Fall of the Berlin wall

[Reactionary Rage]

30 years ago.  What are your memories?  Did you watch it?  

I remember meeting a German trekking in Nepal and one night we had a bit of a smoke and we were talking about the wall etc and I jokingly asked him (but with enough feigned sincerity to make him doubt whether I was joking).  "what is it with Germany and David Hasslehoff?" and he went fucking off on one!  "everybody is always asking me about DAVID FUCKING HASSLEHOFF... he had one fucking song and it's all people ever fucking talk about...".  I really stirred something up lol.  Wonderful stuff.

Anyway...

[Mr. FOLLARD]

I was certainly old enough at the time for it to have an impact, but I wasn't really interested. I didn't start to have a curiosity for this kind of thing until a few years later. I don't have any memories, either.

I was studying in Germany in 1990 and some of my (English) classmates made a trip up to Berlin during the time between the fall of the Wall and the reunification of Germany. It was apparently pretty lively but I didn't bother going.

I've talked to quite a few Germans over the last few years and there's really no clear consensus. I mean, they're all glad it's gone, but there's this Ostalgie - especially among the old - that makes you wonder.

I'd say I'd love to have lived in East Berlin in the 70s but you and Tobes will accuse me of tourism porn or whatever you call it

[Mr. FOLLARD]

I'm thinking of moving back there. No other city gives me such a buzz.

Shame about the locals but Mann kann nicht alles haben

[Sneelock]

Yeah, it was a pretty big deal. There was a feeling of optimism around it. I’m all for that.
Most of the TV Commentary seemed to me to be over fixated on Reagan’s “tear down this wall” speech.

[Cousin Lou]

Nov 10, 2019 19:17:28 GMT Mr. FOLLARD said:

I'm thinking of moving back there. No other city gives me such a buzz.

Shame about the locals but Mann kann nicht alles haben

I have itfrom a reliable source that Leipzig is the new Berlin.

[Mr. FOLLARD]

meh

[Reactionary Rage]

Nowhere is the NEW Berlin. Berlin is....Berlin. Can't you just marry a rich fraulein called Helga, John?

I've been thinking about that period a bit recently. I was only young at the time so the actual significance of the fall was over my head somewhat but it felt like a very positive time when we seemed to now be collectively heading in the right direction after the madness. The Scorpions...Wind of Change! Fuck yeah, that sorta thing. Surely this was the start of the inexorable move towards western style liberal democracies across Europe and probably the world...amIright???

And yet 30 odd years later here we are. Didn't see this coming! Oh well.

*sings* Take me to the magic of the moment on a glory night...

[Reactionary Rage]

Hasslehoff though. Oh Europe. There is something so unbelievably naff about his moment that as a Brit it can't help but feel representative of a certain kind of continental oddness, ken? A little bit Eurotrash.

But then can you imagine Macca or somebody doing it instead? Giving it the thumbs up, performing Freedom version 1 ("alright!", "dooooo!").

I'll take the Hoff please.  Leather kecks n all.

[tory]

I was engrossed by Eastern Europe when I was a teenager. The wall came down on 9 Nov 1989 and two days later Fools Gold was released by the Stone Roses. It was a heady time!

I went to SSEES in 1992 and tried to learn Russian, flopped out and then went over to Berlin and Eastern Europe for a few months at a time over the period from 93 to 96. I lived in Kreuzberg, Mitte and Lichtenberg for a little while, went to Prague, Poland, a bit of Hungary & Romania.

The whole experience was interesting - I was fascinated by Berlin and still am. But Eastern Europe was a real dump and I was really disappointed by it. I remember seeing an old lady in Prague selling hardcore porn magazines in the street that made me feel really sad. It was dismal - that exposure of a closed society to free markets in such a short period of time was I guess understandable.

I've no real interest in going back there. Maybe Hungary as I think it's a fascinating place that I didn't really understand at the time.

[Deleted]

Nov 10, 2019 22:29:13 GMT Sneelock said:

Yeah, it was a pretty big deal. There was a feeling of optimism around it. I’m all for that.
Most of the TV Commentary seemed to me to be over fixated on Reagan’s “tear down this wall” speech.

Me too, but I realized it was a really big breakthrough, no pun intended, in the eventual fall of communism. You got the sense it was the beginning of the end and the start to a unified Germany.

As a kid, East Germany seemed even more bleak than Russia, in some regards, and their Olympic women swimmers were huge.

[oleandermedian]

I watched it on TV in my flat in Madrid. I remember thinking it should have meant more to me than it did. But I was strangely indifferent to it. The reception on TV was rubbish and I went out after a while.

I visited Berlin in the mid-1980s and spent Christmas Day in East Berlin. I don’t recall even seeing the wall from “the other side” - I suppose they didn’t like to advertise its presence. Whereas in West Berlin it was much more in evidence – all that colourful graffiti (only on the West side at that time of course) really made it stand out among the general greyness.

[tory]

Thatcher was a massive factor in it too. She was the one that identified Gorbachev as the one that the West could do business with, met him in 84 and that led to deals with Reagan.

[Mr. FOLLARD]

Mr. Selective STRIKES AGAIN!

[Deleted]

If people haven't watched this, please make sure you do. Very powerful and moving

www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00nx0y6/the-secret-life-of-the-berlin-wall

[tory]

Nov 15, 2019 12:27:29 GMT Mr. FOLLARD said:

Mr. Selective STRIKES AGAIN!

Everyone is selective, Mr Oh I don't know