While I was interviewing my German refugees, one asked me to come along on an 'exchange student' activity. We would follow the old 'Mauer'/Berlin Wall. We began on top of the Europa center. I LOVE VIEWS! It brings a whole new perspective to a place and this did for me concerning Berlin!The Europea Center and the area you can see down in that photo was the 'in' place in old West Berlin and what was always the sign of what the capitalist West could offer East Germany if it ever changed its mind...
The 'long red line' is Kurfurstendamm (Prince-Elector-Street(?), we'll say. NYC's 5the Avenue is to NYC, what Ku'damm was/is to (West) Berlin....
The 'blue' line is Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church that the West Berliners left up after the war as a reminder of what war brings and the 'yellow' line is the 'new' clock tower for the new church which is behind the old Memorial Church.
From the previous photo you can see where I live off in the distance. Any fan of my blog will recognize what's in 'red' as my Funkturm! The 'Radio Tower' of Berlin that was built in the 1920's. (see past blog posts for any additional info on it)
And then off to the left is the old American 'listening' station - apparently they could 'listen' to Moscow from there.
'Stand in the place where you live, now face North!' We were facing west and now north. I did an interview with another refugee in that area and that tall tower is the old TV receving tower for West Berlin (that apparently most East Germans watched! How frustrating would that have been...you could actually see what was going on everywhere else, but never go there!)
This is facing east now, looking down in 'red' is KaDeWe (Kaufhaus des Westens - apparently the largest shopping store/mall in continental Europe - '2.500 types of cheeses' as our guide said...mmm...cheese...) This was still all old 'West Berlin'. Off in the distance in that rectangle is the 'tower' from Tempelhof Airport, where the 'Berlin Airlift' (or 'Air Bridge', in German) took place.
The blue was 'No Man's Land', but now it's Potsdamer Platz. You've seen this as well in old blog posts. I'd just like to point out that 'Mt. Fuji'-looking thing off to the 'blue' left is the Sony Center and it turns different colors are night, every night.
The two towers in black are the churches on Gendarmenmarkt (also in old posts). In between those two churches is another area with it's church. This area is called Nikolai Quarter (also, see old posts) and this where Berlin started over 750 years ago!
'Lady in red...is...posing for my picture...' There she is, the goddess of Victory on top of the Victory Column where Barack Obama spoke (see old post) surrounded by the 'Tiergarten' (old royal hunting grounds, but now park)....
'Lady in red...is...posing for my picture...' There she is, the goddess of Victory on top of the Victory Column where Barack Obama spoke (see old post) surrounded by the 'Tiergarten' (old royal hunting grounds, but now park)....
There in red is the Reichstag and that is where we're headed next....
We saw Checkpoint Charlie, Potsdamer Platz, the Jewish memorial and then as we got nearer to the the Brandenburg Gate there were TON O' COPS and yelling, etc....
IT WAS A PROTEST!
They were protesting 'Big Brother' - seriously! It was a protest against 'ID cards', video cameras being everywhere, etc....
Oh what we give up for 'security', eh? Being that it was all near the Reichstag, I just find the irony beyond crazy!
This is a shout-out to Brad in AZ! Here is your new American embassy all pretty and sparkly. I didn't know this, but apparently we had that land since the early 1900's, but then during the Cold War nothing was there, but now we've got it back. DUMB IDEA! Everyone comes here to protest! The American authorities were paranoid about security, but wanted this area for the embassy! If you want security you do what they did in Bogota. The embassy there is a 'compound'. Probably 1/2 mile by 1/2 mile of flat, nothingness grass (with sensors all over). One entrance from the road, where you drive to the 'building' of the embassy (that sits all alone in the middle)...and then you have EVERYTHING underground! If you want security, that's wht you do! Anyway...just an opinion....
This was a definite 'AHHH (angels singing)' moment - the Gate just looked beautiful right then....
So we (the students) hung out for a while, I said goodbye and went straight for the Brandenburg Gate to see what was going on. It was all over :(
;) But there's all the cops, with the Gate and the moon in the background. 'Que bella e la luna!'
I went and waited for the bus at the Reichstag...even though my camera takes pictures that I didn't/don't see, I still thought this one turned out ok...
Que bella e la Reichstag! ;) haha....
