A winter playlist

This week, we had a little Lucia party at my school. Sankta Lucia is a Scandinavian holiday, usually celebrated on the 13th of December (which apparently used to coincide with winter solstice), to celebrate the light. For us, however, it’s more of a pre-Christmas gathering to celebrate the end of the semester and just have a nice time chatting (and having some dessert) with our classmates and teachers. Me and a classmate of mine had volunteered to organise the event, so in the weekends before the party, I had a nice time painting this illustration for the poster, looking for pine branches in the woods and cutting paper snowflakes as decorations, and looking for some nice background music on Spotify.

So I thought it would be nice to share the playlist that I made with you guys as well. I tried to make a nice mix of different genres and different Scandinavian languages, from the Icelandic oldies of Haukur Morthens and the traditional songs performed by Sofia Karlsson to Siri Nilsen’s wonderful songs in Norwegian, the jazzy tunes of Monica Zetterlund and the Finnish folk songs of Hanna Ruuskanen. And some Cornelis Vreeswijk, of course!

Haukur Morthens – Ó, borg mín borg
amiina – Perth
Kaseva – Syksy
Siri Nilsen – Hodet, hjertet eller magen
Cornelis Vreeswijk – Somliga går med trasiga skor
Monica Zetterlund – Sakta vi gå genom stan
Birgitta Ulfsson – Höstvisa
Hanna Ruusakenen – Pieni kukka kasvoi kiven alta
Jens Lekman – The Cold Swedish Winter
Sofia Karlsson – Jul, jul, strålande jul
Vildnis – Hun sagde
Laleh – På gatan där jag bor
Sofia Karlsson – Så mör är natten i midvintertid
Cornelis Vreeswijk – Märk hur vår skugga
Hanna Ruuskanen – Vanhus
Cornelis Vreeswijk – Balladen om Herr Fredrik Åkare och den söta fröken Cecilia Lind
Vera Vinter – Bjärka
Bo Andersson – Syyslaulu
Lisa Rydberg – Härlig är jorden

You can find it on Spotify by clicking here, or by typing “Vi firar Lucia” in the search box in the Spotify app :)


I went to Sweden for the weekend

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

Vorig weekend maakte ik voor de eerste keer een vliegreis in mijn eentje. Ik ging namelijk op bezoek bij mijn vriendin Linde, die op Erasmus is in Göteborg. Dit was mijn eerste reisje naar Zweden dit jaar, dus ik keek er erg naar uit om er weer eens heen te gaan, om Linde terug te zien, om eindelijk nog eens wat Zweedse boeken in te slaan en om voor de eerste keer een briefje van twintig kronen met Astrid Lindgren in mijn handen te krijgen.

Last weekend, I made a flying trip on my own for the first time in my life. I went to visit Linde, a friend of mine who’s on Erasmus in Göteborg. It was so good to be in Sweden again after such a long time, seeing Linde again, stock up on some Swedish books and getting my hands on one of the new twenty-crowns banknotes, which has Astrid Lindgren on it.

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

Toen ik vanuit het vliegtuig neerkeek op alle bossen en meren dacht ik de hele tijd: wat is Zweden toch ongelooflijk mooi! Ik nam de bus naar de stad en Linde kwam me halen bij de bushalte. Toen we middageten hadden gegeten was het een uur of drie, en het begon al een klein beetje donker te worden, maar we besloten om toch nog een wandeling te maken bij een meer in de buurt.

When I was sitting on the plane and looked down on all of the woods and lakes, I couldn’t stop thinking how incredibly beautiful Sweden is. I took the bus to the city and Linde waited for me at the bus stop. When we had had some lunch, it was three o’clock and the sun was already starting to set, but we still decided to go for a walk at a nearby lake.

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

Het was twee graden onder nul, dus het hele landschap zag er een beetje bevroren uit. / It was two degrees below zero, so everything looked kind of frozen.

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

Toen kwamen we bij het meer. Zo mooooi! <3 / We got to the lake. So pretty! <3

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

We wandelden over een bevroren brug en ik gleed bijna uit. / We walked on a frozen bridge and I nearly slipped.

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

Het bos zag er bijna sprookjesachtig mooi uit. We wandelden tot het bijna donker was en praatten over hoe graag we het bos en het meer mee naar huis zouden willen nemen. Daarna namen de tram terug, aten bonen-en-kikkererwtenburgers en geroosterde aardappels bij Ölstugan (heerlijk!), gingen weer naar huis en keken film in onze pyjama.

