Berlin
The young woman gazed at me deeply through azure blue eyes. Her complexion was soft and fair, and her dark brown hair was shoulder-length, falling loosely on her dark wool tunic. She didn't say a word, but compared my features to the photograph and description in my passport before handing the document back to me and moving on to the next passenger.
Her searing gaze is the most vivid memory I have of a time, many years ago, when Kathie and I crossed to the Soviet sector of East Berlin through Checkpoint Charlie. Other East German border guards methodically opened the trunks of passenger cars, checking eastbound vehicles for contraband and checking westbound vehicles for smuggled people. Guards with wheeled mirrors peered underneath trucks, buses and cars, looking for stowaways.
The contrast between East and West could not have been more stark. After flying from Frankfurt to Tegel airport in West Berlin, Kathie and I emerged onto a beautiful island of the West adrift in the bland grey sea of the East. West Berlin had the typical pale yellow Mercedes-Benz taxis, the Deutschmark as its currency, and all of the modern trappings of the West. From our hotel and the S-Bahn to from restaurants and street vendors, we felt at home in West Berlin.
Wanting to experience the East, we decided to join a bus tour to a museum in East Berlin, which had on display the famous bust of the ancient Egyptian Queen Nefertiti. Accompanied by passengers of different nationalities, including an American soldier in uniform, our bus successfully passed through the border checkpoint and made its way to the museum. Along Unter den Linden, one of the city's main thoroughfares, every building seemed dark, grey and shabby. No color. No life.
Worn little Trabants, with engines making sounds that reminded me of a lawnmower, putted up and down the broad avenues and small side streets. Traffic was light--the opposite of West Berlin. On the bus, our East German guide extolled the virtues of the socialist state. Everyone who wanted to work was employed, with residents paying the equivalent of $8.00 a month to rent an apartment. The wait for a new Trabant, though, could be a year or two.
After seeing Nefertiti's bust and other ancient Egyptian artifacts, we drove to a lakeside park for refreshments and a stretch. The warning we got about talking to locals was unnecessary, as the few people in the park shied away from us foreigners. The guide showed us more of East Berlin, such as the immense Alexanderplatz, government ministries and more museums, all in varying shades of grey.
Returning to West Berlin, what struck me immediately was the vast array of color. Signs and lights, flowers and clothing--everything exploded in colors. Shop windows full of goods, cafe-goers sipping raspberry-infused Berliner Weisse beer, bumper-to-bumper traffic along the Ku'damm. West Berlin was vibrant and bustling with activity, the antithesis of what we saw on our brief visit to the eastern part of the city merely an hour earlier.
When our Berlin weekend ended and I returned to my office in Eschborn, just outside of Frankfurt, I stood in my secretary's doorway describing Kathie's and my experiences. I told Christa how we climbed the steps to the observation platform at the dividing wall, looking east past the no-man's land to the Brandenburger Tor and beyond. I told her about shopping at KaDeWe (Kaufhaus des Westens, or "Department Store of the West"), Berlin's equivalent to Harrod's or Printemps, and about seeing the remains of the old Reichstag building on our way to visit the zoo.
Christa told me about her experiences in the DDR as well, thankful that she'd been born in the West and accustomed to the same liberties and freedoms as we Americans.
Christa and I speculated about what it would take for Germany to be reunited. One thing was certain, though: It was virtually unthinkable that it could happen in our lifetimes. Little did we know that a mere five years later--on November 9, 1989--a crack would open in the wall between East and West Berlin, unleashing a torrent of people and presaging the reunification of Germany.
Her searing gaze is the most vivid memory I have of a time, many years ago, when Kathie and I crossed to the Soviet sector of East Berlin through Checkpoint Charlie. Other East German border guards methodically opened the trunks of passenger cars, checking eastbound vehicles for contraband and checking westbound vehicles for smuggled people. Guards with wheeled mirrors peered underneath trucks, buses and cars, looking for stowaways.
The contrast between East and West could not have been more stark. After flying from Frankfurt to Tegel airport in West Berlin, Kathie and I emerged onto a beautiful island of the West adrift in the bland grey sea of the East. West Berlin had the typical pale yellow Mercedes-Benz taxis, the Deutschmark as its currency, and all of the modern trappings of the West. From our hotel and the S-Bahn to from restaurants and street vendors, we felt at home in West Berlin.
Wanting to experience the East, we decided to join a bus tour to a museum in East Berlin, which had on display the famous bust of the ancient Egyptian Queen Nefertiti. Accompanied by passengers of different nationalities, including an American soldier in uniform, our bus successfully passed through the border checkpoint and made its way to the museum. Along Unter den Linden, one of the city's main thoroughfares, every building seemed dark, grey and shabby. No color. No life.
Worn little Trabants, with engines making sounds that reminded me of a lawnmower, putted up and down the broad avenues and small side streets. Traffic was light--the opposite of West Berlin. On the bus, our East German guide extolled the virtues of the socialist state. Everyone who wanted to work was employed, with residents paying the equivalent of $8.00 a month to rent an apartment. The wait for a new Trabant, though, could be a year or two.
After seeing Nefertiti's bust and other ancient Egyptian artifacts, we drove to a lakeside park for refreshments and a stretch. The warning we got about talking to locals was unnecessary, as the few people in the park shied away from us foreigners. The guide showed us more of East Berlin, such as the immense Alexanderplatz, government ministries and more museums, all in varying shades of grey.
Returning to West Berlin, what struck me immediately was the vast array of color. Signs and lights, flowers and clothing--everything exploded in colors. Shop windows full of goods, cafe-goers sipping raspberry-infused Berliner Weisse beer, bumper-to-bumper traffic along the Ku'damm. West Berlin was vibrant and bustling with activity, the antithesis of what we saw on our brief visit to the eastern part of the city merely an hour earlier.
When our Berlin weekend ended and I returned to my office in Eschborn, just outside of Frankfurt, I stood in my secretary's doorway describing Kathie's and my experiences. I told Christa how we climbed the steps to the observation platform at the dividing wall, looking east past the no-man's land to the Brandenburger Tor and beyond. I told her about shopping at KaDeWe (Kaufhaus des Westens, or "Department Store of the West"), Berlin's equivalent to Harrod's or Printemps, and about seeing the remains of the old Reichstag building on our way to visit the zoo.
Christa told me about her experiences in the DDR as well, thankful that she'd been born in the West and accustomed to the same liberties and freedoms as we Americans.
Christa and I speculated about what it would take for Germany to be reunited. One thing was certain, though: It was virtually unthinkable that it could happen in our lifetimes. Little did we know that a mere five years later--on November 9, 1989--a crack would open in the wall between East and West Berlin, unleashing a torrent of people and presaging the reunification of Germany.
posted by Joe Wollet at 8:16 AM
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