BERLIN
Cities, states, countries build walls to keep people (i.e., attackers or unwanted immigrants) out:
On Tuesday, we visited the Berlin Wall Memorial on Benauer Strasse, which is a preserved section of wall plus two interpretive centers and a viewing tower. We watched two documentaries that explained how and why the wall was built. We learned that by 1961 East Germany had lost 1/6 of its population due to residents fleeing to the West. Overnight on August 13 of that year 40,000 soldiers, policemen and militia from the GDR began to replace the rather flimsy barriers with a concrete wall 3 meters high. All streets to West Berlin were blocked off. In actuality there were two walls, the fence on the border, and then a “sperrgebiet,” or forbidden zone, with watchtowers, tank barriers, automatically shooting rifles, a carpet of steel spikes on the ground (known by many as “Stalin’s lawn”) and hidden land mines, which became known as the “death zone” as guards were instructed to shoot to kill anyone trying to cross it. Officially, between 1961 and 1989, 136 people were killed attempting to cross the wall, but hundreds more died trying to escape the border in other ways. Some escaped successfully.
The happy ending to this story is that the Wall came down on November 9, 1989 during massive protests by the East German people. Berlin and the new unified German government continue to remind citizens and visitors of the Wall’s history, however. A more famous (and tackier we’re told) memorial is at Checkpoint Charlie, the site of the Allied military post and the American standoff with the USSR. Throughout the city there are pieces of standing wall and markers where the wall existed along with placards commemorating those who lost their lives trying to escape. You can also buy little bits of the wall at tourist shops. 
People express their ideas and wishes on walls as well: the Democracy Wall in Beijing 1978-9, the Berlin Wall 1990-2011:
Cities, states, countries build walls to keep people (i.e., attackers or unwanted immigrants) out:The Great Wall of China, the fence between the US and the Mexican border, the wall in north Jerusalem between the Jews and the Palestinians. . . These are walls for protection and defense; walls of exclusion.
Cities, states, countries also build walls to keep people in: prisoners.
The Berlin Wall is such a wall, erected in 1961 to imprison the people of the German Democratic Republic (the GDR) behind the “iron curtain” of the Soviet bloc.
On Tuesday, we visited the Berlin Wall Memorial on Benauer Strasse, which is a preserved section of wall plus two interpretive centers and a viewing tower. We watched two documentaries that explained how and why the wall was built. We learned that by 1961 East Germany had lost 1/6 of its population due to residents fleeing to the West. Overnight on August 13 of that year 40,000 soldiers, policemen and militia from the GDR began to replace the rather flimsy barriers with a concrete wall 3 meters high. All streets to West Berlin were blocked off. In actuality there were two walls, the fence on the border, and then a “sperrgebiet,” or forbidden zone, with watchtowers, tank barriers, automatically shooting rifles, a carpet of steel spikes on the ground (known by many as “Stalin’s lawn”) and hidden land mines, which became known as the “death zone” as guards were instructed to shoot to kill anyone trying to cross it. Officially, between 1961 and 1989, 136 people were killed attempting to cross the wall, but hundreds more died trying to escape the border in other ways. Some escaped successfully.
The happy ending to this story is that the Wall came down on November 9, 1989 during massive protests by the East German people. Berlin and the new unified German government continue to remind citizens and visitors of the Wall’s history, however. A more famous (and tackier we’re told) memorial is at Checkpoint Charlie, the site of the Allied military post and the American standoff with the USSR. Throughout the city there are pieces of standing wall and markers where the wall existed along with placards commemorating those who lost their lives trying to escape. You can also buy little bits of the wall at tourist shops. 
People express their ideas and wishes on walls as well: the Democracy Wall in Beijing 1978-9, the Berlin Wall 1990-2011:One Berlin Wall “memorial” is actually an outdoor art installation. Called the “Eastside Gallery,” it is a 1.3 kilometer stretch of existing wall painted by different international artists initially in 1991. The paintings here cover many topics—they are exuberant, symbolic, mostly hopeful. (See the examples in the photos I’ve uploaded.)
The opening lines of Robert Frost’s “Mending Wall” keep coming to mind: “Something there is that doesn’t love a wall. . .”
Beth
Beth
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