nebeneinander stellen - to juxtapose
berlin is a city of juxtaposition. the architecture, the people, the attitudes all point to a keen need to remember earlier events, but those same things are also so progressive. the mercedes building is right next to the kaiser-wilhelm gedächtniskirche, which was bombed in WWII and remains a shell - a visual representation of past horrors.
today dan and i went to a museum called "the story of berlin" which, coincidentally enough, told the story of berlin's history. funny how that works.
the museum is located in a mall located on the fancy-pants shopping street known as the ku'damm. the mall has a nuclear fall out shelter in the basement (now part of the museum).
the museum has a multi-media, disney-does-history feel in the beginning. (there is also a lot of detail about the princes and the huguenauts and the rise of industry. dan's eyes glazed over at the minutia and he quickly found a chair. dan believes that a "period piece" is a movie set before 1975. dan - use the comment section to register your dissatisfaction with my comments.) you descend a staircase effectively representing the rise of the third reich, or demise of the german way of life for many. the lower floor is extremely interesting, including mock living rooms from the east and west sides of the city. then you take a tour of the bomb shelter - nothing disney-fied about that.
i grew up in the shadow of NORAD. i know people were worried about nuclear holocaust. i was little, but it didn't seem like people thought about it every day even though we lived at "ground zero" in a way. (of course i could be wrong about this - mom?) i was just struck by how in your face the threat of nuclear war must have been. then you exit the bunker and go shopping at cartier and hermes.
dan experiences irony each day as he approaches his gleaming office tower emblazoned with the company logo - a beacon of capitalism - located just on the east german side of checkpoint bravo.
the mall on top of a bomb shelter. the fortune 500 company in former soviet territory. that right there tells the story of berlin. the museum was cool too.
today dan and i went to a museum called "the story of berlin" which, coincidentally enough, told the story of berlin's history. funny how that works.
the museum is located in a mall located on the fancy-pants shopping street known as the ku'damm. the mall has a nuclear fall out shelter in the basement (now part of the museum).
the museum has a multi-media, disney-does-history feel in the beginning. (there is also a lot of detail about the princes and the huguenauts and the rise of industry. dan's eyes glazed over at the minutia and he quickly found a chair. dan believes that a "period piece" is a movie set before 1975. dan - use the comment section to register your dissatisfaction with my comments.) you descend a staircase effectively representing the rise of the third reich, or demise of the german way of life for many. the lower floor is extremely interesting, including mock living rooms from the east and west sides of the city. then you take a tour of the bomb shelter - nothing disney-fied about that.
i grew up in the shadow of NORAD. i know people were worried about nuclear holocaust. i was little, but it didn't seem like people thought about it every day even though we lived at "ground zero" in a way. (of course i could be wrong about this - mom?) i was just struck by how in your face the threat of nuclear war must have been. then you exit the bunker and go shopping at cartier and hermes.
dan experiences irony each day as he approaches his gleaming office tower emblazoned with the company logo - a beacon of capitalism - located just on the east german side of checkpoint bravo.
the mall on top of a bomb shelter. the fortune 500 company in former soviet territory. that right there tells the story of berlin. the museum was cool too.
posted by jordan at
10:37 PM
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