During our tour yesterday we got tons of good stories from our guide. Didn't have a lot of time to take photos as it was a walking tour and usually we were walking pretty fast from location to location and didn't always stop in the ideal photo spot. But the information we got was quite interesting. So I will put some of the stories in this blog as I have the time to do so. I'll start this morning with:
Ghost Stations:
During the Cold War when East and West Berlin was divided, the East Berlin subway stations were blocked up and bricked off so that East Berliners were not able to sneak out of their part of the city by running down the subway tracks until they were in West Berlin. But as the city was divided not in a straight line but round about, West Berliners sometimes had to pass through East Berlin on their way to work and home. They put up a fuss and a solution was devised in that their subway trains were allowed to pass through the old stations that are now closed to East Berliners. They had to slow down and go slow. They could see the subway platforms where there would occasionally be a soldier with a machine gun (don't know how they got there if the entrances were bricked) but otherwise the lights would be quite dim and the place would be quite deserted. Up above, on the ground, the East Berliners could hear the subway trains pass underneath and could feel them but they couldn't get to them or see them. So the stations became known as Ghost Stations.
Holocaust Memorial:
A memorial has been erected in Berlin to the murdered victims of the holocaust. Of course like anything of this significance has plenty of controversy to go with it. Part of the controversy was what kind of memorial to do. At one point a large slab was considered which would have inscribed the names of the 4 1/2 million known victims. Then how would the 1 1/2 million unknown victims be memorialized? The memorial now consists of some 2000 concrete gray blocks of different sizes. they are laid in straight rows and the paths between them rise and fall and undulate. Another controversy arose when the blocks were sprayed with anti-graffiti spray that was developed by the company that had developed the poison gas pellets used in the extermination camps. According to our guide, the Jewish community in Berlin really didn't care much one way or another about the memorial. Their feeling was that they will remember the Holocaust and don't need a memorial to do so. The problem the guide had with the memorial is there are no actual signs that indicate what these blocks are or why they are there. There are signs set in the street around the memorial that tell people they are not to graffiti, not to jump block to block, not to sunbathe on the blocks, etc., but nothing that really says "This is a Holocaust Memorial". Other memorials are also planned for the murdered Roma people or gypsies, the political prisoners, and the homosexuals. Like all political controversies, most of them are meaningless to anyone not directly involved or having a steak in the outcome. The memorial is impressive but had he not explained to us what it was, it would have been an abstract curiosity in the middle of the city.
The Bebelplatz: scene of Nazi book burning
This is a rather insignificant looking plaza. Some nice buildings around it but without being told that it was where the Nazi's burned 20,000 books, you would probably just walk right by it. Books burned included anything the Nazi's considered not fit to be read because they didn't adhere to the party line. Fiction, non fiction, autobiographies, anything. Some authors were even present as their books were being burned. Some other authors wondered later why their books weren't burned as if they weren't important enough. A memorial was set up for the burned books but it is a sealed room underneath the square or platz. You can only see it by looking through a glass window set in the pavement. In the room below are empty bookshelves, enough for 20,000 books. during the day it is quite possible to miss the window. At night, it is lighted from below.
Escape from the Air Force building.
The Nazi air force building backed up against the "death zone", the open area between the two walls, where anyone venturing would be shot and killed and it was patrolled by dogs and men with machine guns. The back of the air force building was totally blocked up and windows bricked so that you could not see into the west. An elevator maintenance man planned a daring escape. He brought his wife and 11 (I think he was 11) year old son to work and told his bosses he was just going to show them around to see what he did. They accepted this and said OK. When alone, he locked them in a closet and went about his business for the day. After everyone had gone home for the day, he let out his wife and son and they climbed up the elevator shaft until they could get onto one of the window ledges above the lights and facing the top of the wall. He had to hurry because even though he was above the lights, the dogs making the rounds could have heard and smelled him. He threw a nylon rope over the wall attached to a tool, I think our guide said a hammer. He had friends waiting on the other side and they attached a steel cable which he pulled back over to the building on his side. Both sides tied off the cable. He then had rigged a seat and pulley. He put his wife into the pulley first and she went over the wall and into friends arms. Next he told his son to go and being the usual 11 year old, the son was not happy about being locked up all day and not happy about sliding quietly over the death zone so he said no. His dad had to promise him a new bicycle to get him to go. He also made it safely. Finally it was time for the elevator engineer to go and by now it is quite dangerous as time has passed but he too made it safely. The next day, the guards saw the cable and realized what had happened but this family was safe.
