november 9th, at the end of the day

after we have all seen the images of people hammering on the concrete of a graffiti-adorned wall conquered by masses, there is one piece of written comment within u.s. media that i think best ties up the meaning of the day. it's a comment in the new yorker simply titled "november 9th" by georg packer.

he seemed to have been the only english writer to remember the other november 9ths in german history, a day that because of its other less joyous associations was never turned into an official german holiday:

"This is because November 9th is also the date on which Kaiser Wilhelm abdicated [abdankte], in 1918, two days before Germany’s defeat in the First World War. On November 9, 1923, Hitler attempted to overthrow the Weimar Republic, in the Munich Beer Hall Putsch. In 1938, November 9th was the Night of Broken Glass [Reichskristallnacht oder Pogromnacht], when Nazi gangs attacked Jews and their property across Germany and Austria, foreshadowing the genocide to come."

german media such as the leading newscast tagesschau included coverage of the ceremonies in several cities including berlin and munich, which commemorated the jewish victims.

packer also seemed to be the only english writer to mention the name of günther schabowski, or "schmetterling schabowski", [butterfly] as the berlin monthly cultural publication "das magazin" once dubbed him. schabowski was the german democratic republic official who on the evening of november 9th 1989 in a press conferences that was broadcast on television had to answer questions about new, more liberal travel regulations set out by the east german sed party [sozialistische einheitspartei deutschlands or socialist unity party of germany]. asked when they these travel rules would go into effect he as packer writes "shrugged, scratched his head, checked some papers, and said: 'Immediately'." this set off the flood of people who we have seen on the indefinitely re-run archival video these days.

packer also ties together the many intricate forces that created the fall of the wall. he credits the brave people behind the curtain, u.s. support of the dissidents, the disastrous communist economy [planwirtschaft or planned economy], the weakening sed party elites, the role of then soviet union president mikhail gorbachev (click here for an interview by al jazeera english's david frost with gorbachev)* alike.

"For Europe's Communist regimes to disappear so suddenly and bloodlessly (Romania was a different story), everything had to fall in place, above and below, within and without. Such circumstances are improbably rare."

whereas i found more credit being given to seminal politicians to path the way to the tumbling of the wall in u.s. based media, the power of the people is something that has been more emphasized in german media. especially in leipzig, where the famous monday demonstrations [Montagsdemonstration] happened, people are proud of this day, i imagine.

dr. peter pfeiffer, a professor for german at georgetown university in washington, dc, who i happened to talk to, reminded me that there were no children during these monday marches as people were aware of the snipers on the roofs around the augustusplatz.

but packer also looks beyond berlin to explain its uniqueness. iraq, for instance, he writes, was according to some advisers of president bush "like Eastern Europe with Arabs". it so far has turned out otherwise. the continuing struggle of people in zimbabwe, burma/myanmar, and china, proves that the friedliche revolution, which is called velvet revolution in english, and its circumstances are not easily repeated. a south korean class mate at ohio university told me before how touched koreans were to see the wall fall in the hope it would foreshadow a reunion in his country. it hasn't happend yet. packer interestingly, sees the biggest parallel case in the recent uprising in iran. a brutal summer for iranian who protested the outcome of the election and president ahmadinejad has damped the hopes for victory of the demonstrators. but suspense remains in the air. the revolution must come from within, packer writes.

like happened in east germany helped by many people and a butterfly.

what exceptional media coverage have you seen? what was the best, favorite, worst, ugliest, or most interesting story in the flood of anecdotes and facts? go ahead and post your recommendations in the comment section.

read the whole comment titled "november 9th" by georg packer in the new yorker

here's a more personal take on the day, with anecdotal memories old and new



* discloser: i am interning with al jazeera english at the moment.

november 9th, the personal take with anecdotal memories old and new

the basic fact in the beginning: i was seven years old when the wall came down. my family did not ride to berlin in a frenzy. my primary memories are mainly childhood images.

among the strongest of them connected to the fall of the wall is that with the concrete also saturday fell away as a school day. i attended the beginning of second grade, after having suffered on saturdays during the first whole grade. now i could watch one of my favorite television shows that ran in the morning called "achim und kunibert" [achim and kunibert, a show with a big clown and a miniature somewhat crumpy clown] and another one i remember quite clearly called "mach mit, mach's nach, mach's besser" [losely translates into "participate, copy, exceed", a show, in which two teams of kids competed in a race involving an obstacle course in a gym].

then there are handed down memories from my parents, about herr zimmermann, the man in our apartment building who was said to be working for the stasi, short for staatssicherheit, the secret police to "secure the state". herr zimmerman was busy with observing neighbors. as a child i had a notion that he is suspicious and to be avoided. in hindsight the pulling down of the dark brown roller blind made sense; watching western channels on television was forbidden, neighbors such as herr zimmermann might tell on the dissident viewers.

