Berlin: November 20, 2009
I am in Berlin researching an upcoming trip for one of my longtime clients. Berlin is an amazing city that is more of an ideal than a location. It truly is an enlightened place where thoughts meet art and art meets life in dizzying and delightful speed. It actually reminds me of SOHO in New York during the late 1970’s when music, art, performance and politics made New York one of the most exciting cities in the world….attracting people from all over who wanted to be a part of it. I got my start back then and remember the exhilarating feeling I got after a heated philosophy/political conversation/argument over a glass of wine on West Broadway. Yesterday I met with five people from an organization called “Zeit Zeugen Börse Berlin”, or “Centre for Witnesses to Contemporary History”.
It was amazing hearing their stories and how they reacted to my questions and to each other. Even from different backgrounds they all were united in thinking of themselves as Berliners first and Germans second. All of them were very hopeful and positive about Berlin now, even though they did not always think so. Two of the men had differing opinions of the famous John F. Kennedy “Ich bin ein Berliner” speech, in 1963. One gentleman, who actually attended the event, was so impressed by Kennedy’s words that he patterned his entire life as a Kennedy Liberal….the other, living in East Berlin at the time, was a staunch communist and at the time thought the speech was awful for the city of Berlin.
There was a 91 year old elegant lady who has written several books and wound up working for the Russians as a translator. She ultimately had to flee Germany for Canada but has returned to live out her days in the city of her birth. One of the other women was a child when her mother was executed for being part of the resistance to Hitler. She wound up being raised by her father, who became a communist and a rather high up one at that. She was indoctrinated to believe that all things western were evil and after schooling was given the job of reading the news and determining how to put an East Berlin “spin” on it. After several years, she began to see the light and wound up escaping to South America. Now returned to her native city, she is a very “liberal” Berliner who fervently believes in Freedom of Speech. The last woman I spoke with, in her perfect English, also had a remarkable life as writer, lecturer and educator dedicated to freedom and human rights. She had lost most of her family to the holocaust and nothing has dimmed her passion for life, or good conversation.
I plan on using these people during a meeting in a “conversational format” as a different way to hear their stories rather than the usual “from a podium” Speaking to the five of them, all over 70 years of age…made me feel very young again. I guess John Kennedy was right ….those of us who love freedom and liberty can all say “Ich bin ein Berliner” and know that Berlin is a really an idea very close to us here in the United States…and the very core of our foundation. I can’t wait to get old.