Another escape:
A Humboldt University student was living in West Berlin and commuting every day through the gates and blockades by his Volkswagen to school in East Berlin. He had a girlfriend in East Berlin and he asked her to marry him. She said yes but he had to be able to take out her mother as well. The student thought for a long time on how to get them out of East Berlin. One day as he was returning home, the car in front of him accidentally went too far when the barricade closed and the student saw that the barricade didn't entirely close on the car but left a tiny bit of room. The next week, he hunted all over West Berlin for a short car. He finally found a triumph, I think, that was not only much shorter but also had a windshield that could turn down when the top was down. He rented it and practiced driving it quickly around corners and such. After he felt proficient with it he drove to school one day as usual. The guards accepted his explanation that his Volkswagen was in the shop. When he left school that day, he left very late so that no cars would be at the crossing and he put his future mother in law in the trunk and his fiancee on the floor of the car. When he got to the stanchions and barricades, instead of slowing down to go through them, he sped up and pulled down the windshield and drove under the barricade as fast as he could. Of course he had notified the news media that he would be doing this. He made it out with his future family. Another student saw this and thought he could try it too so he rented the exact same car and sometime later tried the exact same thing with his people to get out of East Berlin and it also worked a second time! That taught the East Germans to put vertical barriers on the barricade as well
Ghost Stations:
During the Cold War when East and West Berlin was divided, the East Berlin subway stations were blocked up and bricked off so that East Berliners were not able to sneak out of their part of the city by running down the subway tracks until they were in West Berlin. But as the city was divided not in a straight line but round about, West Berliners sometimes had to pass through East Berlin on their way to work and home. They put up a fuss and a solution was devised in that their subway trains were allowed to pass through the old stations that are now closed to East Berliners. They had to slow down and go slow. They could see the subway platforms where there would occasionally be a soldier with a machine gun (don't know how they got there if the entrances were bricked) but otherwise the lights would be quite dim and the place would be quite deserted. Up above, on the ground, the East Berliners could hear the subway trains pass underneath and could feel them but they couldn't get to them or see them. So the stations became known as Ghost Stations.
Holocaust Memorial:
A memorial has been erected in Berlin to the murdered victims of the holocaust. Of course like anything of this significance has plenty of controversy to go with it. Part of the controversy was what kind of memorial to do. At one point a large slab was considered which would have inscribed the names of the 4 1/2 million known victims. Then how would the 1 1/2 million unknown victims be memorialized? The memorial now consists of some 2000 concrete gray blocks of different sizes. they are laid in straight rows and the paths between them rise and fall and undulate. Another controversy arose when the blocks were sprayed with anti-graffiti spray that was developed by the company that had developed the poison gas pellets used in the extermination camps. According to our guide, the Jewish community in Berlin really didn't care much one way or another about the memorial. Their feeling was that they will remember the Holocaust and don't need a memorial to do so. The problem the guide had with the memorial is there are no actual signs that indicate what these blocks are or why they are there. There are signs set in the street around the memorial that tell people they are not to graffiti, not to jump block to block, not to sunbathe on the blocks, etc., but nothing that really says "This is a Holocaust Memorial". Other memorials are also planned for the murdered Roma people or gypsies, the political prisoners, and the homosexuals. Like all political controversies, most of them are meaningless to anyone not directly involved or having a steak in the outcome. The memorial is impressive but had he not explained to us what it was, it would have been an abstract curiosity in the middle of the city.
