Day 3: Berlin

Today we woke up refreshed and ready to go!  We had a good breakfast at the hotel before boarding the bus and beginning our bus tour of the city.  We love Vanja, our Tour Director!  She is very sweet and super organized!  Both of the other groups that are with us are kind, and everyone seems to be getting along well and making new friends!  

We had our first local guide, Dominic, today.  He is the local expert on all things Berlin!  We started the tour at a different past of the Berlin Wall than what we saw yesterday.  This part is on one side of the Spree River which was once the actual border between East and West Berlin in this area.  This wall has been painted by many different street artists.  Here are a few things we saw:

This is a famous picture that seems a little weird to us as Americans, but here is what we learned:

"The Kiss depicts Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev giving the East Germany President Erich Honecker what appears to be a passionate kiss on the lips. At first glance, you might think it’s a complete joke, with no bearing on reality. But the image was based on an actual photograph taken in 1979 in honor of the thirtieth anniversary of the German Democratic Republic–East Germany.

Fraternal kisses among socialist leaders were not unusual, but as the website, Iconic Images, points out, “Both Honecker and Brezhnev were a little more enthusiastic than your average Communist dictator in kissing.”

By the way, I found this on http://www.disappearingman.com/berlin-wall/the-kiss/.  It was written better than I could remember the story! :)

Nothing to do with Germany, really, but we did get to see the hotel where Michael Jackson once hung is child over the railing - Hotel Adlon!

The German Parliament Building

Dominic gave us a good little history lesson using this map!   You can see Germany is split into East and West in the smaller picture, and Berlin is just a small section of East Germany.  It was once the only part of East Berlin that was not Communist, but when the younger generation kept leaving the country through "free" Berlin, the Soviets had to stop it.  So, they built the wall around West Berlin making it almost impossible for people under Soviet rule to leave East Berlin.  The larger picture shows how Berlin was divided.  There were three checkpoints where people wanting to come in or go out of East Berlin had to "check-in" - Alpha, Bravo, and Charlie.  

We went to the memorial site for Checkpoint Charlie and were able to get some pictures with the "fake" soldiers.  It is so different to hear these stories in the land where they occured.  There are so many more details that we just don't get from our history books and even the media.

We have seen several buildings that were severely damaged by the war.  Most of the city was demolished after the war, but there are a few places that survived!  

 After touring around Berlin, we visited Potsdam -- the location of the Berlin/Potsdam Conference after World War II where Truman, Churchill, and Stalin met to discuss reparation.  The conference was held in this small village outside of Berlin because there was not a large enough space still standing in Berlin to accommodate all of the people who attended.  We walked through the palace that was actually the last palace built for the monarchs.  Each of the three leaders had their own office and living space in the palace.  They even had their own entry doors into the actual conference room.
We also learned a lot about what took place during the conference, but I will not go into that much detail with you!

As we were leaving the palace and had just been talking all about WWII, we walked outside to see two army airplanes flying overhead!  We were all a little nervous about it until our tour guide very excitedly told us that there were 30 planes flying this afternoon to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the air lift.  I found this at https://www.history.com/topics/cold-war/berlin-airlift

"After World War II, the Allies partitioned the defeated Germany into a Soviet-occupied zone, an American-occupied zone, a British-occupied zone and a French-occupied zone. Berlin, the German capital city, was located deep in the Soviet zone, but it was also divided into four sections. In June 1948, the Russians–who wanted Berlin all for themselves–closed all highways, railroads and canals from western-occupied Germany into western-occupied Berlin. This, they believed, would make it impossible for the people who lived there to get food or any other supplies and would eventually drive Britain, France and the U.S. out of the city for good. Instead of retreating from West Berlin, however, the U.S. and its allies decided to supply their sectors of the city from the air. This effort, known as the “Berlin Airlift,” lasted for more than a year and carried more than 2.3 million tons of cargo into West Berlin."

We were also told that one man made homemade parachutes from tissues and attached them to candy - dropping it to the kids from his plane!  This got many people excited and people from different places made him more parachutes and sent them to him!

After another short ride, we visited the palace of King Frederick AKA The Potato King!  His humble palace is only 10 rooms because he lived alone and "didn't need much space".  He was known as a great soldier, but he is also credited with bringing the potato to the Germans!  So, our tour guide told us, their are always potatoes on his grave as a memorial!  If you want to hear his very clever way of convincing the people to eat the potatoes, I found the story here:

http://scihi.org/frederick-great-potato/

 Just before dinner, we vistited the Memorial for Murdered Jews in the Holocaust.  It is a very large memorial with 100's of different sized rectangle stones.  It is a unique memorial, and the artist says that you must walk through it and listen, feel, think and you will know what it means.  It was a pretty interesting experience.  It is just rows and rows of stones in different heights, but walking through it felt lonely and quiet.  I even felt a bit anxious.  I love how the Europeans have such an appreciation for art and for experiencing it more than just looking at it!

 We walked across the street from the memorial to Brandenburg Gate which was once the royal entrance into Berlin and survived the war!

 Then, we ate a dinner of sausages and potatoes with some veggies before coming back to the hotel!

Tomorrow we leave for Dresden and then Prague.  More tomorrow!