And down the stretch they fly...

This one is a bit long, but hey, gotta go out with a bang!

After we got to Berlin, we were first impacted by something strange. It was rain! We have had fantastic weather and haven’t even seen the stuff on this entire trip! Fortunately, it blew over in about 10 minutes, so nothing to worry about. From the airport we headed to our hotel, which is located in East Berlin. It is remarkably obvious the difference in the architectural styles of East and West Berlin. The east screams communism, with square buildings that have square windows placed at even intervals, all topped off with the fantastic concrete building décor – all gray. The west on the other hand shows an architectural development, with the styles of the times showing as West Berlin was able to choose and then change with the times.

We started off the next chilly day with a bike tour of Berlin. This was very good, giving a quick overview of the city and some of its rich history (albeit some dark parts). We also visited the renovation of the wall of Berlin, which shows a roughly scale size of the how the wall was constructed to keep the people in East Berlin. We unfortunately were unable to visit Checkpoint Charlie, but another task for another time. Despite another quick little rain shower, the weather actually warmed up and improved for our visit to the zoo. This by far was the highlight of the day. It was a “behind the scenes” tour of the Berlin Zoo and how it works.

This meant we first got a tour of the empty elephant house to show how they trained the elephants to make it easier and safer for the veterinarians and how they house their elephants during the winter. The next stop was the rhino exhibit. There, the vet kindly took us behind so that we could pet and feed the rhinos. They really were just like big dogs, except a bit scalier and a lot dirtier. Next we stopped at the clinic for the animals and talked about the process for figuring out what treatment should be given to such exotic animals, how to radiograph, and where they do the procedures. Then we quickly went through the zoo to the hippo exhibit. We first started at the viewing area, but soon went once again back behind it all to see their cages and the birthing pool. From there we went to a balcony overlooking their main pool and were able to feed them bread. This is done by banging on the rail, so the hippos come over and open their mouths so that you can loft it in there. Absolutely amazing!

Finally, we finished the program with a visit to the Berlin vet school clinics. I worked in small animal exams, so just the routine day to day work. The most striking difference, is that the exam contained five to six tables, and these were all filled with a variety of cats and dogs with a separate vet on each case. It was like organized and unorganized mass chaos! After this, we had a bit of free time to collect our things together, and then out to dinner one last time as a group. We ate at Kasbah, some absolutely amazing Moroccan food. I had lamb in a cinnamon honey sauce with prunes and almonds covered in sesame seeds. And look at that, there you go starting to drool.

That pretty much is it. I am finishing up this blog and then have to leave for the airport in four hours, so we’ll see how much sleep I get. Thanks for reading and have a good one!