The woods were so beautiful, almost like in a fairy tale. We walked until it was nearly dark and talked about how badly we wanted to take all of this home with us. Afterwards, we took the tram back, ate bean and chickpea burgers with roasted potatoes at Ölstugan (delicious!), went home and watched a movie in our pyjamas.

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

De volgende dag was het nog kouder, dus gingen we snel even onze vingers en tenen ontdooien in de serres van Trädgårdföreningen.

The next day, it was even colder, so we went to the greenhouses at Trädgårdföreningen to defrost our fingers and toes.

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

Hej.

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

Daarna ging ik middageten eten met Anna en Viktor, twee vrienden van mij die in Göteborg wonen, terwijl Linde naar huis ging om wat schoolwerk te doen. Toen ik terug kwam, was de zon al een beetje onder aan het gaan.

After that, I went to have lunch with Anna and Viktor, two friends of mine who live in Göteborg, while Linde went back home to do some schoolwork. When I came back, the sun was already starting to set.

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

Tegen de avond gingen Linde en ik nog een wandelingetje door de stad maken. Om half vijf was het al donker!

Towards the evening, Linde and I went for another walk around the city. It was only five o’clock, but already dark outside!

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

Het was héél koud (die nacht werd het min acht) en daarom gingen we even het winkelcentrum bij Nordstan in en kochten warme kousen.

It was very cold (that night, it would be minus eight), so we went into the shopping mall at Nordstan and bought some warm socks.

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

Daarna gingen we eten bij Yammy Kitchen, een Koreaans restaurant waar ik de vorige keer ook was geweest.

Afterwards, we had dinner at Yammy Kitchen, a Korean restaurant that I discovered last time I was there.

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

De volgende dag was het al een stuk mooier weer (hoera! zonlicht!). Linde moest al vroeg naar de les, en dus at ik in mijn eentje knäckebröd met ei als ontbijt.

The next day, the weather was a bit better (yay! sunlight!). Linde had a morning class, so I had a nice breakfast of knäckebröd and eggs on my own.

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com
In deze buurt wil ik ook wel wonen. / I wouldn’t mind living in this neighbourhood.

Daarna nam ik de tram naar het centrum om op zoek te gaan naar een paar boeken die ik graag wilde hebben. Ik ging naar Myrorna (een tweedehandswinkel waar ze pockets voor 20 kronen verkopen), Akademibokhandeln (een gewone boekenwinkel) en Bokskåpet (een superfijne kinderboekenwinkel). ‘s Middags gingen Linde en ik naar Haga en aten fika als middageten, keken nog snel in een paar winkeltjes (ik kreeg eindelijk een Astrid Lindgren-briefje te pakken!), en toen was het alweer tijd om naar huis te gaan.

I took the tram to the city centre to go look for some books I wanted to buy. I went to Myrorna (a second hand store where they sell pocket books for only 20 crowns), Akademibokhandeln (a regular bookstore) and Bokskåpet (a very nice children’s bookstore). Afterwards, I met up with Linde at Haga to have some fika for lunch. We took a look in some shops (I finally got an Astrid Lindgren banknote!), and then it was already time to go back home.

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

"I went to Sweden for the weekend" | rougeimaginaire.com

Ik maakte het gezellig in het vliegtuig en las Mig äger ingen van Åsa Linderborg voor mijn Scandinavische letterkundeles op donderdag.

On the plane home in all my cosy woolen clothes, reading Mig äger ingen by Åsa Linderborg for my Scandinavian literature class on Thursday.

PS: Tack för en fin helg, Linde :)


Mini Copenhagen Guide

Mini Copenhagen Guide | rougeimaginaire.com

During the last week of my vacation, I went on a short trip to Copenhagen with my parents. Last semester, I took a Danish class at the university, but apart from the time that we drove through Denmark on our way to Sweden, I had never been to Denmark before. So I thought it was about time! I was surprised by how beautiful everything was: not just the big buildings, but also the houses in neighbourhoods that were a bit further away from the city centre.

We spent most of our time doing sightseeing: we went to see the statue of the Little Mermaid (from Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale, which I read in my Swedish literature class last year), walked around in Kastellet (a fortress near the Little Mermaid), took a look at Amalienborg (the residence of the Danish royal family), Christiansborg (also known as Borgen, which is the seat of the parliament and the Prime Minister’s office), climbed the Rundetaarn (a round tower from where you have a nice view over the city) and walked around in Christiania (a neighbourhood where some people started their own autonomous town in the 1970s). In today’s post, however, I’d like to share some other things that I really enjoyed in Copenhagen. I hope it’s useful!

