East Germany

Old DDR postcards

While at the local flea market in Friedrichshagen I came across some old East German postcards.  Here's a little about East Germany.

Officially it was the Deutsche Demokratische Republik, the German Democratic Republic, or DDR for short.

Following WWII, the Soviet occupation zone in the east became eventually became a communist satellite state.  The DDR existed from 1949 until German reunification in 1990.

The DDR was bigger than Kentucky but a bit smaller than Tennessee.  It bordered the Baltic Sea, West Germany, Czechoslovakia, and Poland.  East Berlin was the country's capital and the largest city followed by Leipzig and Dresden.  At the end, East Germany was home to over 16 million people. 

The DDR started out rough.  After the war, the Stalin demanded huge war reparations be paid from the occupation zone which further crippled the economy before it could even try to rebuild.  Over ⅓ of the area's industry was confiscated and sent back to the Soviet Union.  About $10 billion worth of agriculture and industrial products were paid out.

The communist government was ruled by the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED).  The economy was centrally planned and everything was owned by the state.

The government heavily subsidised the price of housing, food, and other basic goods so things were affordable when you could get them.  There were often shortages of basic goods.  A Trabant cost a year's salary and you usually had to wait about 15 years.  The incredible thing was that East Germany had the strongest economy of the Iron Curtain countries.

Another challenge for the economy was the "brain drain" the country experienced as professionals and skilled workers fled to the west.  By 1961, about 20% of the population, some 3,5 million people, crossed over to West Germany.  This is why the government built the Berlin Wall, what they called the "Anti-Fascist Protection Wall" that split the city in two and preventing people from escaping. 

The Stasi was the secret police and they were ruthless.  Some 90.000 worked for the Stasi and roughly every one in seven people were informers.  After reunification people can see their Stasi file.  Claudia's dad never requested to see his file because he doesn't want to know which colleagues, friends or family members informed on him.  

  

©CNN

The DDR was a member of the Warsaw Pact.  There were 500 000 Soviet soldiers permanently stationed in the country.  Even after Germany reunified in 1990, the last Russian soldiers didn't leave until 1994 because there weren't enough facilities in Russia to house all of the returning troops.  So for the first part of the 90s, Germany had both NATO and Russian soldiers stationed there.

Sport was seen as a means of international legitimacy and validation of the communist system.  During the 70s and 80s the DDR was a powerhouse at European, world, and Olympic championships.  This was due in part to the state-sponsored doping programme that was later revealed.  Here's an interesting PBS programme that I found on YouTube that sheds light on what was going on.

©PBS

The Iron Curtain started to crack in 1989.  Hungary removed the electrified fence at the border with Austria which led to many East Germans going to Hungary in order to try to make their way on to West Germany.  Others went to the West German embassy in Prague in hopes of defecting to the west.

©JHEBox

The Berlin Wall fell on 9 November 1989.  On 3 October 1990, the DDR was gone and it was reunified with Germany.  Berlin was reunified too and became the new capital.

Reunification hasn't always gone smoothly and there are still some challenges.  Eastern Germany is still the poorer part of the country.  Germans in the western part of the country are still paying a solidarity tax to the east.  

There does exist some Ostalgie which is nostalgia for the eastern times.  

©Berlin Project

At least the DDR gave us Ampelmännchen.  One of my favourite movies is the 2003 file Goodbye Lenin! which is a comedy about the fall of the DDR.

Here's a Deutsche Welle story on a Berlin restaurant that serves typical DDR food.  

©DW News

I definitely want to give it a shot the next time I'm back.  Hopefully for Christmas but I'll just have to wait to see what the COVID-19 situation will be like then.

Update 2022:  Here's a 14-minute video that talks about how German reunification worked.

©DW News

Update 2022:  Here's a short video I found about who decided how Germany would be divided up after WWII.

©History Matters

Lübbenau, Germany

On Monday morning we headed out to Spreewald for the day.

Lübbenau is a town of just over 16.000 people about 82 km (51 miles) southeast of Berlin.  

Lübbenau dates back to at least 1315.  Though excavations have turned up evidence of settlements dating back to the 8th or 9th century.

It used to be part of the Kingdom of Bohemia from 1364 to 1635.

