Well, the last couple days in Berlin have been tough. I hadn't met anyone worth meeting and most of my friends were busy or were out of town, or worse yet, blowing me off. In addition, six weeks since my last job and I'm suddenly hungry to work, with no work to do. It's kind of created a new boredom for me, one ruled seemingly entirely by inertia. Maybe I was just homesick.

Anyway, I told Monica and Gerhard, the family that I'm staying with here in Berlin that I would be taking a trip this week... either Warsaw or Dresden, I'm not entirely sure... I know little about either city except that Warsaw is cheaper which put it ahead in my head. But the travel was longer and I missed the last train that would put me in the Polish capitol before late night. So instead, I took the slow train to Dresden. The slow trains look a little different from the express trains. They tend to be double decker, and aren't quite as comfortable as regular trains... and they stop over at nearly every small town along the way. My transfer point was Grossenhain. I think that was the transfer spot because there was an extra track at the station.

The ride was quite comfortable and I had the upper deck of my car pretty much to myself. Riding through Berlin, I enjoyed views I had never noticed before. A stunning view towards the Reichstag along the Spree for example. And arriving in Dresden, the new perspectives continued. First appearance of the main station in Dresden is that its worn down, inconvenient from birth and dark. Well, it is dark - but only because the natural light is being blocked out by scaffolding. I found out as I explored around the station after disembarking that the Main Station is under massive reconstruction. Come to think of it, most of Dresden is under massive reconstruction.

The construction boom here isn't in new housing or brand new buildings, but rather retrofitting, renovating and modernizing all the concrete slab buildings that the DDR regime built and forgot about 40 years ago. I noticed that on the rather short walk from the main station to the "Altstadt" in downtown Dresden. It is through a large Pedestrian zone shopping area that is actually quite pleasant.

Most of the old city in Dresden was destroyed in 1945, and a lot of the ruins were reconstructed by the DDR regime in the 1950s and 1960s. However, much was also paved over for the "new style" architecture. After all, that was cheaper and more functional. So both "Altstadt" and "Neustadt" remain a mix of beautiful old and less beautiful new buildings. As I first arrived in Dresden, I walked down the Schloss Strasse and viewed something simply stunning. There's this point where you pass one of the city castle walls, still in a degree of ruin from Allied bombing during the second world war... and when you look through the wall, you see a meticulously restored innerbuilding of the castle... giving the impression of rebirth from within.

Shortly past the castle, which is now, to my understanding, a museum, was a bridge crossing the Elbe. Crossing the river puts you firmly in Neustadt. Its not really that new, hundreds of years old, but still new in comparison to the Old City. A fairly long walk, brought me to my hostel. The Mondpalast. Beds were reasonable, but not necessarily cheap. I spent 15 Euro for a bed in a room with nine other people. In contrast, in Prague, I shared a room with one other person for just 13 Euro.