The Bebelplatz: scene of Nazi book burning
This is a rather insignificant looking plaza. Some nice buildings around it but without being told that it was where the Nazi's burned 20,000 books, you would probably just walk right by it. Books burned included anything the Nazi's considered not fit to be read because they didn't adhere to the party line. Fiction, non fiction, autobiographies, anything. Some authors were even present as their books were being burned. Some other authors wondered later why their books weren't burned as if they weren't important enough. A memorial was set up for the burned books but it is a sealed room underneath the square or platz. You can only see it by looking through a glass window set in the pavement. In the room below are empty bookshelves, enough for 20,000 books. during the day it is quite possible to miss the window. At night, it is lighted from below.
Escape from the Air Force building.
The Nazi air force building backed up against the "death zone", the open area between the two walls, where anyone venturing would be shot and killed and it was patrolled by dogs and men with machine guns. The back of the air force building was totally blocked up and windows bricked so that you could not see into the west. An elevator maintenance man planned a daring escape. He brought his wife and 11 (I think he was 11) year old son to work and told his bosses he was just going to show them around to see what he did. They accepted this and said OK. When alone, he locked them in a closet and went about his business for the day. After everyone had gone home for the day, he let out his wife and son and they climbed up the elevator shaft until they could get onto one of the window ledges above the lights and facing the top of the wall. He had to hurry because even though he was above the lights, the dogs making the rounds could have heard and smelled him. He threw a nylon rope over the wall attached to a tool, I think our guide said a hammer. He had friends waiting on the other side and they attached a steel cable which he pulled back over to the building on his side. Both sides tied off the cable. He then had rigged a seat and pulley. He put his wife into the pulley first and she went over the wall and into friends arms. Next he told his son to go and being the usual 11 year old, the son was not happy about being locked up all day and not happy about sliding quietly over the death zone so he said no. His dad had to promise him a new bicycle to get him to go. He also made it safely. Finally it was time for the elevator engineer to go and by now it is quite dangerous as time has passed but he too made it safely. The next day, the guards saw the cable and realized what had happened but this family was safe.
Another escape:
A Humboldt University student was living in West Berlin and commuting every day through the gates and blockades by his Volkswagen to school in East Berlin. He had a girlfriend in East Berlin and he asked her to marry him. She said yes but he had to be able to take out her mother as well. The student thought for a long time on how to get them out of East Berlin. One day as he was returning home, the car in front of him accidentally went too far when the barricade closed and the student saw that the barricade didn't entirely close on the car but left a tiny bit of room. The next week, he hunted all over West Berlin for a short car. He finally found a triumph, I think, that was not only much shorter but also had a windshield that could turn down when the top was down. He rented it and practiced driving it quickly around corners and such. After he felt proficient with it he drove to school one day as usual. The guards accepted his explanation that his Volkswagen was in the shop. When he left school that day, he left very late so that no cars would be at the crossing and he put his future mother in law in the trunk and his fiancee on the floor of the car. When he got to the stanchions and barricades, instead of slowing down to go through them, he sped up and pulled down the windshield and drove under the barricade as fast as he could. Of course he had notified the news media that he would be doing this. He made it out with his future family. Another student saw this and thought he could try it too so he rented the exact same car and sometime later tried the exact same thing with his people to get out of East Berlin and it also worked a second time! That taught the East Germans to put vertical barriers on the barricade as well
Little Fat Traffic Man:
In East Berlin, the pedestrian traffic signals weren't just a stick figure but a fat little guy with a hat. When the light was red, he stood there with his fat arms outstretched to warn you not to cross. When the light was green, he moved at a rapid pace across the street, so to speak, arms swinging. He even has a name which the translation is pretty much "Little Fat Traffic Man" or "Fat Little Traffic Man", can't remember which he said. When traffic lights burned out, they were replaced with the more generic stick figure pedestrian. Citizens protested. They love their little traffic man. So the stick figures were put back to the Little Fat Traffic Man. Now the Little Fat Traffic Man is gradually taking over the unified city and burned out traffic lights in the former West Berlin are also being replaced with the Fat Man. There are now even stores devoted to the Little Fat Traffic Man where you can buy gummy Traffic Men, T shirts, coffee mugs, key chains, etc. etc. I have to agree with the Berliners. He is a very cute and engaging man.
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