As for the weekend

Yes, I know it's Wednesday :) But I was so exhausted after the long weekend that I did not find the energy to write anything here. The three days with my friends went very well, I was a bit more prepared for their arrival compared to the last time I had visitors - though my fridge was still not full enough :) But at least it did not hurt that much to wake up at 3 am to let them in. And is it was the birthday of one of them, we had to have a champagne, and while we are at it we had to drink all the beer available :)
In the morning (or noon, rather) we headed out for the generic "first time in Berlin" walk, including the Checkpoint Charlie, the Potsdamer Platz and the Brandenburg Gate. And also a Starbucks :) I was quite confused when the waitress asked for my name when I ordered my White Chocolate Mocha :) But it turned out that they yall you by name when your drink is ready. Kind a useless when you are the only one ordering, or the first in the queue. Anyhow, I had that coffee and a raspberry cheesecake, and both were very, very good. Starbucks seems to be a good place based on just this :) The California Coffee Company, which we have instead Starbucks in Budapest, was not so memorable, though of course my company and the occassion was :)
Sooo, after the sightseeing and the first tastes of Berlin Glühwein (with rum, of course), we headed for the Istanbul Grill, serving the best kebab ever (at least in the vicinity of my apartment). There and older man overheard us talking, and when he found out we were Hungarians, he burst out in tears...He invited us for a beer, and praised Hungary for helping to unite Germany and especially his hometown, which he was waiting for for 30+ years...He was a good guy, spoke a bit English, but I sat to his table and we had a small conversation in German too. A very good experience, and of course he had his own beer on us. After this, we headed for a Hookah or Shisha, an Arabic water pipe. This is usually filled with some fruit flavoured tobacco, and I really like the taste, and the tea we had with it was also good. The place it self was very Arabic, there was even a separated are for the category of people which did not include us, which was even nicer :) The Shisha place was followed by Oranienburger Straße, which hosts a lot of pubs - here we visited quite a few, and ended up in another Turkish place, which had loud Turkish music and dancing :) So it was quite fun :) The night turned quite long, and we got home at around 4 am.

At this point I have to break the story, I will try to finish it tomorrow! :)
Stay tuned!
M.