Walls Come Tumbling Down

Even though I’m having a month off from the Missives this IS the twentieth anniversary of the storming of the Berlin Wall which is my favourite of all historical happenings. Mainly because I was there only six months before.

So I’m going to repost my Berlin Stories about the time I visited East Berlin and got into a bit o’ bother. I’ll remember it all my life. It was originally in two parts but is posted as one here.

Berlin: East Side Story

When I was 18 I lived in West Germany from 1988/1989. Turns out, this was a pivotal year in Germany’s history. You may remember….

In the region of NordRhein- Westfalen, the state sponsored English Assistant Teachers, of which I was one, got taken on a trip to Berlin every year, by way of thanks for their hard work and to provide them with a cultural experience.

In May 1989, we traveled by bus, leaving West Germany, making our way through the German Democratic Republic, the country name that makes me laugh the most, and eventually alighting in a little Western outpost called West Berlin.

In 1988, Berlin was still split into East and West by means of a hulking big concrete wall populated by men in ridiculous outfits, who were eager to shoot those who tried to climb over it.

Official figures say that around 125 East Germans were shot between 1961 and 1989, whilst trying to get over the wall, or walls. There were actually two parallel walls with a strip of land known unofficially, of course, as the “death strip” in between them. The Wall was over 155 kilometres (96 miles) long.

Bear in mind, official East German figures would of course be doctored. No one knew how many people were actually killed whilst trying to escape to West Germany at the time of the regime and the shoot to kill policy for defectors was, for a long time, denied by the Communist regime. Yet, the documents are there, now in German archives, confirming the command for shooting those caught defecting. The numbers are higher that those admitted to previously.

In 1989 the west side of the wall looked like this.

The East side of the wall looked like this.

At the end of our week in the city we were to spend a day in East Berlin. This would be the strangest day of my life.

Before our cross-border trip we were given a talk on how to behave in East Berlin. Anyone not attending the meeting would not be allowed to go on the three minute S-Bahn train journey from the west to Freidrichsstrasse in East Berlin.

The meeting, hosted by our West German school teacher chaperone, Frau Lohse, broke down like this.

As western citizens, we would perhaps be unable to digest the reality of life for those who lived in East Germany. We may be tempted to show our feelings about any weirdness we encountered or anything we may have read prior to our visit there.

We may even feel sorry for those who lived there. We may be too curious about their lives. We may naively try and do something that makes a small difference. In no uncertain terms should we follow these urges; East Germany was not to be messed with.

And be sure of this; not all East Germans want to escape.

We were told that the people of East Berlin may not be friendly towards us, but there were reasons for this. Having lived in Cologne, traditionally the most unfriendly city in the whole of Germany (and that’s saying something!), I was at least was glad to hear the Ossies had an excuse for their rude behaviour where the average Kolsche* supermarket assistant did not.

The East Germans would be nervous of being seen talking to visitors from West Berlin. This could be for two reasons. Firstly, the Ossies are acutely aware of always being watched by police, or undercover Stasi (secret police). Contact with Westerners was frowned upon at best. Secondly, many Ossies are suspicious or disdainful of those from the West. Their state feeds them propaganda about the West and it is not complimentary.

We were told, “Do not make them any more uncomfortable by seeking their company or imposing yourselves upon them, if not invited to do so.”

Secondly, do not give any of your money away. At the Friedrichstrasse train station in East Berlin, you may come across people who look like they might need some cash. Do not be tempted to give them any money. On reaching the East, all visitors are required to exchange 30DM for Ost-marks (simply known as Marks, the East German currency). You will find next to nothing to spend these Ost marks on. This is a ruse by the East German government to get their hands on Western money. You will not be able to exchange your leftover Ostmarks for Western Deutschmarks. You WILL have left over East money which you will tempted to get rid of.

Under no circumstances give your money to East Germans. This will get them into serious trouble. Most especially, do not give any Western money to East Germans – even if they ask you for it. It is illegal for an East German to possess western currency. Yes, yes, we know the DDR Government has it. Yes, yes, we know the DDR economy can’t function without it. Their citizens are forbidden it.

It was like being warned not to feed the animals by the zookeepers. We took it all in with a large pinch of salt. How bad could it be?

A final note from our hosts. Do not take photographs of any officials, border guards, The Wall or any government buildings. You may be approached by police, asked to empty your camera of film and surrender it. If this happens to you, do not argue. It isn’t worth it, you’ll be put on a train back to the West immediately.

The meeting ended with a wish for us to enjoy our visit to East Berlin, and a reminder that we are guests in a different country with different rules. Rules which, no matter how we feel about them personally, we must respect.

We would catch the S-Bahn to Friedrichstrasse at 8am the next day.

* Kolsche: A person from Cologne. Also their local beer

Part Two: Berlin, Alexanderplatz

Walking across Alexanderplatz, we agreed it had been an odd day.

We were two Western eighteen year old student teachers who found themselves separated from the party of other eighteen year olds who were looking for a pub after their bizarre trip up the Fersehturm (TV tower) of East Berlin in May 1989.

“You don’t go to East Berlin to go to the pub.”

We went our separate ways from the pub bound faction. Cultural differences.

From the top of the tower you could see the whole of Berlin; the whole of it: the American sector, the British Sector, the French sector all merged into one sprawling West Berlin. And then the big old wall that stretched as far as you could see and closed off the Russian Sector that we all now stood in.

