Berlin - Luis Oliveros

Until 2019, I had visited most (if not all) of the capitals of what was called Western Europe—except Berlin, which anyway, in my early days, was not considered part of Western Europe.

In 2019, well in advance, I planned a one-week trip to Berlin for January 2020. I bought a plane ticket and booked a hotel for one week. Then, on 5 December 2019, an unexpected illness struck. After several doctor visits and medical tests, it became clear that my planned trip could not take place. On 11 December 2019, I cancelled all reservations—and lost all amounts already paid.

In 2020, the coronavirus pandemic ended any hope of rescheduling that trip later in the year, but Berlin remained on my mind. Little did I know that circumstances would eventually take me there in April and September 2022, and later again in August 2025.

Those first two visits left a deep impression—not only because of what I saw in the city, its streets, its people, and its architecture, but also because I could not understand the atmosphere, the character, the idiosyncrasy of the new and reconstructed Berlin, as shaped by its recent and quite tragic history. The images of the old Brandenburg Gate, the Bundestag, the Wall, the Flak Tower and the monuments commemorating all those who died trying to escape the Soviet-controlled East did not fully align with what I saw in modern East Berlin.

Brandenburg Gate

The Wall

The Wall

Flak Tower

Escapees from Soviet-Controlled East

In order to remind some forgotten pieces of history relevant to this article, please, see below excerpts from the Encyclopaedia Britannica on the history of Berlin.

Quote

“Berlin … was the capital of the Weimar Republic and Nazi Germany before being divided into East and West Berlin after World War II. Following the Cold War, Berlin was reunited in 1990 and reinstated as the capital of modern Germany. …

… at the end of World War II the Soviet Union took eight of (the twenty) Berlin’s districts as its sector of occupation. What was called the New West End … became West Berlin. The U.S. sector was formed by the six southern districts; the British sector embraced the four central and western districts; and the French were allotted the two northern districts.

This apportioning was based on an agreement that had been reached in London in 1944 and confirmed during the Potsdam Conference in 1945 (at the Cäcilienhof Castle, now a museum and hotel) by the United States, Britain, and the Soviet Union; according to its terms, Germany was divided into occupation zones and Greater Berlin into sectors within, but not part of, the Soviet zone of occupation.


In March 1948 the Western powers decided to unite their zones of Germany into a single economic unit (trizone). In protest, the Soviet representative withdrew from the Allied Control Council. In June 1948 a currency reform was introduced in the trizone, including West Berlin. The Soviet Union responded by launching a land blockade of West Berlin.

A great airlift broke this attempt to cut off the city from vital supplies, with Western Allied planes hauling nearly two million tons of food, coal, and other necessities. The Soviets abandoned the blockade in May 1949, but the Western Allies kept flying until September, building up a year’s supply of essential goods. The division of Berlin was completed when in November 1948 a separate municipal government with its own chief burgomaster was set up in East Berlin.

In June 1953 some 50,000 workers, reacting to restrictive policies, rebelled in East Berlin. The uprising, which spread throughout East Germany, was crushed by Soviet military intervention. A Soviet ultimatum in 1958 concerning the status of West Berlin prompted a new Berlin crisis, again causing hundreds of thousands of people to leave East Germany via West Berlin. To stop the exodus of its population, the East German government, with the full consent of the Soviets, erected the Berlin Wall, isolating West from East Berlin. West Berlin, then literally an island within the surrounding GDR, became the symbol of Western freedom. Generous cultural and economic subsidies and the exemption of its citizens from West German conscription made West Berlin a centre of artistic experimentation and political dissent. During the 1970s a network of treaties, based on the Four-Power Agreement of 1971, progressively eased relations and increased the freedom of movement, at least for West Berliners and Western visitors.”

Mass escapes in the summer of 1989 via Hungary and mass demonstrations in Leipzig, Berlin, and elsewhere within the GDR in the autumn of 1989 brought about the collapse of communist rule just when the representatives of the GDR and their foreign allies had celebrated the 40th anniversary of East Germany. The opening of the wall brought the 28-year division of Berlin to an end, as the unification of Germany ended the 45-year occupation of the city. With a few segments preserved as a monument, the wall was completely removed by the summer of 1991. … The reunited city, since 1991 Germany’s official capital.”

Unquote

I have been to Munich and Frankfurt, two cities that look and feel very different from Berlin. When I first arrived in Berlin in 2022, I knew the weight of its history—the consequences of the First World War, Hitler and the Nazi regime, the devastation of the Second World War, and the years of Soviet occupation. After seeing the monuments to the Wall, the memorials to those killed while trying to escape, the Jewish museum, the tombs along the river, and the many historical photographs displayed in the streets, I expected Berlin—especially East Berlin—to be an explosion of color, consumerism, and capitalism.

World War I

World War II

Soviet occupation

Soviet occupation

Jewish Museum

River

History captured in photography!

Yet, while West Berlin does look like other European cities, with very evident signs of Capitalism, East Berlin felt like an island apart: largely free of advertisements, with little car traffic, where bicycles and trams dominated the streets, and where “Cash Only” signs were still common in restaurants and shops. On Sundays, a remarkable park was the heart of community life and most striking of all, many people dressed almost entirely in black. Small (and often new) businesses lined nearly every street, and—something rare in much of Europe—there seemed to be young people everywhere, many with children, and a very noticeable absence of large numbers of aged people. In 2025, not much has changed, although one can now pay by credit card in more places.

West Berlin

Capitalism!

Car traffic

Mauer Park

Mauer Park

Children

Not everything I see in Berlin is to my liking, but I truly appreciate much of what I find there—things that are no longer so common in many other European cities.

Berlin is a modern city, full of art and beauty—one that deserves not just three visits, but many more, which I hope to undertake in the future.

A contemporary city!

Urban hub!

Art

Architectural charm...

Explorations ahead!