FRIDAY, June 13 – Berlin
Another early morning departure brought us to the Capital city, Berlin. The day was again filled with fascinating meetings with experts – it was information overload!
We started at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, a non-partisan think tank that writes advisory reports for the German government and policymakers. Dr. Marco Overhaus is an expert on EU-US relations, and Dr. Ronja Kempin focuses on security and defense of the EU and NATO (based in France)… it was rather unsettling hearing their take on what is happening in the US, and hearing that the US is no longer considered a reliable ally. They also explained that their policy is now to “Think the unthinkable,” and that their goal is to prevent spillover; ie, to disrupt what’s happening in the US and to keep it from happening in Germany. They believe that US democracy is in a profound state of crisis. Germany is now making contingency plans – it really was unsettling hearing from this expert outsider's perspective.
We had a lovely lunch discussion with Kate Brady, a reporter for the Washington Post who is stationed in Berlin. She explained the process of news feeds, fact-checking, and writing articles, and she explained that she (and others at the Washington Post and other newspapers) have never felt silenced or influenced in her reporting.
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| In front of the German Chancellery |
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| In the Paul Löbe Haus |
After lunch we were lucky enough to get a tour of the Reichstag, home of the Bundestag (the main German legislative body). It is usually closed to the public, but because one of Atlantik-Brücke’s members is a member of the Bundestag, he arranged for a staff member to show us around. We started with a tour of the Paul Löbe Haus, a postmodern glass and concrete building built in 2002 to hold offices for parliament members as well as committee meeting rooms.
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| The missing years: 1933-45 |
An interesting note – 1% of the building costs was reserved specifically for art, and there were many interesting pieces including one gifted by the French that showed many small boxes, each for an elected member of parliament. There is a black box with a gap in dates from 1933-45, since nobody was elected. We saw the box for Adolf Hitler, which unlike all the other boxes, was solid – it was filled with concrete, since everyone keeps kicking it in. It was also a good reminder that before it all went down, Hitler was elected.
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| Crossing the underground tunnel to the Reichstag |
Underground tunnels connect the Paul Löbe Haus to the Reichstag, where the General Assembly meets.
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| The CDU/CSU meeting room |
The original building held the Reichstag of the Weimar Republic and the German Empire; it was heavily damaged in WWII and reconstructed with a glass dome (to symbolize transparency in government) in 1999. We were also able to look into the meeting rooms for the political parties and factions.
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| The Reichstag |
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| A clear view down into the debating chamber |
The outside of the Reichstag building is a fascinating contrast between classic and futuristic - the Neo-Renaissance building was damaged during WWII, and reconstruction including the new glass dome was finished in 1999. On the main facade of the building, the iconic inscription reads "Dem deutschen Volke": To the German People.
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| ... but almost trapped forever! |
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| At the Atlantik-Brücke office... |
After checking into our hotel, we left for our final meeting on Germany’s climate and energy policies. We met at the Atlantik-Brücke building and heard about Germany’s plan to end coal dependency by 2038 and build up their renewables. Because much of their oil and gas comes from Russia, they are trying hard to disassociate themselves and find alternative sources.
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| "Hanging out like Berliners" |
We spent the evening at a biergarten in an urban park near the Atlantik-Brücke building, hanging out “like Berliners”. It was a lovely evening, and nice to enjoy the public park – and to meet Franka’s family! Because Berlin is so much further north than home, it stays light so late in the day that it’s sometimes surprising to look at your watch and realize it is nearly 10PM – so I’m glad we have a free day tomorrow so that I can finally sleep in!
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| Germany truly is unbelievable! |
SATURDAY, June 14 – Berlin
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| Entrance to the Jewish Museum |
With a free morning, I finally got the chance to sleep in (ahhhhh…!), then I headed out to see the Jewish Museum. This was an amazingly well designed (and free!) history of the Jewish people in Germany all the way from the Middle Ages to today. The symbolism of the architecture was so powerful, and there is a fantastic free audiotour that I’m sad I only had time to do a small portion of – I highly recommend an afternoon there if you can!
We met again as a group to head to lunch – döner at what is supposedly Angela Merkel’s favorite döner shop. I guess Duolingo really does know what words are useful in Germany, since döner – thinly sliced rotisserie veal - was one of the first foods we learned! And it really was delicious.
The afternoon was spent touring around Berlin learning about the complicated political history of this divided city.
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A Brief History Break – The Wall that Divided Berlin
After the end of WWII, the defeated Germany was fractured into four zones, each controlled by one of the Allied nations: US, UK, France, and the Soviet Union. Even though Berlin was completely inside Soviet territory, it too was divided into four zones. In 1949, the zones became two separate countries: West Germany (the Federal Republic of Germany) and East Germany (the German Democratic Republic, or GDR). That meant that half of the city of Berlin, the part controlled by the US, UK, and France, became a small island of freedom inside the GDR.
