Berlin
Today is my first full day back from a four day trip to Berlin. I departed Saturday and returned yesterday (Tuesday).
I wasn't sure, before I went, that I would enjoy Berlin. I'm not sure entirely why. But I did, although it is a very emotive city. A traumatised city. It's a really scary place full of some of the most horrible history that the 20th century has had to throw at a Europe and it's hard not to feel that sense of trauma.
Imagine, for example, standing on Whitehall. On the left, towards the houses of Parliament, are apartment blocks. On the right, some old left over buildings that maybe hark back to the grandeur of the British Empire's government offices. Here stands the lonely Foreign Office, now doing duty as the Ministry of Food and Fish. The whole place has a deserted feel. Why? Because most of these buildings were destroyed during World War Two. Then, they occupied an almost no-man's land near the border of the Berlin Wall.
Imagine, one day, waking up to find that you can't suddenly get from the City to Islington because Islington is now in West London and the City is in East and there's a bloody great big wall in the way, which if you try to cross, you'll be shot for trying. Those are the best way I can explain some of the snapshots of some of the feelings I experienced while being there.
Berlin is a very strange city, but it gets a lot less strange when I started to understand some of its history. The city sits on the river Spree, which runs broadly east-west through it. However, Berlin itself started to the north of a section of the river where it runs southeast-northwest. At that point, it splits around an island, where some of the first municipal buildings were built and which now serves as the site of the Cathedral and the main museums. On the other bank seems to be where the city grew into more a geographical centre, a lot like London grew to the West really. This is where the Prussians and later Hitler developed many of the big functionary buildings like the Luftwaffe headquarters and Wilhemstrasse became almost (but not quite) like our Whitehall. The other side of this area is also where the Brandenburg Gate is located and where their Parliament building (called the Reichstag) is located.
Berlin was really decimated in the War. In a way that's quite hard to comprehend. Then, the GDR (East Germany) took over and the split started to happen. They rebuilt some things, but the nature of the Allied/Soviet split meant that the city was weirdly partitioned. So the Soviets got Berlin proper and the central area, called Mitte, but only about a quarter of the East part of it. This meant a chunk of East Berlin stuck into and was surrounded by West Berlin. So, again, using London, this would be the equivalent of getting Westminster and the City of London, but not Camden or the boroughs west and north of there. Likewise, to the south, they would not have had Southwark, Lewisham and Bromley. It was strange in that way. This meant that whole areas that were "central" suddenly became peripheral, while West Berlin formed a centre somewhere out to the west (imagine Shepherds Bush or maybe Kensington becoming the centre of West London).
This all happened when the Berlin Wall came up. The strange status of Berlin meant that the Allies had a chink in the armour that was the Iron Curtain. In the middle of Soviet controlled territory, anyone could get into the West if they could get there. It was not something I'd previously realised before. This meant it became a huge sore in the foot of the Communist authorities.
It also became a rod with which the Allies used to beat the back of the Soviets. Elsewhere, along the Iron Curtain, it could be argued that, due to national sovereignty, the border had to be patrolled and shut down and, with the dearth of information to the West, there was no reason to think that people didn't like living in Communist parts.
The Berlin Enclave changed that. Anyone could come and leave for the West. And they did. Hundreds of thousands of people, every year, left for the West (between about 180,000 and 320,000). In total, millions. The GDR lost 20% of its population and huge chunks of its workforce. The problem became so great that in 1961, the Wall went up, almost overnight.
Initially, the Wall was little but barbed wire, and escaping was low risk. Cities are not meant to be divided like that and escape was always easy. There were houses in East Germany whose front doors opened into West Berlin and the like. But that changed very rapidly, if gradually. By the end, it became the impregnable ribbon of no man's land slicing through the city.
I can understand now why it was referred to as the Wall of Shame. In building it, the Communists had had to tacitly admit that no one really wanted to live in a Communist system and the only way was to force them to do it. Basically, even in 1961, they'd lost the argument but they kept going. I assume because enough people believed and because the Russians were always there, waiting to come and crush anyone who waned to change the system.
Another thing that's really amazing is also how quickly the Berlin Wall disappeared. There's no overt mention of this, but it's clear that the Wall traumatised a lot of Berliners and the minute they could make it go away, they did, with a will that's quite surprising. Since a lot of the border land was empty, there' been lots of prime real estate to develop and they have thrown themselves into this with a vengeance. If anything, it seems like Berliners want to wake up in the morning and discover that the city hasn't changed. The rate of change feels exhausting, even just in description.
While the Wall has almost completely disappeared, what the Berliners have done is to mark where the wall stood with a double row of cobbles. This runs like a scar through the whole city. Traffic bobbles its way over the cobbles in jarring transition to the tarmac and green spaces of lovely green are rent apart by a ribbon of black with no regard for surrounding aesthetics.
