Remember, remember, the 9th of November...

[Takumaji]

On November 9th in 1989, the German Democratic Republic (GDR, the "other" Germany) gave in and opened the wall after Politbuerau member Guenther Schabowski mistakingly announced the end of the ban on leaving the country.

At this very day, fourty years after the foundation of the GDR, the erection of the Berlin Wall and decades of communist oppression, the iron curtain crumbled and fell, and a huge wave of insanely happy people swept across the border towards freedom. One year later, the post-war era finally ended with the reunification of both Germanies.

I was sitting in front of my TV when it happened and couldn't believe my eyes. My friends, family, neighbours and even total strangers danced together in the streets shed tears of joy...

WE all brought down this wall but I also feel grateful for the final approval of the old allied forces USA, England, France and Russia.

A lot of other historical events took place on this day too... 9th of November, a fateful day for Germans...

Still gives me the creeps man... just wanted to get if off my chest.

FREEDOM!!

 

[Lagduf]

I can't imagine what a happy moment that would have been, particularly for a German!

How old were you when the wall fell?

 

[Takumaji]

I can't imagine what a happy moment that would have been, particularly for a German!

How old were you when the wall fell?

I was 19.

My family had lots of friends and contacts in the GDR and I always dreamed of that day even when I was a kid, and then it really happened.

There are no words to describe our feelings back in the day... it was as if a trapdoor had just opened and we could see the sun for the first time in decades.

 

[Ancient Flounder]

I was a child when this happened, so it didn't seem as big as I would later see it as when I watched it live. I couldn't imagine actually being a German citizen and growing up with the wall being there my whole life and then see it be torn down and allow a country to unite as one again.

Gave myself goosebumps there. XD

 

[Takumaji]

All this wouldn't have been possible without Gorbachev and his Glasnost and Perestroika.

Thank you, Mikhail.

November 9 1989 not only was a big day for us Germans but also the beginning of the end of the USSR, the iron curtain, the cold war and global-scale communist representation. It also was the beginning of the European reunification, not only West and East Germany got reunited but East and West as a whole.

EDIT:

Sorry UKers for abusing the ol' Guy Fawkes nursery rhyme for the tread title...

 

[Syn]

I remember seeing the sheer joy of the people tearing down the wall. The look of anything CAN happen really touched my soul.

The world is better place now that the wall is gone!

I hope you have a great celebration of this day Tak

 

[Lagduf]

Is this day, by chance, a holiday now? If not it should be.

 

[alphagamer]

I was too young when the wall came down, I can only imagine what it must have been like if you experienced it live, if you lived in east Berlin; Traveling freely for the first time, visiting relatives, maybe even moving to another country.

 

[Takumaji]

Nope, sadly not an official one but a lot of people celebrate it anyway. Those who still care, that is.

The official holiday is Oktober 3rd, East and West Germany got reunited at that day in 1990.

 

[Takumaji]

I was too young when the wall came down, I can only imagine what it must have been like if you experienced it live, if you lived in east Berlin; Traveling freely for the first time, visiting relatives, maybe even moving to another country.

Two of my friends and I drove to Berlin in fucking cold January 1990 (with my buddy's Citroen 2CV "duck" without heating) to be there where it all happens. We borrowed a large hammer and a chisel and symbolically hacked away on the damn wall right next to the Reichstag while the Vopos (Volkspolizisten, the GDR police troop) watched and shock there heads in disbelief. Heh, the "hammer rental guys" made a pretty penny at that time, some of them asked 10 Deutschmarks for ten minutes hacking... the wall wasn't even torn down yet but the free market had already started working, that was kinda cool and scary at the same time.

My friend handed his camera to a policeman and he took some legendary pics of the Reichstag and over the wall towards East Berlin. Looked a bit like this:

On our last day we went to Checkpoint Charlie and had a chat with some of the US soldiers there who still were in fear of a Sovjet retaliation. In retrospect, we were sooooo damn lucky that Gorbachev and his comrades let it all happen.

The atmosphere was amazing, Berlin was packed full of people, happy faces everywhere you looked. I never felt as free as during those four days we spent in what was to become our capital city again.

We tore down that friggin' wall!!

EDIT:

For those interested, here's a link to Deutsche Welle, a global satellite and internet broadcasting station. They are going to stream tonight's November 9 celebrations in Berlin from what I've heard so it may be worth a look. The celebrations will officially begin around 7 pm CET: http://www.dw-world.de/

 

[OMFG]

I remember we had to watch the coverage when I was in fourth grade (age 9). Every time I hear Wir Sind Wir I think of the fall.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OinyfogIwUk

 

[aria]

I vividly remember watching on TV, I was really into world affairs from a very early age. At the time it seemed like such crazy moment to think that that Cold War had ended so abruptly.

I had to look up the guy Tak mentioned, how funny it must be to have your identity characterized by:

Schabowski gained worldwide fame in November 1989 for inadvertently beginning the destruction of the inner German border, including the Berlin Wall.

Heh, I can only imagine: "oh shit... whoops!"

