A Visit to The Berlin Wall

Yesterday I visited the (in)famous Berlin Wall with Vivek Singh and Aparna. I had some constructed images of already widely circulated wall of Berlin, but I was wondering to see the only left 2 KMs of the infamous 155 KM long wall. The tempestuous German people did not desire to see the wall at all, so when they got a chance to spifflicate it, they remorselessly did it. Now I am giving you some historical background of the wall, and later will write the art works and what they really meant. Again I will drop a line about two books which I read to know the history of the Berlin wall. Still I hope my writing will never feel you, readers, bored if I write so lengthily. And if you really feel so, then think a moment about the people who were separated each other from their beloved country for years.

Think, the wall was such a long long  one! It had been concreted into 155 KM and the East German Government was solidifying it day by day, yet the longing of the people to re-unite its hereditary and friendship smashed the wall completely within moments! That’s amazing and astounding me. We can’t pick up more examples like this from the history to acknowledge the people’s wrath against the government. Now the wall is seen very rare places. Still I can’t believe the intensity of the people to crush the year long slavery of the Wall of Shame. We asked everyone about the leftovers of the wall, and knew that east side gallery was the lone remnants of the wall. There are some other places also but there, only a very few parts of the wall preserved.

The first brisk was put to build the Wall of Shame in a rainy morning of August 13, 1961. It was after all a ‘13th’ day this wall started to be constructed. Why was the wall constructed? It was to check the own people to migrate from GDR (German Democratic Republic) to the western part of the Germany. (but both places were actually shared among four countries!, USSR, America, Britain and France!). People suffered even if they were in east or west Germany. So Berlin became a focal point to express the power of both the communists and the capitalists! Both were waging war in expense of the German people. Berlin's unique situation as a city half-controlled by Western forces, in the middle of the Soviet Occupation Zone of Germany, made it a focal point for tensions between the Allies and the Soviets and a place where conflicting ideologies were enforced side-by-side. The Berlin Wall was the physical division between West Berlin and East Germany. However, it was also the symbolic boundary between democracy and Communism during the Cold War.

When Soviet Union realized that the people were in great numbers migrating to capitalist West side, the idea of a wall evolved. It was not a rumour, Soviet actually wanted to block the people, so the wall became soon a reality. Soviet was so powerful they blocked the eastern part from western part within 24 hours! First they put up a huge barricade to preclude the movement. Before people realized what was actually going on, the wall was reared. In the beginning, the Soviet justified the wall that the barricade had been raised as an ‘anti-fascist protection wall’, and that they had moved to prevent a third world war. The version of the ‘Wall’ that started life in 1961 was in fact not a wall but a 96 miles barbed wire fence. However, after this incarnation proved too easy to scale, work started in 1962 on a second fence, parallel to the first but up to 100 yards further in. The area in between the two fences was demolished to create an empty space, which became widely known as "death strip" as it was here that many would-be escapers met their doom. The strip was covered with raked gravel, making it easy to spot footprints, it offered no cover, was mined and booby-trapped with tripwires and, most importantly, it offered a clear field of fire to the armed guards – who were instructed to shoot on sight.

In every stages of the constructing the wall, the people’s endless spirit to escape jumping over the wall compelled them to find out different survival methods! Some dared to face the mines, bullets, trench in between the wall and all other calamities. Even the 80+ old-citizens tried to escape only to get a six feet space to be buried in a free land. Women experimented themselves by jumping from high-roofed building near to the wall and the relatives from the other side caught her! Some families escaped making huge hydrogen balloon and some making small holes under the wall! But hundreds of people had their last breath in between the east and west of the country!  As Communism began to falter in Poland, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia in 1988 and 1989, new exodus points were opened to East Germans who wanted to flee to the West. Then suddenly, on the evening of November 9, 1989, an announcement made by East German government official Günter Schabowski stated, "Permanent relocations can be done through all border checkpoints between the GDR (East Germany) into the FRG (West Germany) or West Berlin."

