Thursday, September 26
This hostel does have a little bit of an awkward sleeping situation.
I had reserved a spot in an eight-bed dorm. When i checked in, the clerk told me that there were four people already in the room, and that was it. So i could choose any of the four remaining open beds.
I entered the room, met the Kiwi couple, and got a good look at the space. One of them pointed out what i was already noticing.
"So we've got these two, and those two are also taken," she said. "Do you happen to know if it's a full room tonight?"
"The clerk told me it's just the five of us," i answered.
"Okay, that's wonderful, because these other four beds seem a little...awkward."
Indeed they did. The two unclaimed bunk beds in the room are pushed right up next to each other. So, if the room is full, you will be sleeping right next to somebody.
"Well, it's just me, so i guess all of this is my kingdom," i said, gesturing at the entire four-bed situation.
"Wonderful," they laughed.
I claimed the bottom bunk closest to the window, because there's a wide shelf under it, and i could set my computer stuff up there, and have a little workspace, for a change.
A while later, after the Kiwis had returned from dinner, two more people came into the room, a man and a woman. They'd arrived together, so i made the assumption they were a couple, and they would take the top bunks, next to each other. But, an ass out of you and mumptions, and all that.
The man took the bed right next to me. The woman went for the bed above him.
Which, now that i'm thinking about it, it's odd that the Kiwis didn't take the beds next to each other in the first place, isn't it?
I don't know. If that had been Amanda and i, we absolutely would've taken advantage of the close proximity of the beds. Sometimes, when we stayed in hostels on other trips, Amanda would come over to my bed in the middle of the night anyway, no matter how small it was, just because she didn't want to sleep alone. I know not everybody's relationships are the same. Many couples sleep separately for their own comfort. I'm just saying, given the choice between sleeping next to your partner or sleeping next to a random man you just met...
Things felt really awkward when he was trying to go to sleep and i was still finishing up my log from yesterday. So if the end of that one felt rushed, this is why.
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I tend to roll over several times during the night. It felt awkward every time i ended up facing this guy. And yeah, i think it would have been just as awkward if the woman had chosen that bed. Maybe more so. I don't want to snore in a stranger's face. I never exchanged a single word with either of them.
They were both gone by the time i woke up around 8:30. They left nothing in the room, so i don't think they're staying.
This hostel includes all-you-can-eat breakfast, something i haven't seen in weeks. I made sure to take advantage of that, while using my phone to figure out what to do with the day.
First of all, i wanted to see the baby eater statue. When we had our brief stop in Bern in 2013, it was just a few hours, we had two objectives: see bears, and see the baby eater statue. We did see bears. We never found the baby eater.
But again, times have changed. In 2013, i knew about the baby eater from reading a physical book, which only had a tiny blurb about it, and which i'd accidentally left at home. Now, we have the internet, i have an Atlas Obscura account, and you're damn right it's on there, including GPS coordinates, and today i have a smartphone with international data.
So i'm gonna find that baby eater.
I also want to see the bears and walk along the Aare again. I know i said i wasn't going to repeat things Amanda and i did, but...well, the instant i was presented with the opportunity, i realized i was gonna.
Couple other cool things on the list that i can do.
Went back up to the room to get changed. Took the elevator, i don't think i have five flights of stairs in me at the moment. This building has one of those very old-school elevators with a hinged door that you physically pull open. As you go up, you can reach out and touch the wall in front of you, feeling it disappear beneath your fingertips as you ascend.
We used one of these elevators in 2013, in Athens. In my log, i had written, "i was shocked to suddenly be face to face with a thing that i have only seen once before in my life, and it was in a black and white film from the 1950s: an elevator with a regular door. As in, it's got a handle, and it swings out, as if entering a room."
I realized later that the "old film" i was thinking of was Pulp Fiction.
I took a shower. When i returned to the room, the Kiwis had left, leaving me with the dorm to myself. I pulled the curtains open to see the breathtaking view of the tree-dotted hillside city before me, accented beautifully by low-hanging clouds and
rain.