Food

Mini Copenhagen Guide: Atelier September | rougeimaginaire.com

Mini Copenhagen Guide: Atelier September | rougeimaginaire.com

Atelier September
Gothersgade 30

On our first full day in Copenhagen, we had lunch at Atelier September. I had heard about this place in one of Anna Nooshin’s vlogs and it looked so good that I wanted to try it out myself. It had a beautiful interior, the staff was friendly, and most importantly: the food was good (and also super photogenic ;)). I tried out this smørrebrød (an open sandwich from dark rye bread) with avocado, which was delicious, and a cup of green tea, which I didn’t enjoy that much because I had the idea I was tasting the cup more than the tea (I think the glazing had worn of). But I would absolutely recommend this place!

Mini Copenhagen Guide: The Yogurt Shop | rougeimaginaire.com

The Yogurt Shop
Grønnegade 37

Another tip from Anna was the Yogurt Shop. This is a place where you can assemble your own bowl of yoghurt. Even though I think this concept exists in lots of different cities, I had never tried it out so I was quite curious :) I chose regular yoghurt with caramel sauce and all different kinds of fruit. Yum!

I also want to suggest two other places, but for some reason, I forgot to take pictures in there. The first one is Zirup (Læderstræde 32), a nice café/restaurant where we sat in the sidewalk café to have dinner. I had a really nice tomato soup with chili and ginger. The glasses of water we ordered were huge, which I really liked. Also, the staff was super friendly.

On our last evening in Copenhagen, we had dinner at Kate’s Joint (Blågårdsgade 12). It had a really cosy interior and there were lots of candles. They had lots of different kinds of food, I believe most of the things on the menu were Asian and Mediterranean. I chose tofu with fried vegetables and rice and it tasted good! Oh, and the staff was really friendly as well!

 ◇

Activities

Mini Copenhagen Guide: Botanisk Have | rougeimaginaire.com

Mini Copenhagen Guide: Botanisk Have | rougeimaginaire.com

Botanisk have
Øster Farimagsgade 2B

Visiting a botanical garden is always a good idea when you’re on a trip. Last year, I visited the botanical garden of Göteborg and I really liked it, so I thought it’d be nice to visit this one in Copenhagen. These pictures were taken in the Palm house, which is the largest greenhouse. Because the plants in there are used to a tropical climate, it’s quite hot in there, especially when you climb up the spiral-stairs. I thought it was a really beautiful building. Definitely worth a visit!

Mini Copenhagen Guide: Statens Museum for Kunst | rougeimaginaire.com

Mini Copenhagen Guide: Statens Museum for Kunst | rougeimaginaire.com

Statens Museum for Kunst
Sølvgade 48-50

If you’re into art, you can visit the National Gallery of Denmark. They have lots of different permanent and temporary exhibitions, and the admission is free! I decided to only visit the exhibitions about Danish & Nordic art between 1750 and 1900 and Danish & international art after 1900. One of the things I liked the most were these paintings by Emil Nolde, a German expressionistic painter.

Mini Copenhagen Guide: Nationalmuseum | rougeimaginaire.com

Nationalmuseum
Ny Vestergade 10

I thought it would be nice to learn something about the Danish and Scandinavian history, so that’s why we decided to visit the National Museum. This museum has lots of different exhibitions, but I only visited three of them. The first one was about the Danish prehistory, which I thought was pretty nice. When I was learning Danish last semester, we read a text by Adam Oehlenschläger about these golden horns. They were fabricated in the Iron Age and found in 17th and 18th century, but in 1802, they were stolen by a goldsmith and melted down. Oehlenschläger wrote a poem about it in which he depicted the horns as a symbol for the glory of old times. The horns on the picture are replicas of the original horns. Besides that, I visited an exhibition about the Danish Middle Ages and Renaissance, but I didn’t think it was that interesting because I’m generally not very interested in that period. I also visited an exhibition called Stories of Denmark (1660-2000), which was nice because they had tried to make some kind of timeline with all the things that were important for that period, like what clothes the people wore, what their houses looked like, which important evolutions where happening in society, and so on. The presentation was a bit outdated, but it was still fun to watch.

Mini Copenhagen Guide: Theatre | rougeimaginaire.com

Theatre

My dad thought it would be nice to go to the theatre while we were there, but since my parents don’t speak Danish (and mine isn’t that fluent either), we thought it would be better to pick something with not too much dialog. So we went to see a performance called Horisonten (“The Horizon”), which was a mix of theatre, opera and dance. It took place at the Royal Danish Playhouse, a quite impressive building that was opened in 2008. It was a really nice experience, and I actually loved listening to the spoken parts, even though I didn’t understand everything.