Life in East Germany was harder than in the West, so by 1961 over 2.6 million people had escaped to West Berlin. If someone made it to West Berlin, they were immediately given asylum and help relocating. To combat this drain on their workforce, the GDR ‘built’ the Berlin Wall overnight on August 13, 1961. According to the GDR authorities, the wall was meant to protect the people from “fascist elements” and officially called it the “Antifascist Protection Rampart.” At first, it consisted of barbed wire and low barriers patrolled by guards. Fairly quickly, it became an elaborate fortified border with concrete walls, guard towers, and barbed wire that completely encircled West Berlin, stretching over 96 miles long, with a second parallel ‘hinterland’ wall about 100 yards in GDR territory. Between the two was a “death strip” with tripwires, so East Germans couldn’t even approach the actual wall.
The wall wasn’t just a physical barrier, but a symbol of the divide between Communist East and Democratic West. As the Soviet Union began weakening in the 80’s people began protesting and demanding reforms. On November 9, 1989, the GDR announced people could freely cross the border, and that night people rushed the wall and started chipping away at it. On October 3, 1990, Germany was reunified.
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We met our tourguide at Checkpoint Charlie, the famous American border crossing on Friedrichstraße that was the only point where foreign visitors and anyone in the military could cross the Berlin Wall. It was named “Charlie” because of the NATO alphabet – there was also Checkpoints Alpha and Bravo in other parts of Berlin. For a tense moment in October 1961, US and Soviet tanks faced off at Checkpoint Charlie over access rights into East Berlin. Luckily, diplomacy de-escalated the situation, but it highlighted the precarious nature of peace in the city.
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| The tank standoff at Checkpoint Charlie, October 1961 |
We then walked pass Trabiworld, the world's largest collection of Trabi cars. This iconic symbol of East Germany was the only car that was available to most people, with a long waiting list of sometimes up to 10-15 years. They were simple cars made of plastic reinforced with cotton and resin(!) since there was a steel shortage, and it boasted a whopping 26 horsepower engine with a top speed of 60 mph.
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| Ampelmännchen and a Trabi - how very East Berlin! |
The Ampelmännchen, ‘little traffic light man,’ is symbol of East Germany. He is a jaunty little worker wearing a straw hat, eager to get to his job. He is so popular that he is now found at all pedestrian traffic crossings throughout Berlin.
Our next stop was to examine the Detlev Rohwedder Building, former Ministry of Aviation (ie headquarters of the Luftwaffe), lead by Hermann Göring. Built in 1935, it was meant to be imposing, intimidating, and masculine, typical of National Socialist architecture. It was one of the few Nazi buildings to survive WWII, and became one of the main administrative buildings for the GDR government. Along the outside wall under the colonnade is a giant ceramic mural, "Aufbau der Republik" ("Building the Republic") depicting a Socialist ideal of a big happy family. In the ground in front is a large photograph of protesters from the June 17, 1953 East German Uprising.
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| The former Luftwaffe HQ is still just as hated: it's the Tax Office |
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| "I was just trying to stop the war" - George Elser |
As we continued our walk, a simple silhouette stood out in the sky - a memorial to Georg Elser, another individual German who took action to resist. In 1939, he planted a perfectly timed bomb in Munich knowing Hitler gave an annual speech there. Unfortunately, Hitler left early because of reports of impending bad weather, and Elser was caught trying to flee to Switzerland. He was tortured and interrogated by the Gestapo and imprisoned for 5 years before being executed.
We also stumbled across part of the world's largest memorial - the Stolpersteine, or "Stumbling Stones".
These small brass cobblestones are placed in the pavement in front of the last freely chosen home or workplace of a victim of the Holocaust. Each hand-engraved stone has a name and basic information: forced retirement [date], fled [place], murdered [place], etc. There are now over 100,000 Stolpersteine laid in over 30 countries, helping to bring back the memory of these individuals.
The site of the Führerbunker, Hitler’s underground air raid shelter, is now just a parking lot – a purposeful design so as not to allow any memorial and to prevent it from becoming a Nazi shrine. We stopped to learn about his final days – as Nazi Germany was collapsing in early 1945, Hitler retreated to the heavily fortified underground shelter. For several months it was the center of the Nazi regime. As the Soviets began closing in, Hitler quickly married Eva Braun, then 40 hours later committed suicide and had his minions burn his body, so as to avoid capture. The Soviets took Berlin on May 2, 1945 and partly blew up the bunker (and supposedly found his corpse – the majority they burned and threw in the river; a jaw was taken back to Moscow and has never been tested or released).
