It was in 1982 that I first visited Berlin when the wall divided the city. As a guest of the foreign office I was lucky to be able to cross the wall and taken around some of the landmarks of the city of East Berlin. The visit is still fixed in my memory. At one of the museums, I just whistled to get a feel of the now well-known security. Within minutes a few people (in plain dress) surrounded me with their staring eyes sending a chill down my spine. I was warned to behave. Anyway, when we returned, the bus stopped at the check post. A thorough check was conducted by the East German police, so much so that two soldiers went under the bus to see no one is being smuggled out. The wall eventually came down in 1989. In my subsequent visits to Berlin it isnt difficult to identify the eastern parts of the city from the west. You see a few small windows adoring the houses in the erstwhile East Berlin part. Unlike in the west, where the architecture allows for huge glass window panels perhaps a testimony to the kind of freedom we enjoy. More open society. Nevertheless, I did pick up a souvenir of a broken piece of the wall that I still have it among my books in my study, a reminder of the need to bring down all such walls that block freedom. But when I read a report that says 4 out of 10 Berliners in a survey said that they still dont feel at home in a unified Berlin, I think we still havent been able to demolish the wall that exists within.
Posted on: Mon, 10 Nov 2014 04:58:57 +0000