On Tuesday, 3 May 2016 at 11:14:07 UTC, Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:
>
> I arrived as well. I foolishly chose to ignore this thread and assumed taking the taxi from the airport to the hotel is a proper choice. So I hop on the taxi and ask if he takes credit. He says no taxi at the airport does. So I walk to an ATM and get some Euros, then hop back in the cab. There's no driver/car identification displayed inside and I see no meter. I ask where the meter is, he says it's on the left (where I can't see what it shows).
>
> We get to the hotel, he says it's 76 Euros. I'm like, Jesus this is high. He goes, yeah Tegel is far away from this hotel, next time try to book the other airport. I ask for a receipt, he handwrites me one on a standard form with no stamp and no identification.
>
> As I walk to the reception I ask the receptionist what's the usual taxi price to the airport and sure enough I paid twice the usual. I mention what I paid and to her credit she makes an effort to call the number on the receipt and tries to figure out what happened. They say they can't do anything without a stamp on the receipt so she suggests I call the police and try to get his plates off of some security cameras. I figure life is too short to press on, but this is quite the bummer - Germany was really the last place where I assumed this kind of stuff cannot happen. In fact it was the reason for which I didn't heed the non-visible meter warning; something similar did happen to me in Romania, in a very different era.
>
>
> Andrei

Sorry to hear that. The taxi fare calculator said it would be around €40, if you take the shortest route. If the guy took the route through the city, I suppose it took much longer.

Berlin is not Germany and it is not even representative of Germany. Like all capital cities, it's the least representative city of the country. Also, Berlin is Prussian, not "German". German culture doesn't really exist. Germany is made up of many different regional cultures that have different histories, different traditions and mentalities (and dialects). Like most European, so called, "nations".

But never mind, my grandpa got also fleeced by a taxi driver when he went to Berlin a long time ago. He was even taken to some dubious hotel and he had to threaten to call the police. So I see Berlin hasn't really changed in this respect, except the guy took you to the right hotel :-)

On Tuesday, 3 May 2016 at 11:14:07 UTC, Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:
> [...] They say they can't do anything without a stamp on the receipt so she suggests I call the police and try to get his plates off of some security cameras. I figure life is too short to press on, but this is quite the bummer [...]

Sad to hear. Unfortunately, it does not seem to be that rare if you are recognized as a foreigner:

https://translate.google.de/translate?hl=de&sl=de&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.berliner-kurier.de%2Fberlin%2Fpolizei-und-justiz%2Ftouristen-abzocke-fuer-diese-taxi-quittung-schaemt-sich-berlin-22528862&sandbox=1

http://www.berliner-kurier.de/berlin/polizei-und-justiz/touristen-abzocke-fuer-diese-taxi-quittung-schaemt-sich-berlin-22528862

On Tuesday, 3 May 2016 at 11:14:07 UTC, Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:
> I figure life is too short to press on

You could still try and report him to the police, if you have his number plates, so that the fecker doesn't get away with it this time.

On 5/2/2016 11:04 PM, yawniek wrote:
> if you want to do more sightseeing i can recommend
> http://www.ddr-museum.de/en
> i was there last year and its very weird to see how people lift not long
> ago.

I did visit the Technical Museum and the History Museum. I especially enjoyed the locomotives at the former - it's quite a collection, and it all has a wonderful smell of engine oil!

There's just too much to see in Berlin, I could be fully occupied for a month.