Crossing the Berlin Wall in 1988

[FTNWO1000]

Ist das der Reichstag am Anfang

[JUSTforwhitlisting]

You must had lived in West Germany/Berlin to be able to cross.

[wkaemena]

@JUSTforwhitlisting Yes I lived in West Germany and went for a weekend to West-Berlin

[UnitedCommunists]

1. Which way were you going?

2. Which side of the Berlin Wall was the Reichstag on?

[wkaemena]

@UnitedCommunists The Reichstag was in the west but directly at the wall. I was heading form West to East

[jdsd1]

@wkaemena Yes that's correct. Reichstag is only 50 meters away from the Brandenburg Gate, and still they were in two different countries.

[tmmy773]

i'm so sorry i should have subscribed earlier :) I watched some of you videos...very good...it must be difficult to recollect the way things were before...but your efforts are already very well done and very helpful to many people i'm sure..i would like to try someday to revisit Germany

and compare 1988 W Germany to modern unified Germany...that would be awesome. You must get the same feeling of some satisfaction :) i'll def check out your videos :)

[tmmy773]

i visited W Germany 1n 1988-89...i didn't go to Berlin bc as far as i knew it was difficult for Americans to go there then...and my cousin's husband was in the army.

[alanheath]

@tmmy773 It was easy to get to Berlin. You just got on a train. There was an East German visa person but there was no problem - your passport was stamped as the West German government paid for the visa.

[tmmy773]

@alanheath That is amazing...i had no idea. I was living with my cousin off-base for a while...it was the summer of 1988. Her husband was in the army..so its not like i could just go there...i jthought it was "off-limits" to Americans. I did see Koblenz, Frankfurt, Munich, quite a few small villages...and Dachau. It was a good experience. But i wish i had visited Berlin...oh well c'est la vie...i liked Germany and would love to visit Berlin...i will have to do that :) Thanks :)

[alanheath]

@tmmy773 The first time I went I was still in the military! Obviously I was not in uniform though! Berlin is just not the same any longer! It had an atmosphere before that it lacks now! But it is still a great place to visit!  I wish I had filmed things then but I only started doing that in the past five years!

[tmmy773]

@alanheath That's really great you went to Berlin. I really wish i had gone back then must have been awesome. Berlin must have been nice in those days..a mix of liberality and mystery that doesn't exist anymore. Now is all status-quo At least i've been to pre-euro W Germany...with Deuchmarks..Munich was very cool and fun..my cousin and i went to some seedy bars in Frankfurt...they served me no prob even though i was only 16...very cool and no trouble or anything like that :)

[alanheath]

@tmmy773 I filmed some of my recollections from various places as I tried to find what I remembered - often without much success. I put them on my channel which may be of some interest!

[tavalli]

Very good video.

[meklopfklopf]

Nice video and great quality for that time.

Grtz.

[alanheath]

I took a series of photographs on this route in 1982 only to discover that I had put the film in the camera incorrectly!

[jamestargetedindiv]

Check my comments in my channel for information about the Pre-January 8th version of Inception.

[king36er]

Good old times!

[Amperezone]

Hello. :) First of all, I love that video.

Second, I have a question. Am I allowed to use this video in a school project? I'm working on a music video with berlin wall footages.Your material really fits to the rest.

I won't use it without your permission. :)

[wkaemena]

@Amperezone for me no problem ;-)

[Amperezone]

@wkaemena Awesome. Thanks a lot. :)

[Universal1Cadete]

@wkaemena xD it is not your property, right? xD

[wkaemena]

@Universal1Cadete the Crossing the Berlin Wall in 1988 was taken by me with my Sony Camcorder in 1988 so yes it is my property.

[WolfytheWolf5667]

West Berlin? hmm...I've never actually heard of this (my teacher's teach us really shit subjects about lies, e.g. my teacher thinks Germany destroyed Russia. Lol. - not in Germany, I'm British) so what is the wall about? what happened/why is there a wall?

[wadenwickel]

@WolfytheWolf5667 C'mon be serious, you can't not know about the Berlin Wall!

Just in case it was not a joke: The Berlin Wall was a desperate attempt of communist East Germany to keep its best people from leaving. It worked somewhat, but didn't help much. East Germany sucked (no freedom, shitty clothes, only grey and dull colours). I had relatives on the other side of the wall. I could only feel sorry for them when I visited them, which was almost impossible.

[WolfytheWolf5667]

@wadenwickel

I heard thousands of E.Berlin got shot crossing it.

Now KOREA has a wall. God sake, when will we realise, walling off Communists...creates more war?

even though:

Fun Fact: Stalin was the one who wanted to reunite Germany in 1952 and he wanted to have free elections but the Western powers refused because they were afraid that the communists would win. Subsequently the wall was built. Stalin made this offer 3(!) times and it was turned down.

[HelmutVillam]

@WolfytheWolf5667

Stalin was not a true communist, his main goal was to establish absolute control over the soviet sphere of influence by eliminating anyone who could muster the political or military force to topple him, even his own generals and soldiers. A simple aspiration and reuniting Germany wouldn't have detracted in any way from it.

[WolfytheWolf5667]

@HelmutVillam

I know that he is not a true communist as Communism requires all leading members of authority to step-down.

Stalin: Fuck that. Kill him.

[alanheath]

@WolfytheWolf5667 If I remember correctly there were around 100 fatalities in attempted crossings of the Berlin Wall - not thousands. It was pretty clear from the eastern side that crossing was not easy.

[63gstone]

I was there in 88 and got the tour of East Berlin. It was very interesting listening to the PR from the tour guide.

[cdtreadway]

I've crossed it!

[mrchrmedone]

was this video before or after when the berlin wall fall.