Across from this unassuming and forgettable parking lot is the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, a striking and somber dedication to the millions of Jewish victims of the Holocaust. Covering an entire city block, this memorial is a hauntingly somber yet beautifully creative place of remembrance. Thousands of concrete blocks rise up from an undulating plot, creating maze-like paths that evoke a sense of isolation, confusion, and loneliness. It was a powerful few minutes wandering through - and it allowed us to feel, rather than hear or read about, this weighty history.
The Brandenburg Gate, built in 1791 by King Frederick William II of Prussia, was originally constructed as a symbol of peace. The Nazis turned it into a symbol of power, and it was heavily damaged during WWII.
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| Berlin No Kings protest against Trump |
During the Cold War it represented division, as nobody could access it since it stood in the no-man’s land on the East German side of the Berlin Wall. It now symbolizes unity and peace, and is the site of many demonstrations (including today’s No King’s protest, which we unfortunately couldn’t stay for).
Our final visit of the day was a tour of the Berlin Wall Memorial where we met with Anja, head of the education department, who gave us an insightful tour of a preserved section of the wall and death strip as well as the memorial to the individuals who died trying to cross the wall.
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| Memorial to those who died at the Wall |
Because the wall was erected nearly overnight, neighborhoods were divided, friends were separated, and families were split apart. Before the wall, some people lived on one side and worked on the other; overnight they lost their jobs. Some buildings sat right on the border and some citizens jumped out of windows trying to escape into West Berlin. We learned about individual stories of people attempting to cross, some who succeeded through daring and wiles, and others who tragically died in their quest for freedom. I was surprised by the width of the death strip, and can only imagine the desperation people must have felt to get them to attempt the crossing.
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The memorial sits in the middle of the Death Strip, showing how far someone had to run to cross,
only to be met by another 12 ft high wall. |
Dinner tonight was at a Vietnamese restaurant in a popular and trendy former-East German neighborhood that has become gentrified. The abundance of Vietnamese dates back to the Cold War era when East Germany, with a shortage of labor, recruited workers from North Vietnam to work all throughout the country. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, many chose to settle in Berlin and start businesses (the most popular, according to Franka, being restaurants and flower shops.)
SUNDAY, June 15 - Berlin
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| The ingenious Alexanderplatz world clock |
We started today in the Alexanderplatz, what was once the Times Square of East Berlin. It actually started as a cattle market outside Berlin city walls in the 13th century, and it was renamed Alexanderplatz after a visit from Tsar Alexander I of Russia in 1805. The area was heavily bombed in WWII and rebuilt by the East Germans as a showcase for socialist ideals. I loved the retro-space look of it, which reminded me of The Jetsons.
The original plan was to spend the day in Potsdam, but an event in that city would have meant too much traffic and crowds, so Franka quickly organized a tour of the Stasi prison known as the Berlin Hohenshönhausen Memorial.
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Unmarked vans would whisk victims away,
taking circuitous routes to confuse the prisoners. |
The museum tells the story of the people imprisoned by the East German Ministry for State Security, also known as the Stasi or secret police. Hohenshönhausen opened in 1961 as a prison to house people who attempted (or just talked about) leaving East Germany or political prisoners. It was a secret prison, concealed because it stood in a restricted military zone and didn't show up on any maps. Using a network of Civilian Informants, the Stasi used torture, intimidation, sleep deprivation, and psychological warfare to punish anyone who they thought spoke out against the regime.
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Padded cells were used for
sensory deprivation and torture |
We visited the prison cells, interrogation rooms, outdoor “exercise” cells, and dark and foreboding padded cells. Walking around the prison had a weird, surreal vibe - the 1960’s and 70’s linoleum and wallpaper was a reminder that the atrocities committed in the prison didn’t happen that long ago. Officially, the prison closed in 1990.
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| Stasi interrogation room. Each had double padded doors - so who knows what atrocities happened inside... |
For lunch, we finally got a taste of the iconic currywurst - an extremely popular Berlin street food that first started during the post-war food ration days.
The tradition began when an ingenious housewife mixed curry powder with ketchup and poured it on sliced sausages, then began selling it on a street corner. It became so popular (mostly with working class/construction workers) that neighboring vendors started copying her recipe. I thought it was delicious, but tasted more like barbeque sauce than anything else.
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| Berlin Cathedral |
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| Museum Island |
We slowly wandered back to the hotel through Museum Island (a man-made island in the middle of the Spree River housing five museums) and past the Berlin Cathedral - a grand and imposing building that’s the largest Protestant church in Germany (and the 2nd largest in the world). We crossed through the Humboldt Forum and made it back to the hotel for a final wrap-up and dinner.
