Stranger in East Germany
(photo credit: Spielvogel, WikiMedia Commons)
Shannon’s Sunday Stories is an occasional series of personal reflections and musings on life.
Our eyes lock. His are blue and suspicious. Mine, curious and looking for adventure.
I should be afraid, but spontaneity tends to remove fear; adventure will do that to any 22 year old. I am determined to speak with the stranger, tall, lean and handsome in his uniform, as he stands in the street keeping a watchful eye on the people milling about.
I tell my friend, who I am travelling with, my plans to approach the stranger and alarm bells must be going off because perspiration is trickling down her forehead. She motions to me to go ahead without her. We have not been getting along after months of being on the road together throughout Europe and are ready to choke each other. So her concern must be his gun.
The buildings that surround us are old and worn. Some of the architecture is lovely; others, what look like apartment buildings and offices, are plain and boring. It is the buildings with holes in them that I am curious about.
This gives me the excuse I need to start up a chat.
“Excuse me,” I approach the stranger slowly, not wanting to appear overly enthusiastic. “What happened to that building?” I ask, pointing to one of the buildings that appeared to be badly damaged.
He gently adjusts the strap of his machine gun across his shoulders, which relax, signalling he is unconcerned that I am in his personal space.
My shoulders, however, are burdened with the weight of a backpack containing my entire world.
“Der Krieg,” he says. “The war.”
Artillery damage. I imagine planes flying above and dropping bombs, like I have seen numerous times in movies about World War II. It is now the Cold War, which to someone in their twenties doesn’t mean much, if anything at all.
“Where you are from?” he asks in broken English, his face unflinching.
He pulls out a cigarette from the pocket of his uniform and lights it. The match falls to the ground with a thud (I note the cement is same colour as the buildings), and he ensures it is extinguished by stepping on it with his shiny black boot.
“Canada,” I reply with a perky lift in my voice. I dare not say I hitchhiked with my friend to get to Berlin, thanks to a father and son who gave us a lift on the Autobahn in their BMW. Hitchhiking is illegal on the Autobahn and we heard that some have found themselves in a German jail.
“Canada,” he repeats with an easy smile. “Very nice.”
His helmet has tilted slightly across his forehead, but he quickly puts it back into place. His eyes match the sky behind him, and his cheekbones are high and chiseled. Not a hair on his face. He is probably not much older than me. He looks similar to other soldiers of the National People’s Army of the German Democratic Republic (GDR) that we saw “goose-stepping” during the changing of the guard at the war memorial, Neue Wache, for victims of war.
In the distance, behind the buildings, are the watch towers with border guards carrying machine guns, the Elbe river with security boats moving up and down, barbed wire fences and Checkpoint Charlie, where border guards gave me a terrifying grilling about my identification and the contents of my backpack.
And, of course, there is the Wall, which has separated East and West Berlin since 1961, years before I was born.
On June 12, 1987, just more than a year previous, U.S. President Reagan delivered his famous speech calling for the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev, to tear down the Berlin Wall. My friend and I had been backpacking across Europe all summer, along with other pals who came and went, and we heard news reports that the Berlin Wall would be coming down within months and we were encouraged to see it before it happened.
“Have you been to Canada?” I ask the stranger.
A long pause. He looks right through me. He shakes his head ‘no.’
I realize what a stupid question it was. He may never have been able to go outside state borders in his lifetime. I wonder if he ever had to shoot anyone trying to escape over the wall.
My friend signals to me that she is going to stand in a line with locals queuing at outdoor stands for fresh fruit and vegetables. The lines are long and winding. The locals stare at us with a faraway look; a look I have not seen elsewhere. She points to her watch. There is not much else to do and we have to leave through security at Checkpoint Charlie to return to the West before nightfall
Not to overdo my welcome, I thank the soldier and walk away. I can feel his gaze squarely on my back.
I pull out of my pockets the East German Marks that I have not spent because there is little to buy in this communist state. It is forbidden to take out East German money from the East, so you have to spend it or leave it behind. And so I wonder how I can sneak it out.
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Shannon Skinner is an award-winning TV/radio host, author, speaker, and travel writer.
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