As we wandered round the windowed observation point at the top of the tower we eavesdropped in on a primary school party of East German kids obviously on a little day trip of their own.

I’ll never forget this. The teacher asked her class, who couldn’t have been older than six,

“And who is that in the statue down below on Alexanderplatz?”

A little boy waited to be chosen amongst a sea of little raised hands. A quick gesture from the teacher to respond and he said like rote the most bizarre sentence I have ever heard a little kid say ,

“That is Karl and Marx and Friedrich Engels, the fathers of our nation, the German Democratic Republic.”

“That’s right.” said the teacher and moved on with her tour, unaware of me staring at them open mouthed.

So back down on the ground, Fiona and I were on Alexanderplatz talking about the group of kids. And wondering what to do next with our only day in East Berlin. Alexanderplatz is huge, so we decided to walk away from the wall direction and keep going.

“Let’s just keep walking and see what we find.”

On the edge of the square we waited at the pedestrian crossing, well trained to wait for the green man after countless months in West Germany where pretty much all of us had been done for “jaywalking” across an empty road on a red man.

“Christ, if they’d fine you 30 marks for crossing the road wrongly in Cologne, you’d probably be dragged off to a detention centre and have your family tortured in front of you over here.”

East Berlin was bugging us, to be honest. We’d been told off for countless petty things. This is a peculiar German pastime; giving foreigners into trouble for the most inane reasons. We were used to the tut-tutting of West German old ladies on trams if we moved the wrong way. But over here in East Germany the petty rule keeping was up several gears.

Earlier we had moved a chair over from an empty table to accommodate a fifth member round the table at lunch. As you do.

“This is a four person table” the waitress said.

“But there are five of us”

“This is a four person table”

“Do you have a five person table?”

“No. This is a four person table only.”

“But…oh never mind…”

We waited for the green man to appear at the pedestrian crossing. Then behind us, we heard a little voice.

“Zwanzig, dreizig, vierzig, funfzig. Ein Mark….”

We turned round to see a little boy sat on a kerb counting pocketfuls of coins.

“Hello. What are you up to?” I asked.

I was just making conversation. It’s refreshing for students of German to have a chance to talk to kids; they don’t automatically want to try their English out on you and you can have a right good old chat without anyone correcting your grammar. If you’ve ever tried your German out in Germany, you’ll know what I mean…

“Look” he stretched out his hand. He was maybe seven or eight with dirty blond hair and glasses, clearly very chuffed with himself and not at all shy about speaking to two strange women. He was a smiley wee bloke.

We went over to him.

“I’ve got this much East money,” he said holding a handful of the almost weightless, little, fake looking East German coins.

“But look how much West money I’ve got!” he said digging a smaller haul out of his pocket.

“Wow! Where did you get all that?”, said Fiona, in the over-the-top astonished manner you do with kids.

“From the tourists. They just give it to me.”

“Cool. What are you going to spend it on then?”

“Nothing, I’m going to give it to my mum.”

That was it. Fiona and I start rummaging in our bags for our purses.

To this day, I tell you that little boy got me. I don’t know if he was the biggest player in East Berlin and I don’t care. He got to us.

Can we, at this point, just stop and view a misty vaseline edged flashback of our tour leader, Frau Lohse from the meeting the day before? Let’s have a look at her…there she is…

“Never give East Germans any West money. You’ll get them into serious trouble.”

Yeah you can see her, can’t you? Maybe she’s even wagging a finger? Maybe there’s a crowd of us nodding blithely in response?

Well, at that moment we didn’t see her, we didn’t remember what she said. Or we didn’t care. We dug into our purses for handfuls of whatever money we could find and then….

“Guten tag.”

We looked up and to the side of our new friend. Our faces flushed as we realised what was happening. A tall East German policeman in a dark green uniform. There. In front of us. He’d been watching us for goodness knows how long, about to hand over Westgeld to a little boy. Which we aren’t allowed to do and he isn’t allowed to have.

It is like he has appeared OUT OF NOWHERE.

“What are you doing?” he asks us.

The little boy stops the counting but does not put the money back in his pockets. He just looks up. He knows what is coming.

“ Nothing.”

“Then on your way, ” he motions back towards Alexanderplatz. It is clear we are not going to be allowed to go any further out of the square.

We walk away, cold sweating, hearts pounding, back across Alexanderplatz in the direction of the wall. The vastness of the square means we can see the police officer as he stands with the little boy, motionless as he watches us go. We walk further, we look back. He’s still watching us.

After five minutes, we’re nearly at the other side of the square. We check; in the distance, he’s still standing there with the boy, who is now standing up. They both then cross the road together, now tiny figures, walking away from us.

The little boy is about to have all his Westgeld confiscated because two stupid girls thought they could solve a little problem that didn’t even exist. Two girls that thought they were cleverer than everyone else. Two girls that didn’t listen when they were told that giving money to East German citizens could get them into real trouble.

We felt sick. We couldn’t talk. We got on the train, and went home and went to bed at 7 o’clock exhausted, guilty, sad and bewildered about the German Democratic Republic.

When the Wall came down six months later Fiona was the first person I called as I watched the news.

“I can’t help thinking about that wee boy”, I said.

“Me too.”

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November 9, 2009. 1989, East Berlin, Mauer, the Berlin Wall. 11 comments.