Berend is an interesting guy with a lot of knowledge. His lecturing style is kinda boring, but if you're interested in Eastern Europe you shouldn't have a problem staying awake and learning a lot. He likes dates, so keep those in mind when you're writing your essays for his tests. Slip in as many as you can. The questions aren't really that bad. He gives you them before hand and then picks some of the ones he gave to actually test you on. It was a good experience.