Well I’m having an interesting day in the office. Things started out well, I managed to get myself onto platform 11 of Berlin Hbf with plenty of time to spare. The temperature is just warm enough to sit outside without getting too cold. Today I’m on the EC 43 service, destination Warsaw. The train is run by PKP – the Polish state owned railway company. Right on cue a weirdly pink locomotive pulled in to the platform. At the front of the train was carriage 272, my first class home for the day. I had a “fenster” again, thanks to the usual […]
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If I ever had to vote in a competition for the best railway station in the world, I would almost certainly choose Berlin Hauptbahnhof (Hbf). I would have thought for a moment about Shinjuku, Beijing South and maybe even the new Kings Cross, but none really come close to Berlin Hbf. If you have never been, it’s an ultra modern multi level station which at times feels like a shopping centre. That’s because it is in part a shopping centre. As you approach the station on the inter city tracks you climb up and enter the very top deck of […]
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I have to tell you that if you have never heard a Dutch station announcer say the words “Inter City” in English you have missed a minor treat of schoolboy humour. I have been trying to learn a few words of local train lingo for this trip. I’m pretty good in Russian, and even know a few things in Chinese, but so far I have rather neglected my Dutch and German. So I’m pleased to learn that today I’m on a train that’s a “zug”, and I’m sitting in what I think is a “fenster”. Not a nice guitar, but […]
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