street names changed, school names changed. gone was the wilhelm-pieck-straße, where we lived. new heroes more fitting with the new ideology moved in such as dietrich bonhoeffer. once the pride of new tenants, the whole apartment building from the late 1970s has vanished. gone was also otto-grotewohl, the street where my kindergarten was located, i don´t even remember the new name. gone was also the big metal bust of lenin at the nearest high school.

favorite products vanished as well. some for good, some for a while until they had a come back in a smaller production line. my favorite example: knusperflocken [crunchy flakes, a chocolate candy]. they are pretty much known and enjoyed by people in the west and east. but i think only people in the east, i think, really appreciate their survival.

especially people in small town of zeitz, where the knusperflocken are produced by the zetti company. it is one of the few companies that survived die wende [wend, the whole process of political and economic change in east germany] in zeitz, which i should disclose is my home town. the reappearance of products most importantly secured some jobs in a region notorious for high unemployment ever since the wall came down. knusperflocken is where my grandmother worked. knusperflocken are probably the product i care most about to have shipped to me in the united states whenever there is a chance.

so it's childhood memories, parents`talk, and sweets. dr. peter pfeiffer, a professor of german at the georgetown university in washington, dc, said that while most people under 30 years of age do still carry memories of east germany they were not traumatized by them as my parents' generation.

only in the early nineties, dr. pfeiffer, said he noticed differences between exchange students coming from east or west germany in terms of clothing and language. he said one example was the expression fakt ist, [fact is] which east germans used in contrast to west german students and has become pretty common. just as typical ossi words [the sometimes derogative term of people in east germany, ost meaning east] such as "broiler" and "roster" are no secret language any more. at least since german book author else buschheuer wrote her book "ruf!mich!an!" [call!me!] in which the neurotic female main character refers to her hated east german house mates maik and mandy as "broiler"-neighbors.

another professor at ohio university, dr. joseph bernt in the journalism department, said to me once that he remembered the earlier exchange students from leipzig (which is located in east germany). they, he said, about a decade ago came with a sense of despair and hopelessness, a sort of no future confusion. a contrast to the students coming from leipzig these days, he says, they are so enthusiastic with the world open before them.

no matter where you were, in the united states, west germany, east germany or timbuktu --
what are your memories, anecdotes, and associations of the times when, before, and after the wall fell? go ahead and post them in the comment section!

here's a more analytical approach to the day, my favorite article of the day and the reasons why

pumpkin carving

halloween without jack 'o lanterns, is like pancakes without apple sauce.

so creating these lanterns by carving pumpkins is a widely enjoyed activity by young and old u.s. americans. this year i got invited to a party dedicated to producing these neat halloween essentials.

before you slashing about with knives and baby saws, the pumpkin needs to be freed of its whitish, somewhat foamy, seed-laced innards. after a quick circular cut to lift off the top part, we used greenish mini plastic shovels, that came with a pumpkin carving kit, to scoop out the useless inside. (some people clean and roast the seeds, though).














only then a pattern is applied to the outer surface.














this is done either by a blueprint that has tiny holes along black lines to punctuated the pattern on the pumpkin or













by simply drawing on the orange skin with a marker. but if you are like me, you just dig out your swiss army knife and start attacking.


















the result in my case turned out to be quite...crude, to put it politely. i don´t know why people needed an explanation to my simple image. everyone can sure recognize this skillfully carved hole as a shooting star!?!


















luckily i was not alone in my misery. another artist had some trouble to have her shape identified as the african continent, mind you, of course with madagascar situated in the south east.

















after the recognition rate for my little wishing star was quite low, i tried the more common jack o lantern face approach. it´s not my fault it turned out lob-sided. my pumpkin baby was born with this disability to begin with.

















other pumpkin carvers did a much better job in cleaning and smoothing the gaps into a refined image.















even the more unusual kitty-cat pattern came out about right.


















as well as this rabbit-toothed companion, the biggest pumpkin of my carving season.


















but the prizes for the most intricate patterns go to an anonymous artist who carved the calligraphic arabic word for al jazeera (meaning peninsula by the way) as well as















a young carver in the cleveland region for the neatest design and scariest effect!

Angie in DC -- The German Chancellor & a Congressional Honor

Despite working for media I couldn't squeeze myself into one of the highly coveted seats to witness "Angie's" -- as she is often referred to among Germans -- historic address from Congress.

But a colleague did. Al Jazeera English's John Terrett describes the performance German chancellor Angela Merkel during her recent visit to Washington DC in his November 3 blog post:

"Sitting in the Oval office she cut a small figure beside the towering President Barack Obama.