We started off with a guided boat tour of the canals on a traditional barge.

Since 1991 the Spreewald is a protected UNESCO biosphere Reserve and there are thousands of small waterways.

Along the way we stopped off to try the local pickles and lard on dark bread.

I swear that Spreewäldgurken are the best pickles in the world.  We made sure to pick up a few small buckets of pickles to take home for later.

The St. Nickolas church is in the middle of the old town.  The Protestant church built from 1738 - 1741.

Only at Spreewald can you find a pickle radler, a green pickle beer.  It wasn't terrible but I don't have a need to try another one.

Completing the List

With Claudia and Tünde in Berlin, and Natalie currently in Switzerland with the U.N., we're lucky if we can meet up once a year.  So it's amazing that from Christmas, to our weekend in Geneva, and this past week in Friedrichshagen we've gotten three visits in seven months.

After breakfast on Saturday morning Tünde made up a list of all of the things that had to do together.  What a to-do list it was.  Some of the things on the list were to do something together, jump on a trampoline, read stories, take a nap, make a volcano, go to the summer garden, write postcards, visit grandma and grandpa, go for sushi, and eat ice cream.  

We definitely over achieved on the ice cream.  But what are godparents for if they don't spoil you with lots of ice cream?

Natalie had never been to Spreewald before so on Monday we made a day of it there.  A boat ride along the canals, the world's best pickles and lard...what a great day.

We even got in a little beach time.  It's pretty cool that the beach area is where we went ice skating at in December.

On Tuesday we went over Rahnsdorf to help Claudia's parents with a major re-roofing project on the garden shed.  

They put us to work as day labourers with some of the cousins.  It felt so good to help out.  

Plus we did manage to complete everything on Tünde's list too.

The Borders Are Open

The borders are open again.  Hallelujah!  Yesterday was my first trip in four months.  That's a long time for me.   

My train to Berlin was late but it was so nice to actually get on a train and go somewhere.  No masks were required in Czechland.

However, masks are required in Germany so I had to put one on once we crossed the border.

I made it to Friedrichshagen late last night.  Natalie arrived early this morning so yeah for some more godparent adventures with Tünde this week.

We had a big German breakfast complete with teddy bear salami.

Tünde is busy now coming up with a list of all of things we have to do together this week so I expect it to be a rather fun and busy week.

George Novak, R.I.P.

George Novak was the Czech Honorary Consul General in Atlanta and he passed away last week at the age of 88.    

He was born Jiří Novák in 1931 in Brno and became known as George after he emigrated to the USA in 1968.  He narrowly escaped the 1968 invasion and managed to get his wife and son to Vienna.

Mr. Novak was appointed honorary consul in 1994.  He was a representative of the Czech Olympic committe for the 1996 Olympics and helped get support from Georgia legislators for the Czech Republic to join NATO in 1999.

Over the years he helped several Czech manufacturing companies break in to the U.S. market.

His role was upgraded to honorary consul general in 2003.  He was a founder of the Czech School of Atlanta in 2013.  Czech President Miloš Zeman awarded him the Medal of Merit, First Class, in 2014.

Back in 2012 he led a delegation of Georgia officials and businessmen to Brno.  Here's a video I found out on YouTube where he talks about the trip and describes Brno as the Czech Silicon Valley.

©Global Atlanta

No More Masks...Sort Of

As of yesterday face masks are no longer required even on public transportation and in public buildings.  Face masks are still required in hospitals and medical facilities.  Prague still requires masks on the metro.

As far as restrictions go, all pubs and restaurants have to close by 11 pm.  The maximum number of people at public events is 100.

While things are getting better here in Czechland I'm worried about bad things are getting in the USA.  Especially in Arizona where my parents live.  Arizona isn't mandating masks but my parents are wearing them.  Thank goodness.  Yesterday there were 4,753 new COVID-19 cases in Arizona which has a population of 7 million.  That's more than the entire EU which has a population of 446 million. 

11 Years in Czechland

Today is officially 11 years in Czechland.  It was hard enough to believe that last year was a decade here.  Now it's a decade plus one.

I grew up in California so deep down I'll always be a Cali boy.  When people ask me where I'm from in the USA I say Atlanta.  I lived in Atlanta for 13 years.  So what happens in a couple of years when I've lived in Brno for as long as I lived in Atlanta?  

