The domino project was brilliant because it represented both the actual Berlin wall coming down as well as the political collapse of communism throughout Europe.
I’m old enough to remember the Wall going up. It going down was as astonishing as apartheid ending in South Africa without bloodshed - they are two things I would have bet against without pause.
I didn’t understand until I took a tour of the area this April that the Wall came down through the incompetence of East German officials.
We stayed this April in the East Berlin side, just a few blocks from Checkpoint Charlie. Except for a few fragments the wall is almost gone, marked by cobblestones in the street. You can still tell the difference between East and West, though it is decreasing. In Pottsdammer Platz they had a platform you could climb to, and look at stereogram photos of the area before the Wall fell and now. Very impressive.
The New York Times has a nifty before/after photo thing that’s worth checking out. It really is amazing how quickly some scars can heal.
I was fortunate enough to be stationed in GDR during that time.
When news actually hit our unit, we partied down! We took it as a personal US victory (and for the greater good of the world in general).
Later, as we noticed more and more “non-west Germans” arriving in town, it was shocking to watch them get amazed at things like a walkman or even CDs. These things were just out of science fiction for these people.
We soldiers were under strict orders that we were not to go to Berlin for any reason. So, of course, my friend and I had to go. We booked a civilian flight and arrived early December for a few days.
It was amazing. They were still partying in the streets (one girl kissed me when she saw me in uniform) and people were literally smashing down parts of the wall. I still have some pieces in a box in my closet. It was wonderful.
But what really hit me was the fact of how absolutely bleak the east was. I mean, hell, the whole place just looked “grey” and poor. I had never seen anything that horrible in my life. I couldn’t imagine what day-to-day life would have been back then.
I am glad to say that I appreciate the freedom we Americans have all the much more for this experience.
I believe that I belonged to a strange and clandestine bit of the final days of the Cold War, and ultimately the Fall of the Wall.
My family were 30 miles from the border with family in the old East Germany. Hippy, German, intellectuals on the forefront of late 80’s liberal Evangelical Lutheranism, an elightened Academical Theologist and professor of Religion … I believe as a cover, for our international travels and dropoints, I was a quite convenient cover. I believe I also delivered important data as a blind mule.
Those were some good comparison photos.
Jon Stewart captures it well. Link.
The whole show is worth a look. I had intended to start a MPSIMS thread about the second segment which hangs Fox out to dry. Serena’s pretty good too.
I was in the military stationed in Wertheim Germany when this happened. Very exciting time.