People were in shock. Were the borders really open? East Germans tentatively approached the border and indeed found that the border guards were letting people cross. Very quickly, the Berlin Wall was inundated with people from both sides. Some began chipping at the Berlin Wall with hammers and chisels. There was an impromptu huge celebration along the Berlin Wall, with people hugging, kissing, singing, cheering, and crying.

The Berlin Wall was eventually chipped away, into smaller pieces (some the size of a coin and others in big slabs). The pieces have become collectibles and are stored in both homes and museums.

After the Berlin Wall came down, East and West Germany reunified into a single German state on October 3, 1990.Anyhow after the cold war ended, the gates of the wall was ready to open, but the people instead crushed it down in 1989. So the wall which stood as a Chinese wall in between August 13, 1961 -- November 9, 1989 found its own inevitable desitiny at last.

Two books on Berlin wall

After visiting the wall, I had a strong intense to read the history of Berlin wall, I searched and searched, but found only a very less books written about the wall.  There are books, but those are about to publish, may be because of the event was so recent. Anyhow I managed to get two books, one is in German language and the other is in English.

Was Fur Ein Jahr! Deutschland 1990

This book is a pictorial representations what happened in German in 1990 the year after the Berlin wall. The arrangements of pages are very seminal. The first page shows the people destroying the wall, the symbolic fence to separate the people. Again the following page is shown the German football team who won the 1990 world cup championship. The two pictures directly speak the intention of the people, from separation to the re-joining and the win over the world. They defeated all most all the European and Latin American powers to get the cup. Again the next page is about their economy, a man very proudly raises the German currency, Mark. Only after these pictures, the author of the book considers the political leaders to be shown in the pages. Next picture is some political leaders (really, I could not distinguish who they are!). The people are the king basically, so the book focuses on the tears and joy of the mass. This book is not an important book, anyhow it tells the past history of a country through pictures.

The Berlin Wall

This is an old book written by Deane and David Heller. The book actually was written in 1962 just after the wall started to be a reality in the country.  On the book, there is a seal of US Army of occupied West German, so it is clear it was a prescribed book for the soldiers and officials. The book is written like a diary and it anecdotes the day by day incidents in very details. I read the book only to feel the people’s sufferings and their saga of struggle to get rid of the fence. The author is anyway so biased in writing the history. But I felt the screaming and paining of the thousands of masses in each pages. The book is written in 1962, and the very first page there is a prophetic word of Kennady about the demolition of the ‘wall of shame’

‘What is unnatural will not endure. Thats why one day the wall in Berlin will come down’

The portrayal of Khruschchv and Kennady is very different. Both were talking the same language of war, threatening, nuclear bomb, world war 3, but David Heller compares Khrushchv with Hitler and the Eastern German with the concentration camp, and Kennady’s talk as a polite, gentle and needy. Ok, I write two lines of the portrayals of Kennady and Khrushchv in the book.

“The president Kennady called upon the United States to take steps to prepare for a possible war. ‘ We do not want to fight, he said in a voice tense with emotion, but we have fought before, it would be a mistake for others to look upon Berlin, because of its location, as a tempting target.  Modern warfare, the president warned, ‘could rain more destruction in several hours than in all the wars in human history. The last remarks made a profound impression. Not since the Japanese attack upon Pearl Harbour had the Americans people been so angry and so united as on the Berlin Crises. 82% of the people agreed with President Kennady on Berlin.

In Mosco, in his arm waving tirade, Khrushchev shouted that, ‘Hundreds of millions would die in a nuclear war. Two other items in his long outburst deserve note. He concluded with a defiant threat and a macabre prediction of war.

From third chapter it describes the suffering of the people and their attempts to escape from their own land in searching of prosperity. An eighty two year old man escapes the wall after a tremendous attempt only to get a free air to be buried! A lady jumped from the 5th floor to escape and her relatives on the ground spread their arms to hold her. All are attempts to escape; people thought death is better than caged. The book gives a sober description of the sufferings of the people. So its worth reading and I am sure, after reading you can’t control your tears to fall down in thinking of the ill-fated people.

Next Post: East Side Gallery