And rain.
It was a downpour.
...
......
.........
.
!!
Ugh.
I got caught in the rain several days in a row in Amsterdam, and got a cold to show for it. My voice is still a little hoarse. I do not want to go out and get completely soaked just to see a baby-eater.
I checked the weather. It's gonna rain until 9pm.
Tomorrow looks like it should be a beautiful, sunny day, though.
Okay. What can i do in Bern that's indoors?
Data management. I think i'll do some of that. I've been putting it off for over a week again, i need to get this footage safely off of the SD cards. Also, i can rest a bit. Yesterday was the most stressful day of the trip so far, due to the lack of sleep, the mistakes i made because i couldn't think straight, and the poor planning that led me to that situation. I haven't taken the time to rest in a while.
And i'll get a head start writing the blog, while i look out the window at the wet vista before me.
So that's where i'm at right now. It's a bit past noon, i've written this much, i've drank half my water goal already, someone did indeed come in to make the beds next to and above me, i'm feeling kind of relaxed.
I do also get free metro transport with my hostel reservation, amazingly. I think once this SD card finishes dumping, i might head out to the Albert Einstein House and/or the Paul Klee Center. If i can get those two museums done before they both close at 5pm, i'll be happy to call it a short day, and spend my evening getting the rest of my travel plans in order. After Milan, i'm thinking to stop in Andorra, and then it's Barcelona/Sitges time until i fly out.
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The Albert Einstein House was pretty disappointing, to be honest.
The whole area around it is a busy shopping district now, so it seems out of place. They went and put a café on the ground floor, which is also called Einstein, so it kind of fits in that way. The apartment is the first and second floors (or as we would say in America, the second and third floors).
Walking up to it, i was on a covered sidewalk, almost like a tunnel, except that one side opens up to the street, which is all cobblestones. I was thinking, this is more like how i remember Bern. This is what the areas we were in were like. I saw a fountain/statue in the middle of the road that looked like a bear with a helmet and a polearm. I remembered seeing several of these fountain/statues with fun characters last time. I stepped out into the rain to get a better look and a picture of this bear, glanced left to check for traffic, and...
Oh. There's Zytglogge, Bern's famous 800-year-old clock tower/astrolabe, former prison, and current UNESCO World Heritage Site. We definitely saw that last time. I have been here before.
The bear fountain is called Zähringerbrunnen. It was built in the 16th century to honor the founder of Bern, Berthold V, the Duke of Zähringen.
The first floor has the reception desk and the gift shop. I was told that, usually, the tour starts with a 20-minute film, but the theater was out of order today, so they could offer me a reduced admission price, which i agreed to. From the desk, you enter what once was Albert Einstein's living room. It's been filled with period-appropriate furniture, although i don't get the impression these were actually Einstein's furnishings. They've hung photos of the Einstein family along the walls, but there doesn't seem to be any particular order to them. Just some pictures they thought would be in a family's living room.
Between the reception desk and the living room, there's a display of some clothes which belonged to the Einsteins, and a baby stroller with a stuffed bear in it, which may have belonged to one of their children, i'm unclear. Two large, illuminated glass boards tell the story of how Albert and his first wife, Mileva Marić, met at university, courted, had their first child, whom Albert never met, then married, had two more children, and divorced because Albert was having an affair with his cousin Elsa Löwenthal, whom he then married.
This is a great lead-off to the Einstein museum.
From there, i went upstairs. To my left, there was the theater...which was packed with people and showing a film. I walked past it, and found myself in a small room that was just more of these illuminated glass boards filling up all of the wall space they could. In the center was one glass display case, which had just a couple scientific instruments in it, as well as copies of some of Einstein's papers, bound as tiny books. They were in pretty good condition, so i don't know if they're authentic, or reproductions.
