Suppose
when you are alone and unexpectedly a seraph appears before you and she
blesses you a boon that whatever you wish, it will turn to be true! What you will
then desire? We got an opportunity to visit a ‘wishing well’ where our wish
would come true. When we reached the well, there were millions of coins sunk in
the well already.
So if we put some Euros or at least some cents, then the wish
will come true in a faster way. Most of the people actually wished (it seemed)
to seize all that Euros from the well, oops! What a bad idea! But I wished to
not put any coin into the well, surely my wish would not come true. So I stood
up aside and watched what my Spanish friend would wish for! She put some Euros
and wished ‘let the world ever remains in peace! I don’t think all the Europeans
are very superstitions, but this wish anyway was very noble and motivational!
Vivek Singh looking into 'the wishing well' |
Dear
reader, I must not start this note on wishing well, actually I was thinking to put
pen to paper a bit about the famed ‘Spy Bridge’ in Berlin. But the moment I
thought about the bridge this ‘wishing well’ business came to mind first. Let
me make clear what this spy bridge is precisely. In my first blog post (berlin wall) I have elucidated
the Berlin Wall and the countless sufferings of the people the wall made
possible to them. Glienicker Brucke, popularly known as Spy Bridge articulates
the same old story of two oppositional blocks which occupied the beautiful Berlin
city. The eastern side of German (including Potsdam) was shared for Red Soviet
Russia and the Western part was given to Britain, France and US of America. This
is only a part of the story. History of the bridge actually starts a bit early.
When the major towns Berlin and Potsdam flourished side by side, this bridge was
constructed in 1907 in the Havel River to connect these two cities.
'the Natural Fridge' |
I was thinking about our Hussain Sagar of
Hyderabad when I was scrutinizing the bridge. Hussain Sagar divides Secunderabad
and Hyderabad and both carry the legacy of colonial past. Seconderabad was
actually built to gratify French power and they made it a cantonment to
establish their power in Hyderabad. All bridges are the silent witnesses of
ugly business everywhere!
The
bridge immediately became a symbol of spy dealing and exchanging prisoners. Thousands
of poems were written on the bridge. Films, cartoons, TV serious refereed the bridge.
Smiley’s People, a novel written by John Le Carre made this bridge famous
by continuously referring the bridge. The popular nickname 'Bridge of Spies'
was used by the British band T’Pau as the name of the title track on
their first album. The usage is metaphorical, referring to a 'walk to freedom'
but in the context of long dreamt-of relationship.
After visiting the spy
bridge we went to the palace (not exactly to the palace, but the courtyard of Schloss Cecilienhof fortress).
It was a very sunny day in a cold shivering winter.
When the sun mercied upon
us to go anywhere we wished without wearing the maddening winter jacket, then we
preferred to visit the palace. It was one of the earlier journey with a group
called Erasmus Students Network (ESN, Potsdam), an effort of some dynamic young (wo)men
to make a get together possible within the foreign students. We are not ERASMUS
students, yet we were invited.
Schloss
Cecilienhof
has been built in an eye catching place of the
northern part of the Neuer
Garten park. When we crossed
the threshold the courtyard, the birds started chirping, squirrels squeaking, and a gentle breeze slowly passed telling stories to the dancing
meadows, tall and short trees agreed unanimously what the breeze brought for
them, later the wind ended and merged in the nearby Jungfernsee Lake, and then
a school of fish jumped expressing their
joy. Flowers smiled, beautiful butterflies flied everywhere!
Between 1914 and 1917, Kaiser Wilhelm II had Schloss
Cecilienhof built in the north of the gardens for his son Wilhelm and his wife
Cecilie. The use of traditional building materials such as brick and wood helps
the house to blend in with its surroundings.
the red flower star was the contribution of Soviet Russia |
The actual size of Schloss
Cecilienhof only becomes evident upon closer inspection: the house has a total
of 176 rooms. Some of them were used by the Allies in 1945 for their Potsdam
Conference. Its design was based on a
house called 'Biston Court' (later 'Hillbark') on the Wirral Peninsula which in
turn was inspired by Little Moreton Hall. The interior was furnished according
to plans by Paul Troost, who
originally had designed steamship décors.
The brick and oak timber frame building, including six courtyards and
55 carved brick chimney tops, should have been completed in 1915, but
construction was delayed due to the outbreak of World War I and Crown Prince
Wilhelm and Cecilie could not move in until August 1917.
Wilhelm followed his
father into exile one year later, while Cecilie stayed at the palace until she
fled from the approaching Red Army in
February 1945. ! It
was part of soviet Russia, so they made a beautiful Courtyard with red flower star, planted by Soviet armed
forces in 1945.
There
is a ‘natural fridge’ as well! When the shivering and bone chilling cold comes,
the lake starts freezing completely. So the royal family made from this natural
phenomenon useful and built a pyramid
shaped fridge where the icy lake water stored in the pyramid and they kept food
items until the winter ends.
When we started the journey the weather was perfect and fine, but later the climate gradually changed and it became cold again.
When we started the journey the weather was perfect and fine, but later the climate gradually changed and it became cold again.