m̌ ḫ's photos with the keyword: Deutschland

Berlin in one frame: power, history, tourism, and everyday life all politely squeezing into the same picture. The Spree with the boat is the city’s moving audience, gliding past politics as if the government were just another attraction on the route. The Reichstag in the distance anchors the scene: solid, slightly solemn, but now almost used to being photographed more than feared.

The roof of Futurium in Berlin is both an accessible city terrace and a piece of environmental technology, conceived as part of the museum’s narrative about possible futures. Architecturally, it forms a shallow basin: the sloping planes channel all rainwater to a low point, where it is collected in a cistern and reused for cooling and other non‑potable purposes, turning a simple downpour into part of the building’s technical cycle. Almost the entire roof is covered by a dense field of photovoltaic and solar‑thermal modules – sometimes described as a “solar sea” – which supply a substantial share of Futurium’s own electricity and heat demand and support its minimum‑energy, BNB‑Gold certification. Unusually for a technology roof of this kind, visitors are allowed onto it: a skywalk leads around the upper edge, offering views over the Spree, the government district, and the Chancellery, so the public can literally walk on the energy landscape. A bit of trivia: the architects designed roof, façade, and technical systems as one integrated envelope, so the building’s futuristic image is inseparable from the way it manages sun and water.

Of course, it’s possible to take a more polished or descriptive photograph of the Futurium – one of Berlin’s most forward‑looking landmarks, a place where architecture meets imagination. Conceived as a museum of the future, it invites visitors to explore visions of science, technology and sustainable living. Its sleek glass façade mirrors both the sky and the city around it, symbolising transparency and an enduring curiosity about what lies ahead. Yet in the background, the faint silhouette of the S‑Bahn provides a striking contrast – an echo of urban realism, perhaps even a quiet dystopian whisper beneath Berlin’s gleaming promise of tomorrow.

Some time ago, I learned that there are two living kinds of hippos. The common hippo is the big, heavy river animal most people imagine first – noisy crowds in muddy water, huge mouths, a very “don’t‑mess‑with‑me” attitude. The animal in my photo is a pygmy hippo: smaller, more compact, with smoother skin and a quieter, self‑contained pose. From my perspective, this isn’t just “a hippo picture”; it’s a portrait of the shy forest cousin of the common hippo, caught in a rare, calm moment in front of my camera. And what I like most is knowing that both hippos are, surprisingly, closer relatives of whales and dolphins than of cows or pigs.