She occasionally turned to joke with her staff and at one point even covered her mouth with her hand to tell Mr. Obama something that made the pair of them laugh out loud.

She’s the Chancellor of Europe’s political and economic powerhouse – Germany.

She reiterated Germany’s commitment to Afghanistan – it has the third largest number of troops there - though there was no mention of U.S. requests for Berlin to send more troops to Afghanistan, something that is extremely unpopular with German voters.

But Angela Merkel is no push-over for Barack Obama. She wants to be a friend and an ally of the United States but on Germany’s terms.

On Tuesday she became only the second German Chancellor to address the Congress – the last time was in 1957. It’s an honour given only to America’s closest allies and friends."

Read more on John Terret's blog post on Al Jazeera English:
http://blogs.aljazeera.net/americas/2009/11/03/merkel-ally-her-own-terms

shooting & crashing -- a shopping experience in dc

9.05pm. after an eleven-hour shift of work i just wanted to pick up some milk. this proved harder than usual today.

first i tried the safeway supermarket conveniently sits between my metro stop called georgia ave petworth and the hostel at 8th street. coming closer to the safeway at least a dozen police cars with flashing bright red and blue lights rose my suspicion. but police tends to be more visible and present and bothering in the united states than in germany. i walked on. but then the safeway parking lot was roped off with official looking yellow and black plastic tape. i dived underneath to find out if i can get milk or not. a police offer quickly shoved me out of the yellow zone again. he said they are investigating a shooting.

naturally i next walked to the tv cameras on another side of the parking lot. a journalist from nbc washington said supposedly there was a shooting of knifing in the parking lot. she wouldn't know more but i should check channel 4 at 11pm.

i moved on to a couple of bystanders at the wendy's across the parking lot. one of them said someone was shot in the head in the parking lot. i should go to the other safeway down the street.

a lot of people stood around. connecting streets where cut off by police cars bathing the area in an eerie flickering light. behind the glass front of the safeway dark clothed figures moved around.

somewhat shocked, confused, and still curios i moved on. luckily there's the yes organic market even closer to the hostel. i tried my luck there. in the cooling shelf bottles with organic milk from a regional supplier invited to buy something special for the special occasion. a friend had recommended the brand and her samples tasted yummy. in pleasant anticipation i took one of the old-fashioned looking glass bottles. they reminded me of a mythical abandoned milk shoot i had seen built into a u.s. house.

in defiance to the plastic bag culture in wanted to transfer my pretty glass bottle into my backpack. i let the bag with the milk rest for one moment on a stack of shopping carts. a secondlater it was on the floor with a shattering noise. here we go. no milk for me. the cleaning crew came runing. embarrassed that i had destroyed the special milk for which the special bottle alone was worth $2 i showered them with apologies.

they friendly offered me a fresh bottle in return, to wipe my splattered pants, and asked if i was alright.

sure, eleven hours of work, one parking lot shooting, and one glass bottle crashing later i was okay. with milk.

a baker's dozen -- old town alexendria

some housemates came back with shiny eyes telling me about a place called alexandria: old town. water front, wunderschön raved the artsy liberal minded graphic designer german girl, which otherwise was little impressed with u.s. cities and their absence of art and culture (apart from chicago).

with fresh memories of the old streets and crowded rows of houses of annapolis in mind, i hoped for a similar european-feeling experience. european in the sense of narrow alleyways, brick to brick houses, cobble stone alleys, and tiny stores with high prices.

i wasn´t disappointed.
















left and right of king street in alexandria, which lies just south of downtown dc, rows of cute houses with colorful doors, door knockers, gas lamps, and flower pots made me feel like walking in the nice parts of german weimar.


















the narrowest alleyways widened my heart.


















the cobble stone was really rugged in spots,












and even the parking lot had a historic overseer cottage.


















tiny stores with specialty fare such as ethiopian jewelry, postcards of addis abeba, and other artifcats took turns with













restaurants for foodies of all gustoes: italian, french, spanish. chinese, japanese, and lebanese.


















interestinlgy along king street, the main avenue through old town leading straight to the water front and conveniently reachable via metro, i found only two book stores: one mostly for second hand volumes (above) where i acquired three paperbacks for a dollar and














first hand pages, where not only "books a million" -- so the name of the store -- live but also the longest newsstand i´ve ever encountered. interestingly, all magazine, journals, and papers were in english. (i thought at the end of the row after specialty publications for hunting, gun collectors, crocheting, scrapbooking and the sorts i would bump into some el mundo or spiegel, pero nada).