The boards give a timeline of Einstein's life, blurb by blurb, with some photos interspersed to show Einstein things. The whole presentation was written in a straightforward, dry, impersonal way, it was like reading a Wikipedia page that had been run through Google Translate in its early days.
As i was getting started with the boards, a guy came in with a camera, and just started moving from board to board, as if he was on an assembly line, mechanically shooting photos of every single blurb, in order. Like he was gonna take the museum home with him. Okay, buddy. I kind of get it, i understand the impulse. But it's unlikely you're ever gonna go back and reread these. There really isn't the space in here for you to be doing this, though.
The movie in the other room finished, and suddenly, this room was flooded with people. I fought my way against the current back to the theater, to see if i could get in on the next showing, since obviously it is operating. Right as i got there, though, a woman was pulling a chair in front of the door, with an "Out of Order" sign taped to it.
No idea.
I went back to finish going through the boards. It had become much more difficult, the room was cramped enough when it was only me and like half a dozen other people in there, now there were like 30. As i slowly moved around the room, the group from the theater dissipated. Didn't seem like a lot of them wanted to deal with how tight it was getting in that room. By the time i actually got to the end of the presentation, the room was almost empty.
And that was it.
Not worth it, other than just to stand in an apartment that Albert Einstein lived in with his family for two years, while he was still a patent clerk. If that's appealing to you.
The Paul Klee Center was more interesting. I guess i thought it was supposed to be more than an art gallery, but that was really all i got to see of it. The web site that pointed me there listed a number of other purposes the building serves, but i suppose they're mostly special events.
I have to be honest, here. I was not familiar with Paul Klee before today.
The permanent Paul Klee exhibit, Kosmos Klee, is in the basement. The other exhibit, on the ground floor, changes regularly. Currently, it hosts a collection called Brasil! Brasil!: The Birth of Modernism, which focuses on ten Brazilian artists who defined the country's artistic style in the early 20th century. Some of them are well-known, others have not had wide recognition until now.
I went through this exhibit first, because it was right there, after the ticket desk. Seemed a logical place to start. I thought it was very good. I enjoyed all of the works on display, but in particular, i was quite taken by the work of Flávio de Carvalho, especially his portraits. His paintings all had a darker color palette to them, and examined their subjects from a more abstract perspective. The portraits, in particular, i felt were really baring a bit of the subjects' souls, and maybe not the most flattering bits. His style really clicked with me, i couldn't necessarily say why. I'm gonna make it a point to look into his work more later.
In addition to temporary walls set up in the space to display 6-8 pieces by each artist, there were also ten columns in the middle of the large expo hall, one for each artist, each column with a featured piece on the front, and a short biography on the back.
I had walked away from Carvalho's corner without noticing the biographies at first, but once i realized they were there, i had to walk back and read about this guy.
Oh. Yep, it makes perfect sense why i would feel drawn to his work. I'm gonna quote more of this than i usually would, because with each passing word i became more and more enthralled by the man.
"He was something of a maverick, and his work was difficult to categorise within the broader art canon. He worked across a number of different disciplines including painting, sculpture, architecture, theatre, and dance, and created some of the first performance art pieces in Brazil. Carvalho developed his own brand of experimental theatre, which made big waves with the play Bailado do Deus Morto (Dance of the Dead God). His performances in the streets of Sāo Paulo also caused a stir and were met with hostility. Even his painterly experiments encountered a considerable degree of incomprehension; in his expressionist portraits, he endeavoured to probe and convey the psyche of his subjects, depicting women in self-assured poses, rather than as passive objects. He also explored new horizons in the world of fashion and developed New Look (Experiência N.3), a clothing style for the tropical climate and the modern man. He strolled through the streets of Sāo Paulo wearing a skirt, fishnet stockings, and sandals."
I need to learn everything i can about Flávio de Carvalho, so i can wholesale steal his style. This guy lived from 1899-1973. Gone too soon, good sir, would've loved to see a world where you were embraced.
