East German Wall guards who did not respond when waved at.

MANILA, Philippines -- Hard to believe it has been half a generation since the fall of the Berlin Wall this month in 1989.  The 50th anniversary this year of the building of the Wall is added impetus to look back at how things were in divided Berlin.  Visiting the city on the eve of the Wall’s demise in 1988, I had no idea I was at the epicenter of earth-shaking events in the coming months.

In those days, believe it or not, a Philippine passport holder like me did not need a visa to enter West Germany.  ‘The brown passport?  No need’ was the response I got from a German consul in Manchester, England where I was a graduate student.  When I left Berlin, the immigration officer at Tegel Airport just took an apathetic glance at my passport’s arrival stamp then hurriedly waved me off.  I even had to request for a departure stamp for souvenir.  Ah, those were the days.

I also learned that with my passport, I could get a day’s visitor visa to cross over to East Berlin for a nominal sum covering a visa fee and hard currency exchange into East German Marks at a disadvantageous rate.  Great!  The travel guides, however, painted the East German capital as a ho-hum place of monotony.  Regardless, taking in a flavor of the milieu behind the so-called Iron Curtain was an adventure not too many Filipino tourists get to savor.

West Berlin at Christmas time was extravagantly dressed in holiday style, no less than London, New York or Manila.  I went there during school break.  Its affluence was overseen by the rotating Mercedes Benz star atop the landmark high rise Europa Center Shopping Mall, like a star on top of a Christmas tree, dazzling lights and gifts galore underneath.  The streets were spanking clean and orderly.  All the buttons I pressed in public areas worked.  Clocks told the same (correct) time.

I boarded a subway train to Friedrichstrasse Station where the East German immigration counters were, subway level.  It was a no frills, medium-lit, cramped  space.  The immigration officers were behind a glass cage.  While in front of an officer, I wondered why he looked up, then to the left, then to the right.  I noticed there were angled mirrors around the frame of the glass panel so he could see my feet when looking up and what I was carrying when looking sideways.

Another ride in the same station, this time using an East Berlin train took me to the first stop where I went up street level.  It was like switching from watching color TV to black and white.  A sea of gray, there were no billboards (MMDA heaven) or commercial signs.  It was indeed Monotony (note the capital M).  Even the Trabis, the pride of East German and Soviet auto engineering but an inexhaustible source of jokes by westerners, were in drab colors.

At many street corners, there were police stations resembling hotdog-on-a-stick kiosks on the streets of Araneta Center, Cubao in the ‘70s and ‘80s.  The stations had one way glass 360 degrees.  People you can’t see may be watching you all the time.  The buffer zone (also called death strip) to the iconic Brandenburg Gate, aligned with the Wall, was more than double that on the other side.

To have something definitive to do, I thought I’d look for Hitler’s bunker, not far from the Reichstag (West German Parliament building) but walled to the east.  Before leaving for Berlin, I asked a classmate from the British Army for tips.  He confirmed what I knew that intentionally, there was no marker or hint at all as to the location of the ‘Fuhrerbunker’.  He added that East Germans spoke Russian and no English.  They, however, may know a few words like dog and cat, he quipped sarcastically.

Little did I know that my one year of classroom German up to the intermediate level will be put to its first real test talking to East Germans looking for Hitler’s bunker.  They all pointed to the same area.  I took a photo of the vicinity.  It was only in 2006, on occasion of the FIFA World Cup in Germany, that a marker with a sketch of the layout was installed.  The underground complex itself remains sealed, consigned to oblivion.

There was a sole souvenir shop operated by the state strategically located before entering Friedrichstrasse Station to head back to the West.  It was a hole in the wall accommodating no more than eight people at any one time.  To enter, one must wait for a shopper to leave, so there was a queue.  That was my ‘ordeal’, standing in an East Bloc shortage line, like bread lines shown by the Western press time and again.  To their credit, the queue moved along quite well.  Small wonder, when I got into the shop.  In true communist essence, there were only three so-so items to choose from.  I got a DDR (East Germany’s initials) paperweight.

I will never forget a heart-pounding encounter with East German Wall guards (Grepos).  The Wall, with heavy graffiti on the West’s side, ran only a few meters from the back of the Reichstag.  Standing there alone on top of the stairs, I was looking down at the Wall and over at East Berlin buildings just across. They were ever so close.

A pair of guards doing their rounds at the death strip came closer and closer.  When they looked at me, I waved gaily at them.  Got no reaction, as if they saw right through me.  As a snubbed young man with a latent disdain for commies, when they looked at me again I raised my hand and was about to give them an internationally recognized bad sign.  The rustle of their slung Kalashnikovs, however, instantly brought me back to my senses.

The notorious guards, who had killed up to 200 East Germans while trying to flee across the Wall to the West, must have had ‘shoot first, explain later’ orders for everyone else.  Thankfully, possible news had been averted of a ‘Pinoy Shot at Berlin Wall because...

In August 2011, Germans marked the golden anniversary of the start of the construction of the Wall.  Though led by Chancellor Angela Merkel, the event was low key.  ‘Freedom is invincible at the end.  No wall can permanently withstand the desire for freedom’, declared German President Wulff.

Also on the eve of the Wall’s fall, in 1987, the two Berlins commemorated (not exactly celebrated) their 750th founding anniversary.  Sentiments were bittersweet.  The West German press lamented that scarred Potsdamer Platz (Potsdam Square), once the busiest traffic intersection in Europe, had been reduced to desolation.  It had become irrelevant since the Wall crossed right through it.

Hopefully, when Berlin celebrates its millennium in 2237, the rejuvenated Potsdamer Platz will have remained the complete opposite of how it was on the 750th anniversary.  Now where is the time capsule we can put this article in?