 

[Mike Shagohod]

I remember seeing the sheer joy of the people tearing down the wall. The look of anything CAN happen really touched my soul.

The world is better place now that the wall is gone!

#1> I remember feeling happy for those directly effected by the wall and what it stood for as I watched this event at age 11, but also a foreboding sense of "What The Fuck Now?" as I realized there was no longer going to be an enemy in which everything could be blamed on (and vice versa towards the West).

#2> Well I would agree with that statement 90% but the last 10% still feels the way my eleven year old self did, only with more understanding of what it also meant, and that was a balancing scale that tipped to one side. Without a centralized juggernaught like the Soviet Union and the whole USSR to face off with... America lost it's purpose. I can still remember growing up in the Cold War and wondering if a second later I along with all else would be vaporized, or if some kind of conventional war would occur by the time I was 18 or 20.

I know ppl are going to cry: "RED DAWN was a movie, get over it!" (they always do) but seriously here. Outside of the freedom it has given everyone else, look what happened to the world as well. The Russians went nuts when they could not handle a democracy and sold military arms to everyone, ex Spetsnaz began training anyone and everyone (hell I got a 2 week crash course with a few friends in their tactics and weapons usage for crying out loud in 1999)... and now instead of one major enemy to deal with, we have hundreds of splinter faction extremist terrorist groups with wannabe Cobra Commanders plotting and carrying out missions... and an entire destabilized global economy because everyone got soft and forgot what it was like to be ready, steady, deadly. Instead we over indulged and went shopping, men became like women, women are men. Personally I miss the fucking Cold War and Putin is the only Russian who might bring it back. I want old Boris & Ivan back to hating me and me hating him. Fuck them.

#3> Outside of that, the 90% side of me says = Congradulations to those who lives it personally made a positive impact on.

#4> I cannot hear the song "Winds of Change" without thinking about the wall. I thought the song was faggy then and I still hate it now though. Fucking Scorpions.

 

[Marek]

I had to look up the guy Tak mentioned, how funny it must be to have your identity characterized by:

These two should start a support group.

 

[Takumaji]

#4> I cannot hear the song "Winds of Change" without thinking about the wall. I thought the song was faggy then and I still hate it now though. Fucking Scorpions.

I'm not a Scorpions fan but Winds of Change still is sort of a soundtrack of the days between 1989 and 1990... I still get goosebumps when I hear Klaus Meine's whistling intro.

Some say Laibach's Geburt einer Nation (birth of a nation) is the real anthem of those days... bought the maxi single back then and love it a lot (I'm an old Laibach fan) but I bet people over the world would have misunderstood the message (which is an ironic historical reflection, they're no nazis or anything)... heh...

 

[fenikso]

Remember that day. Stopping class to watch all the live broadcasts. What an amazing time.

I was only 11 years old at the time, so I didn't completely grasp the enormity of the event, but looking back at those times it must have been a bit like waking up from a nightmare for people that had to live next to and around the wall.

Thanks for the post Tak, I've always wondered what it must have been like for those directly affected.

 

[aria]

These two should start a support group.

Am I a nerd because I recognized Bork?

 

[Takumaji]

That guy looks angry. Who is that?

There still are some walls to tear down. South/North Korea, Cyprus/Turkey... there's a lot of work waiting for us, guys.

I'll be there with my 25kg sledgehammer...

 

[genjiglove]

I remember stores selling pieces of the Berlin Wall after it was torn down.

Capitalism > Communism

 

[alphagamer]

I remember stores selling pieces of the Berlin Wall after it was torn down.

Capitalism > Communism

Pieces of the Berlin wall still fetch a pretty penny at ebay...

 

[Takumaji]

I hacked about ten pieces with graffiti on them from the wall when I was there in '90 but none of them are left. Dunno what happened to them, must have been lost during two moves.

Dare I say there never was a truly communist or socialist country... they all turned into dictatorships at one point in time, that's not what communism originally was about.

But hey, that's a thing of the past.

 

[J. Max]

That guy looks angry. Who is that?

There still are some walls to tear down. South/North Korea, Cyprus/Turkey... there's a lot of work waiting for us, guys.

I'll be there with my 25kg sledgehammer...

Robert Bork. Crazy, right-wing federal judge who almost, but not quite became a US Supreme Court Justice.

 

[SML]

Pieces of the Berlin wall still fetch a pretty penny at ebay...

Damn, if there was ever a day to put the fragments I have up for sale...

(Bought from the gift shop of the George H. W. Bush Presidential Library, no less.)

 

[norton9478]

I was hoping that the Iranian Regime was going to fall apart last summer.

But the Regime is smart enough to strike the perfect balance to stay in power.

 

[Dio Brando]

Dare I say there never was a truly communist or socialist country... they all turned into dictatorships at one point in time, that's not what communism originally was about.

But hey, that's a thing of the past.

Communism sounds great on paper, but once you throw human nature into the mix, it just doesn't work.

That aside, it truly must have been wonderful to see your country reunited.