Checkpoint Charlie

---

Apparently, Monday is a day when many of Berlin's museums are closed, but the Checkpoint Charlie Museumis open every day, so we decided to make it the main event for the day.

Our Pension features Früstück every morning in the breakfast room, so we decided to take advantage and fuel up for the morning. I had scrambled eggs, some salamis and cheeses, a small bowl of Müsli mit Milch and some coffee and orange juice; Cheryl passed on the eggs, but had a bowl of Müsli with yogurt, plus some of the meats and cheeses, and also coffee and orange juice. Except for the eggs, we had this type of breakfast every morning while staying with Andrea and Ulf, and also when we were in Vienna in 2009, our Pension featured much the same fare, and in each instance, I've found it refreshing to start the day with more of a protein bomb; it stays with me longer, and it doesn't cause my blood glucose to spike, and it also doesn't make me sleepy. So, I will try, once again, to take this habit home with me. Anyway, breakfast was delicious and filling, and we finished up and set off for Checkpoint Charlie, this time by bus.

Actually, before I go on, I'd like to give a shout out to Berlin's public transit system. We have a few good systems in the states, say in New York or Boston or DC (i.e., places on the east coast where lots and lots of people live), but the two cities I've lived in, Dallas and Seattle, have had pretty terrible public transit, and, of course, outside of a city, not having a car isn't even an uncomfortable option. Seattle, for example, has some buses, a single streetcar, a single light rail line (though more are on the way), and a single regional express commuter train, plus some Amtrak trains come through. That's it. Nobody wants to pay for the infrastructure, so we are left with paltry public transit, and a lot of people driving cars and bitching about the terrible traffic. Back to the point: Berlin's public transit is just top-notch. A glance at the map shows a well-connected network of buses, trolleys, above and below ground light rail lines, and regional express trains that go everywhere. It is not necessary at all to own a car here, and if I lived here, I probably wouldn't, because paying for a place to store it wouldn't make any sense when I don't need it to get around.

So, right, we took a bus to Checkpoint Charlie, and there it was, just like in the pictures we've all seen. With the wall and barbed wire and all the security gone, it's not the same, of course, but if you want to see a decent facsimile of what it was like to go through, definitely check out Gotcha!, which is a great educational film from 1985 about spies, espionage and East-West relations.

The best part was the guys dressed in vaguely American uniforms with American flags who charge you to take a picture in front of the checkpoint (apparently, they are licensed, because they've got velvet ropes, and nobody ran them off). I opted to just take a picture of the guardshack and the "You are leaving the American sector" sign. We lingered a bit, and decided to go into the museum.

When we bought our passes, we told the pass-selling-lady that we had CityTour cards, and she said that only the Berlin WelcomeCard got the discount, but then she charged us the discounted rate anyway, so that was nice, but I don't understand it, because we didn't even begin to make a fuss or anything. At the sales desk was a display talking about photography permits and how there isn't any photography allowed without a permit, including with phone cameras, and that even with a permit, no tripods and so forth. We didn't buy a permit, so we took no photographs inside the museum.

You can read about the museum at the Wikipedia article I linked, but in a nutshell, it was started in 1962 by a dude, Dr. Rainer Hildebrandt, who was human rights activist. Dr. Rainier had a particular point of view, which becomes apparent as you walk through the museum and read all the stuff. Until I have time to process, and write more, this is what I understand about his point: a) The west did not do enough to protect the people who ended up in the DDR and b) the people inside the DDR did not resist enough, or at least, not strongly enough, and also c) the Soviet Union kind of sucked. I will need to think on these some more before I can have any hope of writing anything intelligent about them.

I was impressed with the many ways people escaped from the East to the West, that's for sure. There were all manner of tunnels, cars with secret compartments, primitive home-made ultralight aircraft, zip lines, a welding machine with enough room for a person inside (and impossible to detect without completely dismantling it), and even a couple of hollowed out surf boards.

I was depressed by the stories of families separated for years because the wall went up while part of the family was in the west and the rest in the east, and the stories of the people shot in the no-man's-land and left to die. This is more that I'm going to have to read about and think about, though. It's only today that the whole occupation of Germany by the victors of the war has become really real to me; until today, it was a thing I learned about in school, and damned little at that. I remember hearing about it coming down when I was in college, and I remember that it felt far away, and while notable, it didn't really affect me much. It's different when you stand in the place and see it all together. Of course, the wall is gone now, so you have to use your imagination, but it's not so difficult.

We spent about two hours in the museum, and would need twice again that time more to get through all the exhibits. We exited through the museum shop, and bought some magnets and stuff, and headed across the street to a Starbucks for some iced coffee and decompression. While there, I was poking around in Google Now, and happened upon a Mexican restaurant, so after Starbucks, we hopped on the U-bahn and headed to the place.

It was a little hole in the wall called Maria Bonita, but they had margaritas made with mezcal (very tasty) and the food was pretty good, too. I would definitely go there again.

After we finished, we hopped a trolley and went to Alexanderplatz, which is solidly where East Berlin was, and you can tell. First, you're practically at the foot of the Fernsehturm, which is just what it looks like, a giant phallic symbol put up by the Soviets as a giant middle finger to the west. Or something like that. Also, the architecture is just ... something. There is some Stalinist architecture, which is just neo-classical pretension, but most of what you see (outside of the new buildings built since the 1990s) are Soviet block style housing. We haven't explored what was East Berlin too much, so I'm anticipating seeing more of this.

While at Alexanderplatz, we decided we needed to take some "totes adorbs selfies", so we did that, and then we discovered a delightful Eiscafé called Al Teatro, where we rehabilitated Eis in Berlin. After that, we hopped the S-bahn back to our neighborhood, and that finished off our Monday.

---

Photos

Checkpoint Charlie
Those guys aren't real soldiers, and they're ganking the best photo spot.

Maria Bonita Tacos
They were tasty

Selfie with Fernsehturm
We've decided we're the kind of people who take selfies now.

Fernsehturm
Oh, yah, our tower is way bigger than your stuff.

Comments

[J&J]

Interesting observation of the Soviet years. Agreed we need a better transit system here!