Berlin, Germany - Yesterday

Today we woke up pretty spankin' early to get out to Berlin. We docked in Warnemunde, Germany - sort of on the northeast side of the German coastline. We took a 3 hour bus ride in to Berlin and then raced all over jumping out at various hotspots to take pictures and soak in whatever culture we could in 10 minutes or less. We stopped at a beautiful church, the Brandenburg Gate (the old gate between East and West Berlin), the city center with all the embassies (?, embassys, I don't know) and there was a protest and a Starbucks. We had just enough time to participate in both. Then we went to the Holocaust Museum, though only the outside - we didn't have time for the inside which bummed me out. The HM was interesting. The American architecht built the outside with 2711 concrete columns each of a different size. He didn't explain the meaning but rather wanted each person to come to their own conclusions about what it meant. Very powerful, I thought. After that we visited the Berlin Wall, including the part that has been preserved (of sorts) and painted on from over 20 different artists from around the world. I would have liked more time here too but all we got was 10 minutes. Then we went to lunch and had authentic German food: potato soup, pork schnitzel, some weird fried potatoes that I have to Dane, veggies, and a berries and cream dessert. YUM!!! After lunch we went to Checkpoint Charlie then to the mall. I looked in the Chanel, Fendi, Prada, Louis Vutton, and Tiffany stores and could not find anything that I liked and or could afford. It was a very sad shopping trip. It is just not meant to be for me to find something that I love here. After shopping it was time to head back to the boat, which was fine - we were all tired and slept most of the way.

I did find the most AWESOME Ritter Sport chocolates - it's milk chocolate with cornflakes!!!! Sooooo good. Anyway, once we got on the boat I had just enough time to blog and research Water for People a bit more before my 15 minute phone interview. I sat on our patio and watched the sunset as WFP called me. I feel the interview went well, I did most of the talking - talking about my history in nonprofit, how I became an accountant and what I feel I do well as an accountant. They were very interested in my experience at Treehouse in regards to the RE/FE integration. Seems they are integrating RE and NetSuite and the WFP Director was looking for someone with integration experience. Sounds to me like looking for a candidate with integration was as important to her as finding someone who excels at audit is for Jim. They said they'd be getting back with candidates by the end of this week (even thought I didn't even ask) and they wanted to know all about how to get a hold of me while I'm still on vacation, when I'm coming back from vacation and when I'm moving to Denver for good. So - I'd say it went well enough for the first round. We'll see what happens. I don't even know much about this place and if it is even a good fit. I'll save those questions for the second round, if applicable.

I'll blog later tonight about our busy day at sea. We are going to the spa, playing jackpot bingo, going to a wine tasting lunch, cocktail party, formal fancy dinner, and then the Captain's Black & White Ball. I told Dane I need to look my best so I can flirt with our totally cute, and wiley, captain. He agrees. Take, for example, last nights tomfoolery. We are leaving Warnemunde - (oh, this is the best part!) and the port is playing music for us, including our wedding song (our favorite version even of Andre Bocelli and Sarah MacLaughlin singing Con ti Partio) so we danced on our patio in our robes and watched all the people - there were a TON of people, we don't even know why. But there were also 3 cruise boats leaving at once, so there was a lot to see. And as we are leaving - music is playing (Elvis's Wooden Heart), people are hootin' and hollerin', the Captain is honking his horn (3 toots means Peace Out!) and there are all these other smaller party boats that always return fire with honks of their own. So the Captain proceeds to get into a honking war with these boats. Then the other cruise boats have enough, so join in the fray - let me tell you how loud that was to have over 6 boats honking their horns in a horn battle. Hee-haw-larious. Then there was a fireworks show for no particular reason. Awesome. Best part of Germany.

It's going to be a fun night. I only have 10 min left for breakfast so I need to run!