The plan was to submit my application for Czech citizenship which meant that I would get it in 2021.  Now that my exams have been postponed to December 2020 I probably won't get to become Czech until the end of 2021...if I'm lucky.

No Eurovision This Year

Eurovision was cancelled this year due to COVID-19.  The finals were supposed to held on 14 May.  Now we'll never know how Benny Cristo's song Kemama would have fared.

This year's event was supposed to be held in Rotterdam.  I don't know if the Netherlands will host in 2021.  Each country can choose if they will send this year's artists next year or choose a new entry.  However, this year's songs can not be reentered next year.

While there was no Eurovision this year at least there was Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga.  The Netflix comedy is brilliant and the music sounded authentically Eurovision-ish.  While not the real Eurovision it is the next best thing.  The movie is even available on Netflix in Czech so I get to count watching it as language practice.

Here's the movie trailer I found on YouTube.  

©Netflix

2020 Travel Plans

This was supposed to be a big travel year this year.  Well thanks to COVID-19, the state of emergency, and travel restrictions it hasn't worked out that way.

I had trips planned to 20 countries this year.  20 in 2020.  Most have already been cancelled, like my March trip to Ukraine, Hungary, and Romania, and my Easter trip to Banja Luka in Bosnia and Herzegovina.  My future trips I expect will get cancelled too.  My two new countries this year were going to be Cambodia and Vietnam.  I am supposed to go to Kaliningrad, the Russian exclave on the Baltic between Poland and Lithuania.  I don't see Russia opening their borders by September so I'm waiting for airBaltic to offer me a refund.

The biggest disappointment was not being able to see my family this year and missing my niece's high school graduation.  Unfortunately, due to lock down her graduation ceremony was cancelled anyway.

The 20 planned countries for 2020

Like everyone else I have a bit of cabin fever from being on home lock down.  I for sure miss traveling.  However, I'm healthy.  All of my family is healthy.  I haven't lost my job.  So in the big scheme of things I'm lucky and I really can't complain.  

One of my mates suggested putting together a collage of all of the countries I've been in.  I liked the idea so I pulled out a picture for every country I've been since moving to Czechland in July 2009.  These were posted to my Instagram so a few of these collages repeat the Czech flag.  I didn't have a great photo from Luxembourg and I somehow missed getting a photo of myself in Kyrgyzstan.  I guess I need to go back sometime for photos.  I really have been pretty blessed to visit so many amazing places.

Confederate Flag

The Confederate flag is something that's always been controversial but it seems to be more of a hot topic now.  First things first, the "confederate flag" was never the flag of the Confederate States of America.  It was the battle flag of several confederate armies.

©CGP Grey

The Confederate States of America, the CSA, were the breakaway states, i.e., the South, during the American Civil War.  The CSA included South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, North Carolina, Missouri, and Kentucky.

Many Southerns associate this flag with Southern heritage.  That is if you're white.  If you're black then this Southern heritage is one of racism, slavery, segregation and white supremacy.  I don't get how any patriotic American can proudly celebrate the flag that is associated with the sedition of the U.S. government, the loss of over 620,000 lives, tremendous devastation, and the subjugation of other races.

©TestTube News

When I moved to Atlanta in 1996 I absolutely hated the state flag.  In 1956, Georgia changed its flag to incorporate the Confederate battle flag.  This was done as a protest to civil rights and specifically to the Supreme Court decision in the Brown v. Board of Education case that ruled against segregation.

In the U.S., we talk about segregation but we should call it what it was which is apartheid.  To me the Georgia flag was racist and I cringed a bit every time I saw one.

In 2001, new governor changed the flag.  It wasn't a popular flag.  I didn't care for how the new flag looked but it was significantly better than the old one.  This flag only lasted for two years until 2003 when it was changed for the new flag.

The new, new flag has been Georgia's state flag since 2003.  To me it's way better than the previous two versions.  

Timeline of Georgia Stage Flags

    

The Confederate flag is racist.  There's a reason why it always shows up at KKK and white supremacy gatherings.  

I remember being caught completely off guard in 2011 when I saw a hot dog truck in Brno with a confederate flag.  Needless to say but I never purchased a hot dog from here.