OT - Berlin Wall memories

[rlu]

Truthfully I don't recall exactly what I was doing 20 years ago today. This anniversary is more a tv moment, watching the news and grinning and then days(?) later laughing as we watched people take sledgehammers to the wall. I can hear President Reagan's challenge/suggestion from 22 years ago as I write this. I vaguely remember watching MTV coverage of the event (what was that newscaster's name, I think he was from Rolling Stone magazine? Kurt something?)

I think the symbolism of the Berlin Wall coming down (today's the anniversary of the gates being thrown open, not sure when people started chopping/pulling it down) as part of the end of the Cold War is why it is so striking to me. Maybe you had to grow up with air raid sirens and learning about nuclear winters to get it (sophmore year in high school we covered as "natural disasters" earthquakes, tornadoes and nuclear winter).

Side note - when we visited Epcot 8 or so years ago we were there around the beginning of October and learned about Reunification Day by inquiring why there was a parade that particular day.

eta: I like this video about it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMaP-k_Ww3o&feature=related

I like this one too - don't understand the lyrics and hope they are not offensive (wouldn't think so given the topic). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcFPPIkdtYQ&NR=1&feature=fvwp


when I was preteen I wanted a pen pal from Russia through Big Blue Marble but I couldn't since we feared it would jeopardize my dad's work clearance.

[bluestarfish18]

I was only 7 when the wall came down, but I remember watching all the crazy events on TV. My aunt, the constant world traveler of our family, was actually there, and brought me back a quarter-sized piece of the actual wall. Unfortunately, at such a young age, I didn't really care about a piece of graffitied cement and probably tossed it in the trash soon after.

There are some cool art displays going on over there right now. Artists from Korea and other oppressed countries have decorated "dominos" of cement, which will fall and cause a domino effect where the wall used to be.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7svU_MU_o8

[karenj2]

We actually had an exchange student from West Berlin living with us in the US when the wall came down, so it was a big experience for us. I actually have a piece of the wall that Tanja's uncle gave to me (she has one too).

Tanja was both excited and upset about the wall coming down - on one hand it was such a historical moment for her, but it also changed her life completely... Her family is wealthy, and lived in a ritzy section of W. Berlin. When the wall came down, the west Berliners were taxed heavily so that the city could rebuild the eastern portion, which she resented. (That area of town is no longer a wealthy section, unfortunately.)

Living in a city that was basically isolated from the rest of her country, she was hyper-aware of politics; in fact she would argue with us about how little we knew or cared about the politics of Mexico and Canada.

When she returned to Germany that summer, I came over to visit. Even though the wall was down, the city was still VERY divided. We actually drove over to East Berlin to tour and have lunch, and got stuck in "no mans land" (with a single lane road with ditches, mines and gun towers on either side). The map we had of east Berlin wasn't accurate, as the government deliberately messed up the streets close to the boarder so people couldn't defect.

DH and I visited Berlin about 6 years ago when my sister was living in Germany. It was completely different! It's certainly improved, but it's still a work in progress.