Transportation

Mini Copenhagen Guide | rougeimaginaire.com

Mini Copenhagen Guide: City Bikes | rougeimaginaire.com

Biking

Like in most big cities, you can take the underground, but besides that, biking is a great way of getting around in Copenhagen. We saw so many people biking on the streets (almost as much as in Amsterdam), and in most streets, there were good cycle tracks (and sometimes even separate traffic lights for bicycles). Another advantage of biking is that you can do some sightseeing while you’re on the go.

We decided to try out the city bikes, which are bicycles that you can find at docking stations all around the city and just leave at a different station if you want to. You just have to create an account on the website (or on the bike itself). We decided to go for the monthly subscription formula, where you pay 60 DKK for a month and when your bike trip is shorter than 30 minutes, it’s free. The bikes have an electric motor and the best thing, a GPS system, which is particularly useful when you don’t know the city that well.

Accommodation

Mini Copenhagen Guide: Urban Bed & Breakfast | rougeimaginaire.com

Urban Bed & Breakfast
Amagerbrogade 17

I just couldn’t write this post without including some pictures of the beautiful hostel where we were staying. The rooms are nice and spacious, there’s a small kitchen and I wish I could’ve taken the bathroom home with me because it was that beautiful (I mean, just look at that bath!). When I first came into the bathroom, I thought: “wow, this place smells exactly like my new shower gel from Rituals”, which was easily explained by the fact that there were scented sticks with the same scent (it’s called Hammam Delight and it’s soo good!). Strangely enough, it’s not actually a bed & breakfast, so you have to take care of your own breakfast, but there are many supermarkets around so that’s not really a problem. So if you’re going to Copenhagen and you’re still looking for a place to stay, this might be a nice idea. It’s not super close to the centre (about 2,5 kilometres away), but when you’re going by bike, it’s totally okay.

So I hope you enjoyed reading about my week in Copenhagen. Feel free to leave your own tips in the comments! :)


Photo shoot

rougeimaginaire: "Photo shoot"

Yaay, I handed in my last paper! I finished my bachelor thesis a couple of weeks ago, but I still had to write one more paper for my Swedish literature class (luckily, this one was a lot shorter, but it still took more time than I expected). So now I have vacation until the 20th of September! I hadn’t told this before, but I decided that I’m going to do the Master in Scandinavian studies as well, because this year only made me feel like more, and I wasn’t able to say goodbye to Ghent just yet.

I didn’t just spent these last couple of weeks reading and writing, though. Last week, Tysje, who is studying photography at the KASK in Ghent, asked me if I wanted to be a model in a photo shoot for her master’s project. So I took the train to a tiny little village in East Flanders and we spent the whole day shooting in this beautiful, beautiful house where her aunt lives (I wouldn’t mind living in a house like that either!). It was really fun to hop about in the house barefoot and try all these different clothes and poses. So what do you think of the results?

rougeimaginaire: "Photo shoot"
Pictures by Tysje Severens.

I finished my bachelor thesis!

rougeimaginaire: "I finished my thesis!"

Guess what I did last week? I handed in my bachelor thesis! Now I don’t usually write about my school work on my blog, but since I’ve been talking about it before and I’m actually quite proud of it, I thought I’d share this. It’s written in Swedish, but in English, the title would be something like: “I wish somebody would write a story about the people who warm up the heroes afterwards.” An analysis of gender stereotypes in Tove Jansson’s Moomin books. Tove Jansson was a Swedish-speaking Finnish children’s book author, illustrator and painter, and she’s mostly famous for her books about the Moomins, which she wrote and illustrated herself. There’s also a tv series that’s based on the books, which you might have seen if you grew up in the 90s like me.

In my thesis, I compared the gender stereotypes in two of the Moomin books: Trollkarlens hatt (Finn Family Moomintroll) and Trollvinter (Moominland Midwinter). What I found out was that in Finn Family Moomintroll, the characters were portrayed pretty stereotypically, although this may also be interpreted as irony at some points, whereas in Moominland Midwinter, the characters were breaking the gender stereotypes. Moomin is probably the most complex character: he is very sensitive but also smart, and he loves adventure, but sometimes he just wants to be safe at home. This probably explains why he, along with Little My, who doesn’t care one bit about what other people think of her, and Too-ticky, who’s very dreamy and philosophical and questions basically everything, is one of my favourite characters.

