20 Years Since the Wall Fell
I was a young whipper-snapper when the wall fell. I had been to Germany the previous summer and had fallen in love with the people and culture. I was not there when the wall started to fall, but luckily it didn’t all happen at once.
I was given an opportunity to go to Germany in December of 1989. I stayed through the new year and was able to make it to Berlin on a cold Sunday morning after a long train trip from Dortmund. I was in a hurry to make it to the East, since I wanted to see the Brandenburg Gate. When I arrived in East Berlin, I saw almost no one. It was surreal and quiet. I walked maybe a half-dozen blocks to get to the gate from the S-Bahn station.
I have to say that it was anti-climactic on the East-side of the wall. I had expected to see East Germans hammering at the wall in a symbolic effort to get through, but as I approached the wall, I still saw no one. But I did hear something. From somewhere far away, there was a tapping. I figured out that the source of the sound was an echo coming from the other side of the wall bouncing off of the buildings on either side of the wall. It was the only sound I could hear. It was perhaps symbolic that the West was more interested in the act of tearing down the wall, the East Germans just wanted out.
I tried to cross back at the Brandenburg checkpoint, but the rule was still that you had to cross back in the same place that you arrived. So I hurried out of the spooky silence of East Berlin and took the S-Bahn to Checkpoint Charlie.
The scene there was completely different. As far as my eyes could see, there were people hacking away at the wall with hammers and chisels, people selling things and gawkers snapping pictures of the scene. People played music and almost everyone had a smile on their face.
The typical image of the wall, a graffiti covered canvas, was disrupted from the ground to about 7 feet up by people working on taking a piece of the wall, and preferably with graffiti. I wanted to have a hammer and chisel, and luckily there was a guy renting them from a little table a few feet from the wall.
“Sprechen Sie English?”
“Hell yeah, I’m from New Jersey!”
He rented me the hammer and chisel for 5 marks and let me use it as long as I wanted.
I don’t think I knew the whole history of the wall when I was there. I didn’t have the kind of context that my parents had, but I knew that what I was doing was historic, exciting and revolutionary. It was truly something to experience, but I am not at all disappointed that my kids won’t get to experience it. I prefer bridges to walls.
http://www.examiner.com/x-2547-Watchdog-Politics-Examiner~y2009m11d9-Berlin-Wall-and-Ronald-Reagan-Video
Jebus lizard, jebus.
Even though I have the American citizenship and am proud to live here – above all I am and will always be a “Berliner” – even moreso then being German. It is an amazing city and I am glad you got to see it, LG.
As for Reagon – even though his fans – you know, the people who think of him as holier than thou – like to always state that He tore down the wall . No, he didn’t. I couldn’t agree more with a TIME article that stated:
“Neither Gorbachev nor Reagan was directly responsible for the fall of the Wall; rather, it collapsed from its own weight..(snipped parts)…..Allowing democracy to spread through Eastern Europe in 1989 was Gorbachev’s greatest accomplishment; in this drama, Reagan was the supporting actor. “
Other than this speech, Ronald Reagan had virtually nothing to do with the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Google has put up pictures of the Berlin Wall from the Life Magazine archive.
Redwaterlily has a great eyewitness account of the fall of the Berlin Wall — definitely go over there to read it, she’s also got some interesting video too.
O skipped the Berlin Wall event, but…
Obama says he wants to visit Hiroshima in future
Associated Press ^
TOKYO – President Barack Obama says he wants to visit Hiroshima and Nagasaki sometime during his presidency but won’t have time during this week’s trip to Japan to go to the cities devastated by U.S. atomic bombs at the end of World War II. No sitting U.S. president has visited the two cities largely because of the controversy it could raise at home. In an interview with Japanese broadcaster NHK that ran Tuesday, Obama said he would be unable to visit the cities on his trip to Japan this weekend due to time constraints but would be willing to do so in the future. “The memories of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are etched in the minds of the world and I would be honored to have the opportunity to visit those cities at some point during my presidency,” Obama said in the interview, done Monday at the White House. Calls have grown in Japan for Obama to visit the two cities since his April speech in Prague envisioning a nuclear-free world and since he was named Nobel Peace Prize winner last month.
think he will find time to make an official visit to Pearl Harbor? or Batan?
first of all idiot, the guy is from Hawaii… or at least lived there shortly after coming over from Kenya. Im SURE he has been to pearl harbor. second, i cant tell what you are mad at. You seem to take umbrage to an American president going to the site of one of the worst single events one country has ever done to another (it was WORSE than PH and 9/11 put together and many many more innocent children died, so before you aim your faux patriotic fire at me, dont)… BUT you also seem to be demanding he go. You have proven once again, you dont hate Obama’s actions, you hate Obama. get over it. He is YOUR president elected by Americans. You LLLOOOOOSSSSTTTTT
a.,
There is literally nothing Obama can do to make these people happy. They complain about everything. I count most of it as background noise.
Liz, you must have had an extra big helping of “Glenn’s crazy tonic” this morning eh?
oh, i know U.I but continuing to call them fun things like the “Bible Humping White Wing” party and gleefully anticipating a Socialist America with a Wiccan Iraqi-born gay hermaphrodite (although i dont know how that is possible…)president is almost as fun as that new tiolet freshener with Glenn Beck’s face on it i just installed (yes i really have one)
I was 4 when the wall fell. the only real memories i have of the time was my dad ranting something about how it would forever make Ronny Forget-a-lot a Saint forever
..leave it to the “Bible-Thumping White Right Wingers” to hijack a thread on a totally different topic and take it over in an attempt to spew their hatred. Of course, they have to do that on Delaware LIBERAL…idiots.
I think what lizard overlooked with the Berlin wall thread is who the real victim is here, Naisho, who has been romantically linked to the Berlin wall for several years…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5Yuc7XSCJ4&feature=related
(psst ps i’m kidding)