Walking along the path of the Berlin Wall unveils story after story of the creativity that grew in its shadow, and now grows in the space it left behind.
The atmosphere at Bearpit Karaoke in Mauerpark
On an uneven, weed-cracked stage in front of a concrete amphitheatre, two men are dancing for comic effect, pausing occasionally to bellow “Tequila!” As karaoke options go, this is a bold choice. But then again, Berlin’s Bearpit Karaoke doesn’t lend itself to playing safe.
Every Sunday afternoon, weather permitting, Irishman Joe Hatchiban rocks up at the Mauerpark’s shabby impromptu arena. He has karaoke equipment, speakers and a car battery strapped to his bike, and around 1,000 people are waiting for him. Enterprising locals sell cans of beer to the audience amassed on the steps, and the roars for the would-be stadium rockers taking the mike get progressively louder.
The Berlin Wall connection and the rebirth of Mauerpark
It’s a brilliant slice of cheerful ridiculousness that neatly captures Berlin’s free-wheeling, anything goes vibe. But the Bearpit Karaoke couldn’t have happened in this spot 36 years ago. An unobtrusive set of double cobblestones emerging on the pavement beyond the Mauersegler beer garden explains why. The cobblestones, which run through the centre of Berlin past key sites such as the Reichstag and the Brandenburg Gate, represent the path of the Berlin Wall. And what is now the Mauerpark was once the death strip dividing east and west.
Of the misconceptions about the Berlin Wall, the biggest is that there was just one of them. The reality is best seen along Bernauerstrasse, where the cobblestones swing a sharp right. Here, some original sections stand, but they’re complimented by rusty iron poles marking the path. Walking along, it becomes strikingly clear that there was one wall along the border, and another slightly further into East German territory. What lay in the middle was strictly the preserve of savage dogs, barbed wire, mines and snipers bullets coming from the watchtowers.
Stories from the divided city of Berlin
What started as a barbed wire fence erected around West Berlin overnight on August 13th 1961 became an increasingly sophisticated barrier. For 28 years, the Wall’s purpose was to stop the flood East Germans escaping to the west. West Berlin was a capitalist island inside the questionably named German Democratic Republic, but as long as East Germans could set foot on that island, they could emigrate to the west and have freedom to travel as they pleased.
Displays on posts along Bernauerstrasse tell the tales of those who attempted to get out. Among them are photographs of people dangling from third story apartments, hoping to be caught by firemen’s nets on the other side, and an East German soldier making a run for it while his colleagues have their guard down.
The rise of creativity and squatting in Kreuzberg
The street is like a walk-through museum, telling tales of divided families and people who could look out of their window, able to see freedom but not reach it. At vantage points, many could do little but make informal appointments to wave at loved ones from the other side of the Wall.
The division of the city had a profound impact on its character. Walking through multi-cultural Kreuzberg, it’s easy to see why Berlin became the doner kebab’s birthplace. Philipp Stratmann, part of guiding co-operative Vive Berlin, explains that the Turkish influx was a direct result of the Wall going up. “West Germany’s industrial giants were reliant on the influx of workers migrating from the east, and that flow dried up overnight. They were desperate for workers, so agreements were drawn up to bring in workers from the poorer areas of eastern Turkey on ten year contracts.
“The same happened with nations such as Greece, Portugal and Spain, but due to the political situation back in Turkey, romances and relationships that started in Berlin, many of the Turks never went home.”
From squats to the punk rock scene
Kreuzberg, flanked on three sides by the Wall and thus one of the least desirable places to live in West Berlin, also gave birth to the city’s squatting movement. In Mariannenplatz, very close to where the wall ran, Philipp says: “This 1890s hospital building was home to both the first squat and the most recent one. A group moved in a few months ago after being evicted elsewhere. They’ve very cleverly got the residents onside by having an open door policy, and they’re running an alternative healing school in there.”
The first squat, which occupied the other end of the hospital building, was the Rauch Haus. It kicked off in 1971 when anarchist blues rock band Ton Steine Scherben encouraged gig-goers to go there and take it over. The movement boomed from there, and was closely attached to the punk rock scene – which also took root in Kreuzberg.
The SO36 club, which hosted the likes of then local residents David Bowie and Iggy Pop, was taken over by squatters in 1984. They put up an exhibition inside, outlining their vision for the district, and warned the police that for every squat eviction, they’d cause a million Deutschmarks worth of property damage.
The police, somewhat pragmatically, carefully decided which battles to pick.