The Paul Klee exhibit is ordered chronologically, beginning with drawings he did at the age of six, in 1885. Klee kept a handwritten list of all of his artworks, and in his later years, had gone back and canonized several of his early childhood works. This is exactly what i would do if i were an influential artist; i kinda have anyway. I drew a series of comic books from 1991-99, first grade through eighth, which i picked back up in my twenties from 2006-08 and briefly again in 2011, and have always thought i'd get back to someday, even if only for myself. So i get it. It's just strange to see that kind of thing in a prestigious art museum.
The 1885 drawings look exactly like what you'd expect from a six-year-old, but next to them are sketches he did in 1894, at fifteen, and they are mind-blowingly detailed. The dude came up fast.
After that there are paintings from his early twenties, which are very nature-themed.
Then there's a theater, which was showing a documentary about Klee's life. Headphones hung from pegs on the wall, each glowing with LEDs in either blue, green, or red. A description plaque explained that blue was German, green was English, and red was French. That's a really good idea. That way the movie is quiet, so it doesn't disturb the other museum-goers, and also you can listen in whatever language your most comfortable with, and follow along at the same rate as everyone else.
I watched for just a minute, then returned the headphones and moved on. I was concerned about getting through the entire museum before it closed.
There were some puppets that Klee made, including one called Lady Death which i found compelling.
Then there was an exhibit about some of Klee's friends, many of whom were architects. It included miniature mock-ups of buildings, which Klee had a hand in designing. As i entered this space, reading an informational board, someone came up behind me, hovering just off my flank. I moved over a step, to make sure they had enough space to read also, but they didn't move. Once i did finally move off, the man stepped up to where i'd been standing, and took a picture of the whole board. I looked up.
YOU.
Yes. It was the same guy who had taken pictures of every single informational board in the Einstein house. Bro. Just read Wikipedia.
I made that word look aggressive with character styling, and in my internal monologue it's a deep bellow, but i don't actually harbor the guy any animosity. Experience the world however you see fit, dude. I just think you could be having a better experience, but mostly i think you could be a little less obtrusive to other museum visitors.
Klee's later period work turns much more abstract, as he was dealing with a disease that severely impacted his motor functions. It became much more about feeling and emotion, and very minimal. In some ways, it felt like he had come full circle, as these works had a visual similarity to the displayed drawings from his childhood.
Lastly, they had his violin on display, as he was also a passionate musician.
Paul Klee worked in many mediums, and wanted his art to be an experience.
I know he's the most revered artist in Switzerland, but if i'm being honest, i didn't feel particularly moved by any of Klee's pieces on display. Not like i felt at the Munch museum in Oslo. Not even like i felt just upstairs looking at Carvalho's work. Maybe there's some Klee out there for me, but i didn't see it today. The museum is in possession of about 5,000 pieces of Klee's art, and only has about 120-150 on display at any given time, for the same reason the Munch museum rotates versions of The Scream. A lot of his work was done on paper, it can't be subjected to light constantly, or it will deteriorate. It needs to rest in darkness.
I still had about 35 minutes left by the time i'd seen all the displayed works. So i slipped back into that theater, grabbed a pair of green headphones, and sat down to watch the documentary. It was just getting to the end, Klee's death occurred within minutes of me sitting down. So i thought that would be perfect, i'd just wait for the loop, and i'd get to see it all in one go. At the end of the credits, there was a note that the film is 24 minutes long. No problem.
There was only one other person in the theater at this time. He got up and left, presumably because he'd seen the whole movie. I waited.
What came on next began with outtakes from a series of interviews, plus title cards introducing the speakers. I thought that was actually a pretty clever way to begin a documentary, we get to see each of these interviewees being candid and funny, just a tiny bit of sausage to make us like them right out of the gate.
It quickly became apparent that this was not the Klee documentary i had been expecting. It didn't loop. It played something else.