I wasn't sure, before I went, that I would enjoy Berlin. I'm not sure entirely why. But I did, although it is a very emotive city. A traumatised city. It's a really scary place full of some of the most horrible history that the 20th century has had to throw at a Europe and it's hard not to feel that sense of trauma.
Imagine, for example, standing on Whitehall. On the left, towards the houses of Parliament, are apartment blocks. On the right, some old left over buildings that maybe hark back to the grandeur of the British Empire's government offices. Here stands the lonely Foreign Office, now doing duty as the Ministry of Food and Fish. The whole place has a deserted feel. Why? Because most of these buildings were destroyed during World War Two. Then, they occupied an almost no-man's land near the border of the Berlin Wall.
Imagine, one day, waking up to find that you can't suddenly get from the City to Islington because Islington is now in West London and the City is in East and there's a bloody great big wall in the way, which if you try to cross, you'll be shot for trying. Those are the best way I can explain some of the snapshots of some of the feelings I experienced while being there.
Berlin is a very strange city, but it gets a lot less strange when I started to understand some of its history. The city sits on the river Spree, which runs broadly east-west through it. However, Berlin itself started to the north of a section of the river where it runs southeast-northwest. At that point, it splits around an island, where some of the first municipal buildings were built and which now serves as the site of the Cathedral and the main museums. On the other bank seems to be where the city grew into more a geographical centre, a lot like London grew to the West really. This is where the Prussians and later Hitler developed many of the big functionary buildings like the Luftwaffe headquarters and Wilhemstrasse became almost (but not quite) like our Whitehall. The other side of this area is also where the Brandenburg Gate is located and where their Parliament building (called the Reichstag) is located.
Berlin was really decimated in the War. In a way that's quite hard to comprehend. Then, the GDR (East Germany) took over and the split started to happen. They rebuilt some things, but the nature of the Allied/Soviet split meant that the city was weirdly partitioned. So the Soviets got Berlin proper and the central area, called Mitte, but only about a quarter of the East part of it. This meant a chunk of East Berlin stuck into and was surrounded by West Berlin. So, again, using London, this would be the equivalent of getting Westminster and the City of London, but not Camden or the boroughs west and north of there. Likewise, to the south, they would not have had Southwark, Lewisham and Bromley. It was strange in that way. This meant that whole areas that were "central" suddenly became peripheral, while West Berlin formed a centre somewhere out to the west (imagine Shepherds Bush or maybe Kensington becoming the centre of West London).
This all happened when the Berlin Wall came up. The strange status of Berlin meant that the Allies had a chink in the armour that was the Iron Curtain. In the middle of Soviet controlled territory, anyone could get into the West if they could get there. It was not something I'd previously realised before. This meant it became a huge sore in the foot of the Communist authorities.
It also became a rod with which the Allies used to beat the back of the Soviets. Elsewhere, along the Iron Curtain, it could be argued that, due to national sovereignty, the border had to be patrolled and shut down and, with the dearth of information to the West, there was no reason to think that people didn't like living in Communist parts.
The Berlin Enclave changed that. Anyone could come and leave for the West. And they did. Hundreds of thousands of people, every year, left for the West (between about 180,000 and 320,000). In total, millions. The GDR lost 20% of its population and huge chunks of its workforce. The problem became so great that in 1961, the Wall went up, almost overnight.
Initially, the Wall was little but barbed wire, and escaping was low risk. Cities are not meant to be divided like that and escape was always easy. There were houses in East Germany whose front doors opened into West Berlin and the like. But that changed very rapidly, if gradually. By the end, it became the impregnable ribbon of no man's land slicing through the city.
I can understand now why it was referred to as the Wall of Shame. In building it, the Communists had had to tacitly admit that no one really wanted to live in a Communist system and the only way was to force them to do it. Basically, even in 1961, they'd lost the argument but they kept going. I assume because enough people believed and because the Russians were always there, waiting to come and crush anyone who waned to change the system.
Another thing that's really amazing is also how quickly the Berlin Wall disappeared. There's no overt mention of this, but it's clear that the Wall traumatised a lot of Berliners and the minute they could make it go away, they did, with a will that's quite surprising. Since a lot of the border land was empty, there' been lots of prime real estate to develop and they have thrown themselves into this with a vengeance. If anything, it seems like Berliners want to wake up in the morning and discover that the city hasn't changed. The rate of change feels exhausting, even just in description.
While the Wall has almost completely disappeared, what the Berliners have done is to mark where the wall stood with a double row of cobbles. This runs like a scar through the whole city. Traffic bobbles its way over the cobbles in jarring transition to the tarmac and green spaces of lovely green are rent apart by a ribbon of black with no regard for surrounding aesthetics.