[bruno2260]

Was that a guard tower going by @ 0:10? I thought the pedestal type towers were all replaced with square concrete towers by this time.

Also how was a train able to cross from West to East? I didn't know that was possible.

[wadenwickel]

@bruno2260 Yes, it was possible. This line came from the west and ended in eastern Friedrichstraße Station where you could cross the border into East Germany (a lengthy procedure which involved being treated like a criminal). So the train was practically West German territory even though it was operated by East Germany. Many people took it into Friedrichstr. to buy duty free at the Intershop (which was illegal without passing border control).

[king36er]

@wadenwickel

Yes i can remember it(Duty Free Shop) :D

At this time i was a very young grafitti Artist and with some friends we jumped out of the trains in some closed eastern subway consider Stations like jannowitzbrücke and we sprayed our Grafittis on the walls there until DDR border Policemans chased us and we runs from the tube to the west side

[wkaemena]

@king36er what a pitty that they were not able to kill you..... then Berlin would be cleaner now and we would not need to spend millions for cleaning the mess.

[enikkan]

it is the reichstag

[benjathome]

Nice video, cheers. One thing I've always been confused by and that's the access route/s to West Berlin from West Germany.

I know there was a motorway connecting the two areas but how was it fortified? Was the border running alongside or was there a checkpoint at each end? Could someone let me know the answer please?

[seabazzz]

@benjathome

checkpoints at the border between east and west germany, and another checkpoint at the border between eastgermany and west berlin. and in between a whole bunch of stasi people observing you.

[wkaemena]

@seabazzz it was 1 year before

[tannalv]

From 0:20 until the end, what building is that? It looks like a huge castle.

[wkaemena]

@tannalv that is the German Parliament

[OrangeKarl7]

Extremely incorrect.(answering that filming was permissable in the DDR, specifically the capital city, East Berlin) Filming was greatly restricted. Sure,you might get away with a snapshot if taken & not noticed or if the bored Volpo didn't want to bother. But filming? Remember, little hand-held things like we have today for filming or your own tiny mobile phone, that did not exist. So your big camera stood out. You'd be very discrete about any filming; MANY buidlings off limits for filming.

[jezeats]

@OrangeKarl7 I imagine it might be a bit different on the train from BRD (West Germany) to West Berlin. Even if it were illegal, there probably weren't any volpo on board.

[Trent33424]

[germany 4 life]

[mmimmol]

Ich fahrte das erste mal in October 1989, und dann in 2. Nov 1989 und dann...

grusse aus Polen,

letzte mal in 14.Nov 2009

[TheGary1986]

thanks for uploading

I believe it wasn't legal, filming on the train while going from west to east Berlin?were you nervous at the time of filming!

all the best

Gary

[arfurt1]

Filming was absolutely legal. The only thing forbidden in cold war in both Germanies were aerial photos of allied and german military crap because everyone was afraid of the other side's airstrikes. Unlike Pjöngjang East Berlin was definitely a nice and interesting place for Tourists.

[MissRenataRoux]

@TheGary1986

It was indeed not legal, but East Germany Police allowed a lot of thing to tourists, because they knew too well that most of them wanted only to get a look of the Wall or take some some pictures

Most of all, in the train there was no Police at all between the last West German station and the first East German station,

[bronzeonion]

huh? I thought the berlin wall was like the north and south border of korea!!!! lol but you can pass the berlin wall on a train

[TheGary1986]

Berlin is situated in the middle of Europe and back then was surrounded by the GDR.

bronzeonion, and where were you when your Geo teacher explained that!

[bronzeonion]

lol, im only 13 we havnt learnt it yet! atleast you said that in a friendly manner lol =]

[TheGary1986]

bronzeonion, you cheeky devil!

[mamypokopants]

was the big radio tower with the ball in DDR or FDR

[wkaemena]

FDR is Franklin D. Roosevelt but the Tower was standing in the GDR German Democratic Republic = DDR=East Berlin = East Germany

[xmorpheuzx]

@wkaemena pls note that east berlin is a city not a country... -.-

[Smick100]

It was at Aleksanderplatz in East Berlin.

[OOIEatte]

DDR

[ykarpov]

@mamypokopants FYI in case somebody hasn't said this already, by FDR you mean the BRD- Bundesrepublik Deutchland, or in English the Federal Republic of Germany (as opposed to the Deutche Demokratische Republic). Just for the linguistic 2 cents ;)

[wkaemena]

it was just at the wall but on West Berlin side.

[14Trooper88]

Was Reichstag in DDR or W-GER?

[Jadwis24]

In West Berlin. West Berlin was not a part of FRG, for example people from communist Poland couldn't travel to West Germany without a visa but they could travel without one to West Berlin.

[ManfredDeJesus]

Really? How so?

[0815Leser]

germany and berlin was parted in 4 peaces.

the russian part of germany was the gdr, the russian part of berlin was eastberlin.

the french, british and american part of germany was the frg. the french, british and american part of berlin was westberlin. the 3 westparts of germany and berlin were allready reunioned in 1948.

eastberlin were normaly not a part of the gdr, but the russion made it, and the west-allies made nothing against.

[0815Leser]

2.

so eastberlin and the gdr grow together.

westberlin und the frg hat no border together, the russians were against a union. westberlin was not a part of the frg.

westberlin had the dm, but it had own stamps.

eastberlin and the gdr hat the same money, the same stamps, the gdr parlament was in eastberlin.

[PeterMayer]

I have cousins in Berlin and visted them in 88. Took my wife into East Berli. Just went this year and yeah, it's different!

[wkaemena]

nowadays it would look quite different....

[saltnpepper101]

Thats was nice. Thank you