"I'm thinking about the aurora borealis. You can't tell if it really does exist or if it just looks like existing. All things are so very uncertain, and that's exactly what makes me feel reassured."

So, that’s how things ended with my thesis. I thought it was interesting to write about a literary subject for a change. Even though I’ve written two of these papers before, I feel like I have learned a lot during the process of writing this one, and it was the first time I actually enjoyed it. So tell me, have you ever read the Moomin books or watched the series?


Recipe: pita bread with red bean sauce and feta

rougeimaginaire: "Recipe: pita bread with red bean sauce and feta"

When I was living in Ghent the past couple of months, I didn’t just study, I also spent quite some time exploring the wonderful world of cooking your own dinner. It’s not always easy to come up with new healthy and tasty dishes, but luckily there’s always the internet for inspiration. Two of my favourites are this Moroccan lentil stew (I always made it with couscous) and these brown bean sauce and avocado wraps that Loepsie shared on her blog. However, on one of my last days at my dorm, I came up with this random dish with all the things I had left in my fridge (among which some of that bean sauce) and I loved it! It’s very easy to make and all the nice fresh vegetables make it perfect for summer. Enjoy!

rougeimaginaire: "Recipe: pita bread with red bean sauce and feta"

Ingredients:

(for three people)

For the sauce:

  • one onion
  • some pieces of garlic
  • two carrots
  • one tomato
  • 250 grams of passata
  • 300 grams of canned red beans
  • some olive oil
  • some chili powder
  • a pinch of salt

Toppings:

  • lettuce
  • radishes
  • some garden cress
  • feta
  • avocado
  • cream cheese
  • pepper

and three pita breads per person.

rougeimaginaire: "Recipe: pita bread with red bean sauce and feta"

Instructions:

  1. Cut the onion and the garlic into small pieces and put it in a pan and add some olive oil. Put the stove on medium heath and stir every now and then until it’s cooked.
  2. Cut the carrots into thin slices (otherwise it’ll take them forever to cook) and dice the tomato. Add them to the pan.
  3. While the vegetables are cooking, you can prepare the toppings. Dice the feta and put some olive oil and some pepper on there (no salt, because feta tastes pretty salty already). Wash the radishes and cut them into slices. Cut the avocado and add som salt and pepper. Wash the lettuce and cut it into shreds. Cut off some garden cress.
  4. When de vegetables are done, add the passata. Put the beans in a strainer, rinse them off and then add them ass well. Let the sauce simmer a little longer, and then it’s done!

rougeimaginaire: "Recipe: pita bread with red bean sauce and feta"

  1. Heat up the pita breads in a toaster (or in a frying pan: on medium heath, otherwise they’ll get burned). When they’re done, cut them open, spread some cream cheese in there, take some sauce and top it off with some lettuce, radishes, avocado, garden cress and feta. Done!

rougeimaginaire: "Recipe: pita bread with red bean sauce and feta"


New layout!

rougeimaginaire: "New layout!"

Hey! Today is a big day, because my blog has moved from Blogger to its own domain name: rougeimaginaire.com!

I’ve been planning this for a while, but since both my brother (whose help I was definitely going to need for this) and I had quite a busy year at school, it had to wait until summer break. But now, it finally happened! My brother did most of the work, although I also got some things done when I wasn’t working on my thesis (like when I manually had to clean up the code of all of my posts, ugh).

I also have a new layout. I designed it myself, and my brother made it into a working WordPress theme. I wasn’t really that tired of my old layout, so the new one looks quite similar, just a little bit more fresh and clean. The biggest change is probably the fixed main menu, which makes it easier to navigate. I also changed the fonts: for the main text, I’m now using Open Sans instead of Georgia, and for the titles I’m using the Google font ‘Dosis’.

Another change is that my posts now have both categories and tags, which you’ll find respectively at the top and the bottom of every post. The tags can include names of countries and cities I’ve been (like ‘the Netherlands‘ or ‘Göteborg‘), more specific topics (like ‘books‘ or ‘outfit‘), post types (like ‘video‘) or just random things like ‘Swedish things‘. Besides that, you can also find posts in the archive, or just by using the search function (which is a lot better than the previous one!) at the top right of the page. Oh, and you can always switch between the grid view (if you want an overview) and the list view (if you’re just browsing).

rougeimaginaire: "New layout!"

