We are now back in South Africa, our trip overseas was a bit of a chilly one, but very very cool. Because I’m married to an internet scouring genius and an all round nice guy, we got to see a bunch of cool things when we were in Paris and Berlin. The next couple of posts are going to be about some places I think you should definitely visit if you are in either of these 2 cities. And if you are anything like me, then you’ll appreciate places that are worth pulling your camera out over and these spots definitely fall into that category.
I’ll start with Berlin…First of all there is this tiny Korean restaurant called Gong Gan (Schwedter Str. 2, 10119 Berlin) that we literally just stumbled across one day whilst looking for a place to have lunch. We walked in and right away I could tell that I was going to like it. It was put together in such a cool way, it had what looked like handmade/joint together furniture and wall decor that was pieced together like something you would find in a crazy clock workshop. We sat down and were promptly greeted by the sweetest Korean man who was only more than willing to try help us understand the menu (it was in German). In the end we asked him what his favourite thing was and he pointed out a dish called bibimbap, which is a bowl of warm rice topped with namul (sautéed and seasoned vegetables), gochujang (chili pepper paste) and meat, if you want. You are meant to mix it all together throughly before eating it.
I’m not sure if the fact that it was served in a gold steel bowl with matching gold metal chopsticks and spoon had anything to do with it, but it was damn delicious and we pretty much ate every single last bit of it.
Like I said, I would definitely say seek this little place out and have a meal there, it was well priced and well designed and well cooked – you won’t be disappointed.
Gong Gan – Schwedter Str. 2, 10119 Berlin
The second place I’m going to say you have to go visit if you find yourself in Berlin is Designpanoptikum – Surreal Museum For Industrial Objects. Ok now this place is a once off, crazy, made-up land of craziness. I know that sentence doesn’t really make sense, but I kind of feel like you have to go see this place in real life to understand just how special it is. The owner and curator is one Mr. Vlad Korneev and he himself is as engaging as the objects that he has collected over the last few years. His museum is full of all things bizarre, scientific and wonderful looking, he combines pieces here and there to create new ways of looking at things, but he also has things that are great in their original form. The museum isn’t huge, but I would say go check it out, bet you you’ve never seen anything like it before…
Designpanoptikum. Surreal Museum For Industrial Objects – Torstraße 201, 10115 Berlin, Germany
i want to go to there!