With the teacher group tour ending, I said my farewells to the amazing educators that I met and learned from - Franka and Philipp did an amazing job finding a quality group who stayed focused and engaged throughout our tour. I learned so much about the history of Germany, particularly insights into WWII and the aftermath that I either had no idea about, was misinformed, or had only heard about. Thank you to Atlantik-Brücke for this amazing opportunity!
We started at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, a non-partisan think tank that writes advisory reports for the German government and policymakers. Dr. Marco Overhaus is an expert on EU-US relations, and Dr. Ronja Kempin focuses on security and defense of the EU and NATO (based in France)… it was rather unsettling hearing their take on what is happening in the US, and hearing that the US is no longer considered a reliable ally. They also explained that their policy is now to “Think the unthinkable,” and that their goal is to prevent spillover; ie, to disrupt what’s happening in the US and to keep it from happening in Germany. They believe that US democracy is in a profound state of crisis. Germany is now making contingency plans – it really was unsettling hearing from this expert outsider's perspective.
We had a lovely lunch discussion with Kate Brady, a reporter for the Washington Post who is stationed in Berlin. She explained the process of news feeds, fact-checking, and writing articles, and she explained that she (and others at the Washington Post and other newspapers) have never felt silenced or influenced in her reporting.
We met our tourguide at Checkpoint Charlie, the famous American border crossing on Friedrichstraße that was the only point where foreign visitors and anyone in the military could cross the Berlin Wall. It was named “Charlie” because of the NATO alphabet – there was also Checkpoints Alpha and Bravo in other parts of Berlin. For a tense moment in October 1961, US and Soviet tanks faced off at Checkpoint Charlie over access rights into East Berlin. Luckily, diplomacy de-escalated the situation, but it highlighted the precarious nature of peace in the city.
We then walked pass Trabiworld, the world's largest collection of Trabi cars. This iconic symbol of East Germany was the only car that was available to most people, with a long waiting list of sometimes up to 10-15 years. They were simple cars made of plastic reinforced with cotton and resin(!) since there was a steel shortage, and it boasted a whopping 26 horsepower engine with a top speed of 60 mph.
These small brass cobblestones are placed in the pavement in front of the last freely chosen home or workplace of a victim of the Holocaust. Each hand-engraved stone has a name and basic information: forced retirement [date], fled [place], murdered [place], etc. There are now over 100,000 Stolpersteine laid in over 30 countries, helping to bring back the memory of these individuals.
The site of the Führerbunker, Hitler’s underground air raid shelter, is now just a parking lot – a purposeful design so as not to allow any memorial and to prevent it from becoming a Nazi shrine. We stopped to learn about his final days – as Nazi Germany was collapsing in early 1945, Hitler retreated to the heavily fortified underground shelter. For several months it was the center of the Nazi regime. As the Soviets began closing in, Hitler quickly married Eva Braun, then 40 hours later committed suicide and had his minions burn his body, so as to avoid capture. The Soviets took Berlin on May 2, 1945 and partly blew up the bunker (and supposedly found his corpse – the majority they burned and threw in the river; a jaw was taken back to Moscow and has never been tested or released).
Across from this unassuming and forgettable parking lot is the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, a striking and somber dedication to the millions of Jewish victims of the Holocaust. Covering an entire city block, this memorial is a hauntingly somber yet beautifully creative place of remembrance. Thousands of concrete blocks rise up from an undulating plot, creating maze-like paths that evoke a sense of isolation, confusion, and loneliness. It was a powerful few minutes wandering through - and it allowed us to feel, rather than hear or read about, this weighty history.
The Brandenburg Gate, built in 1791 by King Frederick William II of Prussia, was originally constructed as a symbol of peace. The Nazis turned it into a symbol of power, and it was heavily damaged during WWII.
Our final visit of the day was a tour of the Berlin Wall Memorial where we met with Anja, head of the education department, who gave us an insightful tour of a preserved section of the wall and death strip as well as the memorial to the individuals who died trying to cross the wall. 
We started today in the Alexanderplatz, what was once the Times Square of East Berlin. It actually started as a cattle market outside Berlin city walls in the 13th century, and it was renamed Alexanderplatz after a visit from Tsar Alexander I of Russia in 1805. The area was heavily bombed in WWII and rebuilt by the East Germans as a showcase for socialist ideals. I loved the retro-space look of it, which reminded me of The Jetsons. 
The tradition began when an ingenious housewife mixed curry powder with ketchup and poured it on sliced sausages, then began selling it on a street corner. It became so popular (mostly with working class/construction workers) that neighboring vendors started copying her recipe. I thought it was delicious, but tasted more like barbeque sauce than anything else.
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