The first steps to break down the Berlin Wall took place on
November 9th 1989 and the official reunification of the two Germanys one year later, but they came of age in style, in what used to be East Berlin, long before the 20th anniversary of their unification on October 3rd, 2010, German Unity Day. The country’s only national holiday and in German known as Der Tag der Deutschen Einheit.
For more than forty years before that could take place, from the autumn of 1949, there was an East and a West Germany and in the middle of the Eastern sector, known as the German Democratic Republic or GDR, was West Berlin a small independent area protected by the French, British and the USA, and part of what used to be the former German Capital, Berlin. After the building of the Berlin Wall in 1961 Checkpoint Charlie, became one of three 'Checkpoints', and after 1962 was the only place at which foreigners visiting Berlin could cross from West to East and back again.
Of course in retrospect crossing into communist East Berlin with my young son's passport in my handbag was more than a little misguided, but
as it was the first of what was to become many trips to East Berlin this particular thought had not even crossed my mind.Certainly it was the passports discovery, while he was not with me but had chosen instead to enjoy that days brilliant sunshine and stay with friends sailing on Lake Wannsee in the Western sector of Berlin, that had led to the intensified checkpoint search, during which several thousand Singapore dollars in unreasonably large denomination notes were found in my camera bag, left there, unbeknown to me, by the friend who had borrowed it.
A compulsory purchase of DDR (East German) marks and accompanying declaration registering all currencies in my possession had already been completed, of course with no mention of any Singapore dollars, so their appearance, together with the spare passport, meant that the already officious attitude of the border guards suddenly became open hostility.
Interrogation in a small side room, further searches, including through some of my clothes, and, as I later found out, strange anonymous phone
calls to several people listed in my diary’s telephone index, permanent confiscation of the dollars, and temporary confiscation of the extra passport followed until, after more than two hours the guards were satisfied they were dealing with a tactless tourist not a major child smuggling criminal.During this time the German friend with whom I was visiting East Berlin, and who as a citizen of Germany had dropped me off at Checkpoint Charlie and then passed through the Heinrich Heine Strasse crossing, had been repeatedly going backwards and forwards through the border asking at Checkpoint Charlie if a British person had gone through, to which the answer on both sides was always 'No'. Which of course was basically true because the one who was trying to go through was in fact stuck in the middle.
However somewhat nervous, and without the suspicious passport, but nevertheless free, it was at last possible to step out into the shadows of the manned watch tower and adjacent bricked up buildings.
Even the haze of Trabant exhaust fumes on that side of the wall could not conceal some cultural and architectural gems, nevertheless the drab apartment blocks, Stalinist architecture, still visible scars of World War Two, countless armed soldiers, poorly stocked shops, unwelcoming cafes and overall greyness, were a conspicuous contrast to the Western Sector of Berlin of the time.
It would have been difficult to visualise a more obvious reminder of a divided city.
East Berlin of the not so distant past but somewhere that is now almost impossible to recognise or even to imagine.
Any return journey is made to a city where a dividing wall, the genuine Checkpoint Charlie, watch towers, smog, and most signs of forty years of communist rule, no longer exist.
Renewed, and almost unrecognisable, what was dour East Berlin is the spirited heart of cosmopolitan and dynamic Berlin Mitte, centre of a unified Berlin.
A desolate and vast building site during most of the 1990’s but today an active, colourful and popular residential and commercial neighbourhood, filled with creative and economic life, a vibrant, eclectic mixture of historical and modern, cultural and artistic, and now re-established as the hub of German government. All those years ago it took only hours to explore what the city could offer, whereas it would now take a very enjoyable, and busy, few weeks.
Under communist rule many of the buildings, those which had survived the general enthusiasm of being torn down and rebuilt as examples of socialist architecture, were uncared for to the point of ruin but nevertheless not destroyed, beautifully restored they now juxtaposition with stunning contemporary architecture.
Meanwhile innovative theatres, world famous orchestras, opera, ballet, and musical concerts, museums and art galleries, culture that covers all areas of interest, blends seamlessly with the wide ranging diversity and categories of restaurant and hotel, cafes, pubs, clubs, a pulsating night life and shopping that rivals London, New York or Paris.
Transformed as it interweaves the present together with its historical past into charismatic Berlin Mitte, the former East Berlin, capital of the German Democratic Republic and a bleak, neglected shell when exultant Berliners began to knock down the wall on November 9th, 1989, now thrives in its freedom and renaissance, the people as well as the place having accomplished far more in the passing years than simply reclaiming a lost heritage.
1986 photo by Thierry Noir at Bethaniendamm in Berlin-Kreuzberg - Checkpoint Charlie with vehicles entering the Western Zone, photo Bundesarchiv material - View over the Russian Zone from Checkpoint Charlie observation post 1982, with East German watchtower to left of flag, contributor Lyricmac, - View Palast der Republik, Berliner Dom and TV tower 1988 by NMMIMAJ, present day Berlin Unter den Linden with TV tower by VollwertBI, all courtesy de.Wikipedia
The Berlin Wall by Frederic Taylor, historian and storyteller, is a captivating read. It is perhaps the definitive work covering the failed experiment of East German communism, together with the lives of those who lived with and under it, many whom now look back at those days with affection.
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