Berlin’s creative boom after the fall of the Wall
By November 1989, therefore, Berlin already had a huge creative, anti-authoritarian scene. And when the Wall came down, this movement suddenly had an extraordinary amount of space to thrive in. Newly united Berlin had an enormous band of wasteland and near-derelict buildings running through its heart.
Multi-million euro development projects – such as the glitzy Potsdamer Platz shopping centre and the new main train station – took years to get off the ground. But the squatters and the artists didn’t have to worry about niceties such as planning permission – they just moved in.
Suddenly, there was a major world city where vast swathes of prime real estate were in the hands of the young, the scruffy and the creative. And this acted as a beacon, pulling in more of the same from around the world.
Berlin’s street art and alternative energy
Dubbed “poor but sexy” by former mayor Klaus Wowereit, Berlin’s pulling power has made it a city quite like any other in Germany. In many situations, English rather than German is the default language – many of the hang-outs are run by excitable migrants rather than lifelong locals.
The artist colonies and grungy bars along the path of the wall have been slowly closed down or moved, one by one. But several spring up again, such as the Afro-Caribbean beach bar and music venue, Yaam.
There’s a certain whack-a-mole factor to this – the party just moves elsewhere. The Prenzlauerberg and Mitte areas have largely gentrified, Kreuzberg and Friedrichshain are heading in the same direction, but now the galleries and nightlife venues are cropping up in Neukölln.
East Side Gallery and the legacy of Berlin street art
The most visible sign of Berlin’s enduring cool is the street art. The city is covered in tags, murals and stencils. The Wall, again, had a role in sparking this. The longest stretch left standing after German unification was the East Side Gallery in Friedrichshain, which was given over to spray can artists from around the world. 1.3km of drab concrete was turned into a series of murals with a broad peace-and-love theme.
The East Side Gallery is something of a spray paint Disneyland – the city’s most interesting work will not be found there – but it has become a globally recognisable symbol of the city’s tolerance for street art.
Street art tours and Berlin’s night-time energy
Robin Smith, who shows visitors the best street art on Alternative Berlin’s tours, says the city authorities turn something of a blind eye. “They’ve got around 35 anti-graffiti people, but there are an estimated 3,000 people spraying on any one night.”
Walking around Friedrichshain, he points out some of the more innovative campaigns. One features a series of pining love letters to a fictional Linda – the artist put them up as a social experiment to see how the public would respond.
The old railyards off Revalerstrasse offer a classic example of gives Berlin its special techno-tinged, subversive edge. Warehouses have been turned into nightclubs, tae-kwon-do schools and gallery spaces, but the whole strip is essentially a giant canvas. Huge, intricate, grandstanding murals take pride of place on the sides of nightspots such as Cassiopeia and Lokschuppen Berlin which don’t properly get going until three or four in the morning.
Berlin’s mix of freedom and absurdity today
Robin tells tales of fellow artists with unlikely backgrounds. “One does the tops of high buildings on his own. He blagged a job at a camping store and got the people there to teach him how to abseil,” he says.
“Another tagger is an investment banker from London. He’s in a suit by day, and spray painting on the sides of trains by night.”
No matter how much the development booms, Berlin’s embrace of such absurdities is unlikely to go away. Where the Wall once ran along the River Spree in Friedrichshain, cranes are erecting luxury apartments and media company offices at a ferocious pace, yet on the opposite bank is the Badeschiff, a cargo barge that has been morphed into a public swimming pool. In summer, DJs set a soundtrack and dripping bathers embark on fiercely fought ping pong and table football competitions. In winter, a caterpillar-like plastic cocoon goes over the barge, saunas are installed and everyone strolls around naked from pool to bar stool.
Another survivor is BeachMitte, where beach volleyball courts stretch as far as the eye can see, and blissed out spectators lounge in deckchairs clutching a bottle of Becks. In the middle is the strangest climbing and ropes course you’re ever likely to see. Overgrown twenty-something kids scamper through lurid green Volkswagen Beetles, mazes of dangling punch bags and rolling oak barrels.
Not too long ago, attempting to climb in this spot would have meant death. The glee-inducing silliness that now stands in the Wall’s path is a glorious embrace of the new freedom.
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More Berlin travel
Other Berlin travel articles on Planet Whitley include
- The best time to visit the DDR Museum in Berlin.
- Canoeing along the Berlin Wall.
- Taking the Berlin to Munich train.
- Is it realistic to do a Berlin to Prague day trip by train?
- Berlin to Dortmund train times and prices.