So now I’m really curious what you are thinking :) Of course, it’s always possible that you find something that is not working quite as it should. If you do, please let me know! Also, a big thank you to my brother Bert! I hope I can go back to blogging more frequently soon (but first: back to analysing the Moomin books!).


Mini Berlin Guide

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide"

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide"

Hey again! My exams are done, summer break has started (although I still have to finish my bachelor thesis and a paper), and I just got back from a four-day trip to Berlin with my parents. I have to say I really kind of fell in love with the city, because it just had such a good vibe. I can’t really explain it, but it felt like all the people were just so calm and friendly. Also, it seems like there’s a lot of cool things you can do there, like nice coffee bars, beautiful parks and cool stores. Besides that, it’s really interesting to learn about the city’s history. It’s quite impossible to fit all of that into a four-day trip, so I definitely want to go back some time soon.

Anyway, I thought it would be nice to share some of the nice places I stumbled upon while I was there. I’ll skip the common tourist things like the Brandenburger Tor, the Holocaust monument and the Alexanderplatz, and tell you about the things I personally enjoyed the most. I hope it’s useful!

Food:

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide" - Roamers

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide" - Roamers

Roamers
Pannierstraße 64 (Neukölln)

I read about this place on Siri Forsell’s blog while I was preparing our trip, and when we arrived to Berlin on Sunday afternoon and were quite hungry, it was the first thing that popped into my mind. I really liked the way it looked, it had a good atmosphere and the food was just delicious. I had a spinach salad with an over-easy egg and some avocado (getting hungry just looking at this picture). If you’re looking for a good place for breakfast, lunch, or just a cup of coffee, you should go here.

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide" - Schwarzes Café

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide" - Schwarzes Café

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide"

Schwarzes Café
Kantstraße 148 (Charlottenburg)

I read about this place in our city guide, and the description said that they serve breakfast, lunch and dinner at any time of the day (or night). So I obviously went for scrambled eggs on toast, because how could I resist breakfast at two in the afternoon? We sat in this lovely garden at the back of the building and our waiter was really friendly (but also a little bit scatterbrained).

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide" - Kitchen of Modern Asia

Kitchen of Modern Asia
Friesenstraße 13 (Kreuzberg)

This is a place where we randomly ended up after my dad’s bike got a flat tire and we had to wait for a guy that was coming to fix it. I wasn’t planning on writing about this (that’s why I only took one picture) but the food was just SO GOOD. I chose a dish called Tofu on Fire. I don’t usually like tofu, because it tends to have no taste, but this time it was really delicious. Besides that, the prices were good and the waiter was super-friendly.

Activities:

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide" - Mauerpark Flea Market

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide" - Mauerpark Flea Market

Mauerpark flea market
(Prenzlauer Berg)

Every Sunday, there’s this huge flea market at the Mauerpark, where you can find lots of old and new things, have some delicious food or enjoy some live music. It was very crowded (and hot!), and although I didn’t really buy anything, I thought it was a nice experience.

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide"

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide"

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide"

Berlin on Bike
Kulturbrauerei, Knaackstraße 97

It’s really nice to explore Berlin on bike, especially when the weather is nice. We decided to go for a guided tour, because not having to figure it out all on your own just makes a bike tour a lot more fun and relaxing. This was one of my favourite things of the trip, because it was just so pleasant to bike in the city when the sun is shining. The tour we took was called the Berlin Wall Tour and we cycled around in the area where the border between East and West Berlin used to be and stopped at some important places. I actually thought it was really interesting to get to know a little more about the history of Berlin and the Wall, and our guide explained all of it in a very accessible way. We took the tour in Dutch, but it’s also available in English and German.

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide" - Tempelhof

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide" - Tempelhof

rougeimaginaire: "Mini Berlin Guide" - Tempelhof

Tempelhof

The last tip I want to give you is Tempelhof. This is an old airport that was built by the Nazi’s and in the 1930’s it was one of the biggest airports of Europe. It was also used by the Western Allies to transport supplies to the people in West Berlin during the blockade in 1948-1949 (when the Soviets blocked all the roads and railways). The airport was closed in 2008 and re-opened as a park in 2010. Our guide from the bike tour recommended us to explore it by bike, because it’s so big and when the weather’s warm it’s just a lot more pleasant. I thought it was really interesting to have a look there because it just feels so cool to be able to cycle around on an airstrip. Also, this is a really good place to take pictures or just to relax (you’re also allowed to grill there!).

So these were all my Berlin tips, but I’m sure there’s lots of other nice things to do/eat/see.

Feel free to leave your own tips in the comments! :)