We spent one day on the never-ending German freeways, and after many hours, service stations, fast meals and more kilometres, we finally arrived at the capital. Awaiting us was the restored communications tower of the old Berlin-East.

The first impression when entering the city is the apparent chaos of the traffic. Crossings and strange roundhouses, the possibility of turning where you want e.t.c. In spite of everything, but the surprising thing was that you couldn’t hear the noise of horns or see upset drivers, except when we made some mistake because even the GPS is not infallible; -)

When you have spent some days driving around Berlin, covering many kilometres along its avenues and streets you realize how large it is. For example, to go from our campsite, in the west of the city, to the centre, we crossed about 20 kilometres. That explains the impeccable network of public transport that they have; the innumerable tramlines, underground, train and buses arrive to all the corners of Berlin. What attracted our attention was the lack of barriers and “security” in order to control the sale of tickets. We assume that they consider that it really is a “public service” and the action of paying for the ticket is the contribution of each one to maintain it. A good public transport means less traffic and therefore less pollution (acoustic and of the atmosphere); something that unfortunately is not applied too much in our lands, where often the lack of efficient public transport and/or the prices force people to use the car.

In this sense, the bicycle lane pleasantly surprised us. It crosses the city from one end to the other. Such good roadways and the kind of land- quite flat- mean that the use of the bicycle is very common as much in the city as outside it.
Indeed, cycling along one of these ways, we observed that they had built the track, respecting the surroundings, integrating itself into it completely; avoiding the trees instead of getting rid of them.
Immediately we commented that in our country it would be done without that environmental care. In spite of its enormous size Berlin has plenty of extensive green areas so that more than parks they are forests within the city.

The first impression of Berlin was strange. It seems strange that an old city, or historical constructions or monuments do not exist. In terms of the city the mark left by the wars of its recent history lasts. On the other hand World War II devastated the entire city, its churches, monuments, and their old districts. And on the other hand, the “cold war” and its famous Wall divided it into two parts with different systems to it.

In spite of being already history, still today the consequences of the Wall can be seen, you are able to distinguish perfectly in which of both sides you are only by its aspect. They even commented to us, and we saw it, that peculiar city retains everything in duplicate: 2 city councils, 2 courts, 2 airports (now 3), and 2 big hospitals.

High buildings, not particularly attractive, most of them white and with no type of architectural style, council houses constructed by socialism for the workers, and that still lasts and gives a communist air to the zone; they serve as reference to know what side you are on. However the part of the west is a cultivated field of banks and jewellery shops with guards in their doorsways, Mercedes cars everywhere and also limousines... the presence of money is evident, however, and as opposed to the east, does not involve cultural or political movements.
And so from this standard but prefabricated and rather snobbish atmosphere we immediately found our place that is... the lands of the old G.D.R.

Indeed, in the eastern block, cultural and politic social movement was seen much more. We saw several squats, which is how we found out how some became public with the aid of the city council, becoming something similar to cultural centres.
Also the presence in the street of support to the countries of Latin America such as Chile or Chiapas was remarkable, as was the considerable number of immigrants mainly the Turkish.
So Silvio, one of the contacts that we had along with Marie in Berlin, jokingly told us how before there wasn’t a typical food from Berlin. The nearest was the kebab (our main food during our stay there) since you find more stores than sell it than taverns.
It is a lively area. A place of work in the morning and a haven for ravers at night, since there are many crowded clubs.
There was certain nostalgia when they spoke of their experience of the fall of the Wall. In our opinion, the differences between the East and the West, and all that it represents are still present.

There is a very representative history of this, as Silvio told us called the "Ossie" (East's people's nickname).He is a music lover but in the old GDR it was very difficult to obtain new discs, and with the fall of the Wall and the expansion of the markets towards the GDR, he had the opportunity to buy what he wanted. What’s more the first thing they did was to give money to the newcomers from the East so that they could shop. So that for them it was like a small material liberation. Although, in time, those that at first were glad with the change, later saw that not everything was a bed of roses, and that they had lost the relationship with other people and the close contact they had when they lived in the East. They felt that they had moved from a human community to a consumerist society.
The inheritance of the old RDA seems to live on not only graphically in the streets, dishes, bars e.t.c. but also in the memory of people.

In this way we could verify the effect of the resistance that both systems opposed and imposed for years in Berlin.
Referring to the idiosyncrasy of the Germans, we must say that at first they appear rather cold, or at least they seemed so in their contact with the people.
Although it goes without saying that those we had contact with treated us very well. Mainly our fabulous contacts Marie and Silvio that have helped us a lot. Thank you very much to both of them.

La verdad es que estuvimos muy a gustito allí, pero el deber nos reclamaba y pronto pusimos rumbo a nuestro siguiente destino...Dinamarca.

Ekogaia project

Two powerboats that offer biodiesel, Sprint and Fox

UFA FABRIK    www.ufafabrik.de