We’ve always loved a good weekend city break. Pre-Covid, we’d manage at least one or two a year—easy little getaways with big impact. Cramming in a few full-on days of foreign culture was always a real treat, and while we were never gone long, we always came back feeling somehow renewed.
Since Covid, we’ve still travelled—done longer trips abroad, had weekends away—but not a proper city break. This year, we felt the call to bring that ritual back. Lisa gifted me a Christmas trip—and top of the list was Berlin.
It felt timely. Even symbolic.
Just 10 days before we flew out, the UK marked 80 years since VE Day. And the week of May 12–18 was Mental Health Awareness Week, themed around community—how connection holds us together, and isolation breaks us down. I’d actually been invited to deliver a presentation on exactly that—Community in the Workplace and its Impact on Mental Health—the day before we left.
So those threads—war, peace, mental health, community—were already weaving themselves through my thoughts as we touched down in Berlin.
Now, Plymouth doesn’t have its own airport, so we flew from Bristol—just a couple of hours up the road. With smooth parking, easy transfers, and the famously efficient German rail network, we were from tarmac to hotel in no time. So far, so smooth.
I’ve always considered myself a student of history—or at least, a curious reader. I’ve read plenty about Germany, about World War II, the Cold War. Our daughter recently won a school trip to Auschwitz as part of her A-level History course, which reignited discussions at home about “all that stuff.”
But being in Berlin shook me.
Because what I hadn’t really grasped—what hit me right in the chest—was what came after. The psychological aftermath. The division of a nation. The splitting of cities, communities, and even families. The invisible scars on a generation’s mental health.
Everyone knows about East and West Berlin. The Wall. The USSR versus the Allies. But standing where that wall once cut through neighbourhoods like a scar, it becomes more than a political memory—it becomes personal. Lisa and I, usually laughing our way through every street and silly sign, both fell silent. There was a coldness. Not in the weather (but it was raining!)—but in the story. The history that haunted the air. I found my hand reaching for hers—some warmth, some grounding in the face of this stark reality.
One of the most impactful parts of our trip was visiting the Berlin-Hohenschönhausen Memorial, a former East German Stasi prison. Lisa had heard about it from someone in her fitness class—a Berliner now living in Plymouth—who recommended it as a place to really feel what life had been like under East German rule.
Our guide was a former inmate.
That changes everything.
The stories weren’t just about physical confinement. They were about psychological warfare. Isolation. Manipulation. Silence. The slow, methodical breaking down of people. No bruises needed—just separation from loved ones, the absence of time, the erasure of self. And even the guards were under constant surveillance. Orwell’s 1984 no longer felt like fiction—it felt like biography.
As someone who thrives in the open air—running thru the green spaces of Plymouth, paddling off of the Devon and Cornish coast, moving freely—the thought of being locked in that system twisted my gut. Every fibre of me ached to run. To breathe. To shout. And then… to be grateful. For freedom. For choice. For connection.
And it made me think—we still battle these forces today. Not with barbed wire, but in our minds. We still fall into isolation. Still feel watched, judged, trapped. We still cut ourselves off—through fear, shame, self-doubt. The modern version of the wall is often invisible… but no less real.
That’s why community matters. That’s why we need each other.
Because disconnection breaks us.
Community saves us.
In contrast to that darkness, I found a pocket of peace in the quiet grandeur of Berlin Cathedral, where I went to Mass. It was still, sacred, and soothing. A reminder that even in a city with a painful past, there are spaces carved out for hope, healing, and reflection. It felt important, as a Catholic, to pause in that space—to pray, to connect, to honour the peace within the storm.
As we wandered further, we stood before the Brandenburg Gate—Berlin’s iconic monument.
Its history is as turbulent as the city’s. Built as a symbol of peace, it was later used for military parades and propaganda, then sealed off during the Cold War, trapped in the no-man’s land of division. The Quadriga—the statue atop the gate—was once seized by Napoleon and taken to Paris, then reclaimed and returned. Over time, it’s represented everything from imperial might to Nazi power to Soviet resistance.
But now?
Now, to my eyes, it represents something new. Something whole.
It stands as a beacon of unity. Of healing. Of a city—and a people—stitched back together, embracing their diversity. The square around it buzzes with life. Locals, tourists, musicians, activists, lovers. Different. Equal. Together.
It’s no longer a gateway of conquest. It’s a gateway of community.
And maybe that’s what the Fool carries forward.
Not naivety, but hope. Not perfection, but courage. A willingness to keep walking—to keep stepping forward, even when the road is heavy with history.
That’s what this trip felt like. A gentle reboot. A reawakening. A pilgrimage into adventure, reflection, and reconnection.
I may have gone as a tourist, but I came back as a pilgrim—with new eyes, a fuller heart, and a deeper reminder:
Healing doesn’t happen in isolation.
It happens in community.
In shared stories. In silent prayers.
In brave conversations.
In weekends away that stir the soul.
Berlin reminded me that we all carry scars—some visible, some silent.
But we also carry hope.
And we carry each other.
So here’s to walking the Fool’s path with courage.
To rebuilding connection—within ourselves, with each other, and with something greater.
To the quiet places—cathedrals, coffee shops, candlelit corners—where the soul remembers it’s never truly alone.
Step by step, the pilgrimage continues. ✨