A museum employee came through and collected all of the headphones off the wall within a few minutes, but didn't take mine. I was confused by that. Sure, the museum is closing soon, but you haven't stopped the video, so surely people could still take those and sit down? Although all i was hearing in my headset was German now, i was following along with subtitles.
I watched for ten minutes or so before i gave up. This was just a series of interviews with rich people who collected Klee's art. I wasn't going to get anything out of this.
When i took the headphones off, i realized i could hear the audio being pumped into the room from speakers now. That's why he took the headphones. It's the last screening of the day, and multiple languages aren't offered now. There's no need for them.
I went back upstairs, wondering if there was anything else to do at the museum today. The building is huge, these two exhibits take up only a fraction of its space.
I found an open room with a very strange seating situation, a bunch of padded boxes stuck together in seemingly random ways. There were doors leading outside, and a hammock strung between two trees nearby. There were also bookshelves in one corner, filled with many tomes, all about Paul Klee. Some were even available in multiple languages. This was intended as a library. I got a cup of water from the cooler quick, and left.
It was still raining pretty hard outside, as expected.
I made for the bus stop. I was going to have to transfer buses near the train station, so i thought i would look for food near there. Not in the train station, but. Nearby.
There are a ton of restaurants in the area. Many of them are very expensive, but to be honest, i just expect that in Switzerland. The exchange rate is not favorable to Americans, but also, prices are just really high here. I know i told myself i wasn't going to complain, that's just part of going to Switzerland, i was gonna accept it and just live my life, but once i was looking at prices on menus, my brain defaulted to its more miserly original programming. The sticker shock is real. I looked through a bunch of options, many way more than i wanted to spend on food, and finally landed on one called Aminos Bern Crêperie. From the quick description on Maps, for some reason, i got the impression this was a vegan place.
It was not.
I guess it has vegan *options* but that certainly is not the same. And by "vegan options" i mean you can get falafel.
The menu was posted on the window outside. There are two options: French tacos, or crêpes. The French taco looks exactly like what i had at O'Tacos in Paris, and i thought about giving those another shot, at (hopefully) a more reputable establishment, but i ended up going with the crêpe, which was nothing like my understanding of a crêpe. Which is the reason i ordered it.
For either item, you go through a little choose-your-own-adventure to build the thing. Choose your meat. Choose your sauce. Any add-ons? Do you want fries with that? I don't want fries with that, they're 5.50 CHF, or $6.50, and that is too much for fries.
The menu was entirely in German, and the clerk only spoke German, so it was a bit of work to get my meal ordered. For the "meat," i went with halloumi, which is actually a cheese, i picked the "Amino" sauce, since it's like the title item of the restaurant, added raclette cheese, and from the column which Google Translate just called "Ingredients," added mushrooms, grilled eggplant, and hummus.
All of that was packed into a crêpe which was rolled into a cone, reinforced by cheese.
Once i sat down at the table, i noticed a QR code in the middle with the English words "Please scan self-service." Oh. Well that would have been easier.
It was huge. I stared at it for minutes, trying to figure out how the hell to even eat it. At some point, you just have to get started. So i nibbled at the bits that were hanging out of the cone, eventually getting some bites of the crêpe shell, and gnawing at ingredients until i could squish the thing down enough to get my mouth around it and take a proper bite.
It was delicious. I'm very happy with my choice.
I don't know if this is just what a Swiss Crêpe is like, or if Aminos Bern Crêperie is a rogue establishment, desecrating crêpes for their own sinister purposes, but i love it.
I got back to the hostel about 6:15, and continued my data management. Instead of using the counter by the window in the dorm, though, i noticed a "Co-Working Space" on the floor plan near my room, and i'm giving that a shot. it's nice in here. Lots of outlets, a big conference table, the sounds of other people typing on their Macbook keyboards faster than i do, which is impressive. It's 9:15 now, and, true to the forecast, the rain seems to have stopped about half an hour ago. Once this SD card finishes dumping, i think i'll go for a walk.
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It was a nice walk! I got to pet a cat!
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