Berlin Wall and the DDR museum (19 September 2024)

 

Relaxing in front of the Berlin Cathederal

We started the day off with a coffee served by the lovely Susan at our local café.  It looked like they had really nice food but they were only open until 3pm and as we were going further afield we would not get to try any.

 

We took the tram to the Berlin Wall Museum.  It was on the same line that brought us to our apartment on our arrival.  It was interesting getting a bit more information about the wall.  I realised that for some reason the wall had held a lot of fascination.  So many films had featured going across that border adding tension to the movie or TV series.  It also featured in several books that I have read.  What I did not realise was that there were two walls; a back wall on the eastern side and then the larger wall on the western side.  In between was a wide strip of gravel with mines and alarms. 

An apartment building next to this one was destroyed for the wall

What the wall would have looked like - Guard tower is an original

Looking at the wall from the East Berlin side

 

The bit we saw was not the actual wall but it was in a place where the wall had been, and was re-constructed remnants of the wall.  You could see how it would have divided communities. We were staying in the former East Berlin. 

 

We lunched at the Bistro in the Humboldt Forum before going on a boat ride along the Spree.  It was interesting seeing some of what we had already seen on our bike ride and but from a different perspective and to learn about others that we had not seen.  There is an area full of museums call Museumsintel or Museum Island which is a semi island formed by the Spree and a canal coming off the Spree. 


Another view of Berlin Cathederal

 

After the boat ride we visited the DDR Museum which provides the history of East Germany and East Berlin.  Again it was another fascinating insight into the regime at the time.  It even had a mocked-up apartment that showed what the communist regime had built for the locals.  One of the interesting parts was the complete divide between about 10,000 or more elite people for whom there was enough food and of high quality and other goods.  The elite even had different cars mostly made by Volvo.  The rest of the population meanwhile endured shortages of food and other consumer goods.  One interesting fact for me was that an engineer earned almost exactly the same as a mechanic.  The wages did not appear to be very high. 

 

That night we took a risk and used the commandant’s kitchen to cook in, fearing that at any moment  she would appear and scold us for the way we were using the equipment.  Fortunately, our fears were unfounded. 

 

The Reichstag


The strip of grass represents the width of the wall that encircled West Berlin

 

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