Ich Bin Ein Berliner

Berlin is a fascinating city of contrasts and change. When the Berlin Wall came down in 1989, David and I had just been married a few months. I still remember watching film footage on TV of that historical moment when the people of East Berlin were finally able, after 40 years, to climb over the wall without fear of being killed.

Dave’s mother left East Germany and crossed via Berlin into West Germany in 1958, three years before the Wall went up. Most of his family that lived in East Germany were unable to leave once the wall was erected, and lived a very different life than their friends and relatives in West Germany.

Today location of the Wall in Berlin is marked in the streets by a double row of cobblestones. Slabs of the Wall can be found in certain areas around the city.

We stayed in the former West Berlin section of town. This area was filled with parks, shopping, and unique architecture, very different from the block-style apartments across the dividing line. Twenty years of development in East Berlin is beginning to show, though, as new shops, restaurants and business areas are developed.

The first night, we took the bus to the Reichstag, which is the Parliament building. Dave gave us a walking tour a.k.a. Rick Steve’s cheat sheets, and we walked by a number of sights, including the Brandenburg Gate, the Jewish Holocaust Memorial, and finally to the infamous Checkpoint Charlie. The line to go inside the new Dome was too long however, so we decided to save it for later.

The Holocaust Memorial and Museum were especially moving; it is a full city block of slabs of cement of various heights that remind one of tombstones and gives one the impression of the enormity of human lives lost during Hitler’s reign.

At Checkpoint Charlie, we went to a museum, the Checkpoint Charlie Museum, began in a house that was used to help escapees make it successfully over the Wall at this infamous checkpoint. The museum has numerous displays of many innovative escape devices that people used to evade the sharpshooters at the Wall, including cars with hiding areas in the trunk, suitcases, flying devices, and underwater diving equipment – all made from everyday materials. It was fascinating to read about the escapes that happened over the years.

We bought a chunk of the Berlin Wall at the gift shop, and then went out to dinner back by our hotel at a great restaurant around the corner.

The next day, we were all ready to tour an art museum or history museum, when at breakfast the boys found a brochure on a Lego Discovery Center, sort of a mini Lego Land, conveniently located just a few bus stops from our hotel. It was like finding gold for the boys! We decided to take them there so they could get their Lego fix. They really loved it: the Center included a huge room of Berlin in Lego brick miniature, a dragon ride, stations to build Lego creations, a factory tour, and an Indiana Jones adventure. We were the only Americans there; this was a place for Berliner moms to take their children on a rainy day, much like we would go to the Museum of Science in Boston. The kids loved it. If you ask Caleb what was his favorite museum on the whole trip, he would answer “The Lego Discovery Place!”

After bricks and walls, we went to East Berlin and saw some of the architecture left over from the Communist Fifties, including the giant TV Tower that looks like something from the Jetsons. We opted not to pay the money to take the elevator up the Tower, and instead got a great view of East Berlin from the Berliner Dom (Berlin Cathedral.)

In the evening, we were treated to an even more spectacular view from the top of the Reichtag glass dome. This new dome is all glass, and gives visitors a 360-degreee panoramic view of Berlin. While we were in the dome, a massive thunderstorm rolled by. This was very impressive to witness from the top of the glass structure. After that, we were treated to a memorable sunset.

We headed home and got street food, since it was so late and no-one felt like sitting down at a restaurant. Caleb chose Turkish pizza, which proved to be the best choice. Jake and I had terrible Chinese noodles, probably the worst food we’d had on our trip thus far.

But not to worry: the next day we were heading to visit Dave’s relatives, and great food would definitely be a part of that great day.