From Prussia with Love

Long overdue update: I spent a month living in a place formerly know as Prussia, working at a research institute, spending most of my weekends and some weeknights in Berlin.

Prussia!!!!

Ok, so technically I couldn’t have been in a country that no longer exists!

I was actually staying in Potsdam. And I loved it! Potsdam combines a really unique mix of old Prussian history, glamour, and glory with the decrepitness and decay of the city as it suffered through years of the communist regime under the GDR. In the same small city there are magnificently restored Prussian palaces –Sanssouci, Neues Palais, Charlottenhof- along with completely abandoned, decrepit, depressing buildings like the chilling KGB headquarters and prison, and watchtowers from the time of the Berlin wall.

During my whole stay in Germany I was really struck by the role Berlin has played in shaping 20th century world history. I don't think there is any other city in the world that has been so central to the events of the 20th century as Berlin. I was even lucky enough to be in Berlin during the 20th anniversary of the fall of the wall!

Berlin, and Germany in general, is in a very unique position to study the merits of preservation versus restoration in the context of world history. In the case of Berlin for example -a divided city trying to emerge as one after decades of being split in half- how important is it to preserve this divided history? How much effort, if any, should be put into healing and rebuilding this division? How much effort, if any, should be put into preserving the history of this division? How much do you rebuild/remove in order for the psyche of the city as one entity to recover? How do you honor and preserve the memory of atrocities in a way in which does not celebrate the perpetrators?

The only satisfying answer I heard while I was in Germany was that in preserving history, they take the approach that EVERYTHING must be done to memorialize the victims and NOTHING must be done to memorialize the perpetrators.

This explains why there is a chilling and touching Holocaust memorial in central Berlin, but the ruins of Hitler’s bunker is now a nondescript parking lot.

My favourite example of preservation is the bombed out Kaiser Wilhelm church. It has been left ‘as is’, as a testament to the destruction of war. To me, someone who really has been lucky enough to live a life that has not known this kind of destruction, it is a truly important memorial to see.

A strange example of restoration in Berlin is the original Berlin city palace. The Stadtschloss was the seat of the Kings of Prussia and the Emperor of Germany. WWII severely damaged it, and, after the war, being in East Berlin, the GDR finished its destruction and built their own state parliament on top of the ruins. Now after German reunification, the GDR parliament building has been destroyed and plans are underway to rebuild the original Stadtschloss on top of these ruins… which are on top of ruins. A perfect example of the stratification of history in Berlin. Dig down deep enough and you see one regime replacing the other, on and on and on…

When there have been many different regimes overthrown at different times (first reich, second reich, third reich, GDR), how do you decide which version of history gets preserved?

To me, one of the most fitting memorials I saw in Berlin was a memorial for the Nazi book burnings which took place in Bebelplatz square, just outside of Humboldt University. It is so unobtrusive you could easily miss it. It is just a clear plate of glass in the ground in the centre of the square. You could walk by it two feet away and not notice a thing, but if you get close enough and if you look down through the glass you will see a room of all white, with empty bookshelves on every wall.

More lighthearted highlights of my trip included seeing and climbing the Siegessaule - I was disappointed that I couldn’t stand on her shoulder like Bono does in the video (one of my favouritest songs in the world)- and finding my new favourite online radio station http://www.radioeins.de/.

I truly loved my time in Berlin and Potsdam and am already hoping to go back soon. If you have never been, you should go too.

Auf wiedersehn.