Die Mauer

If there is one thing that almost defines Berlin, it's The Wall. After the 1989 Fall of the Wall, East and West Germans were anxious to tear it down and move forward with unification and now 20 years later, most of it is long gone. However there are still constant reminders of it everywhere you go. We usually saw at least one remnant of the Wall almost every day in Berlin, and each one leaves you more aware of the immense waste of human effort and degradation of society that goes with any kind of wall building. Furthermore, it's remnants and well publicized history serve as a stark reminder that we need to continue to work on breaking down walls, physical and mental. Oddly enough, this very date (August 13) is the 49th anniversary of the initial construction of the wall... a date that needs no celebration, or maybe an anti-celebration? (Click photos to enlarge.)

Where the wall no longer exists, there is usually a trail of cobblestones indicating it's former path through Berlin.

Graffiti'ed chunks of the wall can be seen hanging like artwork on the sides of buildings.

Small sections can be found tucked away, here and there...

Near Checkpoint Charlie, the most famous crossing point between East and West during the cold war, the parts of a small homemade plane that was famously used in one lucky family's escape, hang on the side of the building.

At least 136 hopeful escapees were not so fortunate, having met their death at the wall. They are now immortalized in a grim, monument of etched glass photos encased in rusting steel, which stands eerily in a patch of the former death strip behind one of the few stretches of wall that have been preserved as a monument to it's confounding construction and existence.

In a more upbeat and hopeful memorial, there is the East Side Gallery, a mile long stretch of wall covered with brightly painted murals of reunification, freedom and peace as well as abstract, emotional outpourings of artwork that seek to liberate our mental walls that have yet to be dissolved.



Probably the most famous mural of the East Side Gallery, 'Brotherhood Kiss', is based on a real photo of Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev kissing East German leader Erich Honecker (builder of the Wall), taking jab at the extremely homophobic regime. The original mural painted in 1990 was destroyed by officials about a year ago, but it's back and it's everywhere, in your face. The caption says: 'My God, help me survive this deadly love.'

Although it's not my favorite Pink Floyd record*, The Wall would have provided superb accompaniment to a stroll along the East Side Gallery. It clearly inspired this mural, which appears to be based on the cover art from the 1980 album. Be sure to bring that on your iPod when you visit.
(*Pink Floyd's brilliant first album, Piper at the Gates of Dawn, was never outdone in my opinion, not even by Dark Side of the Moon.)