Wallspotting

Here is another colorful and cheerful card from the Berlin wall days. As you can see they really had to distort the sky to make something colorful out of the depressing sights.

This is one of many cards with multiple small sights from the divided Berlin. Therefore it is a bit hard to show you the location of everything.

• The house on the upper right picture is the from the state parliament building on Niederkirchnerstraße, which I wrote about in another post.
• The picture at the lower left of course shows the Brandenbuger Tor. I haven't posted any pictures from there yet, but as you can imagine there are many post cards from that spot.
• The lower middle picture shows a staircase from which people from the western part could look over the wall. The eastern people was of course not allowed to something similar. If you read Thomas Brussigs book Am kürzeren Ende der Sonnenallee you can find out what things the western people could shout to the eastern from such stands.
• The lower right picture is from the Checkpoint Charlie area, which I wrote about in my first blog post.

This post card was posted 20th february 1989. That means that it was posted just about nine months before the wall came down.

The post card was sent to Sweden, to the town Olofström. The greeting is in swedish and translates to:

Hi!

Am now in Berlin!
The trip went well, just some bumpiness on the boat. Yesterday we were at the zoo + the aquarium. We have also had time for a disco called "Society".

Hugs

Pernilla

Neukölln

Welcome to Neukölln! As you can see on this post card it hosts nice restaurants with nice beer! The wall and the barb wire will make sure you end up home, in your own eastern bed.

The big sign says "Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit", which translates to "Unity, justice and freedom". It is very ironic that there had to be a wall with barb wire to protect those big values.

The bar on the picture is Heidelberger Krug. This place was subject to a massive tunnel project. In the basement a big escape tunnel was built. You can read more about this interesting story here:

• http://www.grenztruppen-der-ddr.de/podium2/viewtopic.php?f=70&t=1947&start=25
• http://www.welt.de/kultur/history/article106140295/Die-meisten-Fluchttunnel-gab-es-in-Berlin-Neukoelln.html
• http://www.berlin.de/imperia/md/content/lzpb/aktuelles/berliner_fluchten.pdf

The house still exists, but now houses a restaurant called Schweigel, Budike & Destille.


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If you would like to visit this historical place and maybe eat and the restaurant, then you have the location on this map.


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The back side is unfortunately unwritten for this one as well. I will try to scan some of my written ones. They are often just greetings to friends at home and often answers to radio competitions, but sometimes they can give a glimpse about the life behind the wall, the frustration and the longing for freedom. Again it is ironic that the latter word is the same as on the sign on this postcard.