Not even two months after the Berlin Wall had been erected, I was born into the western part of this mysterious and fascinating city—I guess by accident. Who determined whether you were born to a family in the West or in the East? The small two-bedroom apartment where I grew up in the southern part of West Berlin (Neukoelln) was only 15 minutes walking distance from this world famous but horrific monument.

While graffiti was decorating the western exposure of this concrete monster, and interested tourists (and locals) could take a peek eastward from wooden watchtowers strategically positioned along the western demarcation line, a wide “death zone” or “no-man’s land” extended from the Wall deep into East Berlin and was characterized by barbed wire, multiple rows of fences, wire-triggered explosive devices, watch dogs on mobile leashes and soldiers with rifles ready to shoot and kill those who dared to follow the soon-to-be-famous advertisement: “Let’s Go West.”

Seeing the Wall almost every day, being confined to “our” side and traveling on the rather bumpy East German autobahn “in transit” to West Germany, however, was part of our West Berlin normalcy.

In 1989, I was living in Schöneberg in the heart of West Berlin, right around the corner from Rathaus Schöneberg, the district’s city hall. Rathaus Schöneberg had achieved some claim to fame when John F. Kennedy used it as the backdrop for his speech addressing a gigantic crowd of Berliners in 1963. The speech ended with the frequently quoted phrase: “Ich bin ein Berliner” (which does not mean: “I am a jelly-donut). Kennedy’s speech was directed to the population of West Berlin and was an assurance of America’s commitment to – if necessary—defending the freedom of this encircled city. A few months after Kennedy’s visit to West Berlin, he was assassinated in the streets of Dallas, Texas.

On November 9, 1989 late in the evening, I was watching the news on television in my cozy Schöneberg apartment. Gunter Schabowski, representative of the still-in-power East German government, was reading a declaration that surprisingly proclaimed East German citizens could—from now on—easily obtain travel permits to the West. It was apparently no longer required to provide unequivocal proof of a family emergency or similar hardship that would sometimes be accepted by East German authorities as justification for a “blitz-trip” to the golden West. Even in cases when a travel permit was granted, which was a rare event, the East German traveler’s family had to stay behind to ensure his timely return to his beloved socialist fatherland.

At this point, I have to admit that I did not take Schabowski’s declaration very seriously. Although peaceful demonstrations in East German cities had been going on for several weeks, what Schabowski had said was just a little bit too fantastic to be true.

West Berliners lived in West Berlin and East Berliners were condemned to staying in East Berlin – that’s the way it is. During the 28 years of my life that I had lived in this city, East Berliners traveling freely to West Berlin would be like running into polar bears in the Sahara desert. Thus, I did not pay too much attention to Schabowski’s announcement and went to bed because I had to get up early the next day to go to work.

When I left my house the next morning I was stunned. Thousands of East German visitors had “arrived” and were hustling through the western part of the city. Visitors were waiting in long lines on sidewalks to receive their “Begrüssungsgeld” (welcome money), issued by the West German federal government through private banks. This was an unbelievable sight and the beginning of the probably most impressive political experience of my lifetime. The continuation of the story is well known.

I spent many days and nights in wintry Berlin witnessing pieces of the Wall being dismantled by East German soldiers and meeting people from the East. It was also the beginning of a period during which the West Berliners begun to explore the other side of the iron curtain. Despite the physical proximity of East Berlin, this part of our city was largely unknown to us.

Four years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, in 1993, I moved to Seattle in the United States for job-related reasons. My wife is American. I am still captured by the events in November 1989 and will always remember them as a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

The city of Berlin (West and East), with all its problematic history, draws me back for a visit at least once or twice per year. My non-continuous presence in Berlin makes the rapidly occurring changes in a city that tries to grow back together even more obvious.

Ich bin ein Berliner! And I will always be.

From Marco Mielcarek
Seattle, Washington

Photo provided by Marco Mielcarek