Friday, July 17, 2009

East Berlin

It was an overcast day, when we went to East Berlin. That seemed to fit, since the city hadn't changed much since the war. Going through Checkpoint Charlie at the Berlin Wall was spooky. Our bus was stopped and searched by men with guns. Many of the buildings near the wall were bombed during the war and had not been rebuilt. We were told not to talk to any of the residents. After all, this was a Communist country. We saw the Soviet embassy. Most of the buildings were grey with no color. The only real color we saw were flags that the guide said were put up for a youth festival. It was sort of like going from a color movie to a black and white movie. We stopped at a restaurant to get some authentic German cheesecake. It was good, but the waitress wanted to talk to us about America. Seemingly out of nowhere came this man dressed in a trenchcoat. He said something to the waitress, and she disappeared. The guide said he was KGB. Great. We were being followed again. The highlight of the morning was visiting the Soviet War Memorial which had mass graves of Russian soldiers who fought to liberate Berlin from the Nazis. The hammer and sickle were everywhere, as well as statues of Lenin. When we got back to the wall to cross into West Berlin, guards with machine guns boarded our bus to look for escapees. They ran a giant mirror under the bus. We were told not to take pictures of the wall from the East, but of course I did. But, I wasn't caught. The afternoon was free to do whatever we wanted to do. While the girls rested, I went across the street from the hotel to the Berlin Zoo. I didn't stay long, but it was a nice visit, until I saw some Aryan boys. It was obvious who their parents were. All of the boys were over 6 feet with blonde hair. It was a strange sight. I got back to the hotel, and the girls wanted to go shopping, so we went to a department store and bought some things. One of my talents on the trip was to convert American money to the currency of the country we were in. I am not good in math, but I learned quickly that we didn't want to be cheated by the people in the stores. Or at least taken advantage of. It also helped to talk with your hands, because some shop keepers didn't speak English. We did learn bits and pieces of the languages so as to compliment the folks in the countries. They were more likely to help you, if you took a stab at their language. Toward the late afternoon, Talula wanted to get a German hymnal for her pastor back home. There was a large church in the center of town near our hotel. Part of the church had been bombed in the war, and they left up the shell as a reminder. There was a more modern church building behind it. Talula, Sandra and I went to the church to see about the hymnal. They had a gift shop there, but no hymnals were for sale. I stopped a priest there and asked him if we could buy a hymnal. He got very mad and told us they weren't for sale. We were told to leave, as we had insulted the priest and his church. When we got outside, Sandra reached into her oversized purse and pulled out a hymnal and gave to Talula. I'd like to apologize to the priest for us stealing a hymnal from his church, but it was for a good cause. That night, we just hung out in the rooms and rested. It had been a long day but a good one.

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