, no, if you suddenly pay 2,000 euro for a flat that used to be 300, I mean, come on, right? And...

damn i mean who am i to ask you not to but maybe just keep in mind that maybe you come from a country let's say i i'm from berlin i've lived through it in berlin in london in cape town and now here mallorca and it's so annoying it's so freaking annoying people come with their us money or what and suddenly it's like oh wow you only pay a thousand euro room and I'm like only a thousand euro per room are you crazy that was in London then I went back to Berlin where like rents were very very cheap like less than 300 I paid for my apartment in Mitte and it's still to this date the biggest apartment I ever had and the cheapest isn't that crazy And people come and are like, oh my gosh, that's so cheap.

I'm going to pay $1,500 for it.

Well, I'm like, why? Why would you do that? Now everybody is going to pay more and you are never going to pay less.