Wednesday, November 11, 2009

The Fall of the Berlin Wall, 20 Years Ago

I'm not much for politics, but this subject means a lot to me.  I will admit, however, that I didn't remember the anniversary on my own.  I was reminded by my virtual-blogger-facebook friend Petya (who I've never met in person) at the beginning of the week.

I've meant to blog of the subject since Monday, but haven't had time with all of my work.  However, I don't want it to be perfect before I mention the event.  It's important.

At this point, I'll suffice it to say that I didn't know how much of what I'd learned about communism was true.  Media, propoganda, movies, books, school, rumor, etc. were my education.  I didn't live it.

Here's a short list of learning influences, good, bad, accurate, and inaccurate.  Communism, oppression, repression, the Cold War, etc.  overlapping, analogy, metaphor...

Duck and Cover
Gotcha!
We The Living
"Four legs good, two legs bad"
Red Dawn
"We will bury you"
Bond girls
Anthem/2112
1984
"Ich bin ein Berliner"

None of these paint a picture of what life under Communism must have been like.  Turns out some was accurate and some not...

If I never come back to update this and flesh things out, I leave you with my own little story of that day.

I was in a vanpool, coming home from my job at USC, when I heard about the Wall on the radio.  This was before everyone had a cell phone, and I was anxious to get home to call my dad.  My father is from Germany, was once a Berlin Wall guard in the American Army, and we'd talked many times about how awful that wall was.  I wanted to see how he was doing after the news.  I called him an hour later, and I could tell he was crying a little.  Just so you know how a few average Americans took the news, there were some tears in the van, too.

3 comments:

  1. Didn't it seem, when the wall came down, that the world was starting to make sense? That we were on the verge of a better world? What the heck happened?

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  2. I know. It feels like that, doesn't it? But, things are better for millions of people. The additional bad things around the world would have still happened. Things could be better, but they would have most assuredely been worse.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I never thought I would live long enough to see that day. I stayed up for hours watching TV and the coverage that night. Yes, teary day. World War 11 was finally over. RobLL

    ps - in hind sight we might have needed to suspect it possible, Churchill suggested it could happen very quickly. I remember after Stalin died, and things were changing, we just weren't looking.

    ReplyDelete

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