cobblestone and cheap books, a dazzling choice of specialty magazines...what more could i ask for? but ahh, who would have thought, the best was yet to come: bakeries. the highest density of the rare store specism so far counted on u.s. ground. sure, they are mostly chain enterprises but seeing the word alone NOT falsely printed next to "kroger" or "walmart" or "giant" lettering was worth a jolt of heart.


















there was the old acquaintance from cleveland with the yummy, chewy pumpernickel bagels -- apart from the annoying caraway seeds.


















and new discoveries that always came with a café attached and were mostly advertised as french.


















my all time favorite -- apart from home-made bread produced by my favorite american -- is "the daily bread" as the elegant and practical name of this store translates. it was the first time i got a taste of bread from a u.s. product that reminded me of plain dinner bread at home. bread has been a stable dinner "dish" for my family. when i asked what we would have in the evening, my parents would say jokingly: schnitte mit brot, a slice with bread, meaning just bread.














inside the store my eyes popped, my nostrils widened, my mouth watered at the sight of















french classics like croissants, even the chocolate-filled versions,
















meringue, another all time favorite pastry of mine,














and these colorful collections, a favorite of my favorite american.

but i resisted the temptation of a quick sugar shot. i decided for the substantial rounds on the shelves. i just could not resist the other temptation to try a potential non-mushy, dark-flour, slightly sour-tasting bread with a hard crust, like in germany.

there was a "pain de siegle paysan" or farmer's bread with rye flour on the left and a sour dough boule with wheat flour on the right side. both were equally promising from the outside. the saleslady was kind enough to reassure me that the rye bread does not contain caraway seed after consulting a directory of ingredients.

so the rye it was. without regret.

















a quarter of the loaf cost $3.23. it was completely worth it in my opinion when compared to the regular average of $4 for any old hydrogenated-oiled, high fructose corn syruped, natural and artificial flavored, enriched mass labeled "bread", which i can minimize to an inch of height by just pressing down my palm moderately on the package (my standard test to consider a loaf).

my peasant bread was hard as a rock on the outside and coated with a thin veil of flour but soft, moist, and melting on the tongue on the inside where the dough was interstratified with air bubbles from recent oven time. (the saleslady said it was baked the same morning in georgetown, another dc neighborhood).

these are moments when it's worth to have your pocket knife ready despite the risk to have to temporarily throw it into trash cans due to security madness. cutting a fresh slice, i enjoyed my rye bread with a breeze of wind on the last day of summer at the water front.

a dollar a cuke: dc grocery shopping

asking about dc, a lot of u.s. americans gave me apart from recommendations for sight-seeing two things to think of: that it has one of the highest crime rates and is one of the most expensive cities in the united states.

nobody warned me the two would come combined.

that crime is not far away, i just experienced a few weeks ago. think shooting outside a supermarket (ironically called safeway).

that prices are definitely higher than in chronically depressed appalachia* my wallet experiences weekly. think squishy so-called bread for $4/€2.70 inside.

here are some basic items on my shopping list as bought in a non-fancy supermarket in a non-fancy area (think shooting). even when going for the cheapest brand of each item, only a customer card issued by the supermarket (i have a whole collection by now) pushes the prices into a somewhat decent range.

• 1 whole wheat toast-style bread $3.99 or €2.68
• 1 fresh mozzarella ball (they are a bit bigger than in germany): $3 or €2
  (with card, regular $4.49 or €3)
• a jar of spaghetti sauce: $2 or €1.34
  (with card, regular $3.34 or €2.22)
• 1 kg white flour store brand: $1.69 or €1.13
• red seedless grapes: $2.48/lb or €1.66/Pfund
  (with card, regular $4.25/lb or €2.85/Pfund
• 1 pound swiss cheese: $4.49/lb or €3/Pfund
• 1 cucumber (shorter than in germany): $0.99 or €0.66
• 6 large eggs, store brand: $1.19 or €0.80
• 1 pound bananas: $0.58/lb or €0.39
• 1% milk lucerne brand: $1.99/2 liter or €1.34
  (with card, regular $2.49 or €1.67)
• 1 avocado: $1.99 or €1.34
• a package of mushrooms: $1.50 or €1
  
  all computations are based on the exchange rate of october 17, 2009 of $1 equaling €0.67 or €1 equaling $1.4906 according to the frankfurt stock exchange.

candy bombers with "ostpaketen" welcome!
think christmas candy ;-)

*in u.s. american stereotypical thinking appalachia -- a region that parallels the east coast along the appalachian mountain range reaching from pennsylvania in the north to part of alabama in the south and huddles south east ohio and pretty much all of west virginia in the middle -- conjures up specters of poverty visualized on tv as toddlers with rotting teeth due to too much coca cola in baby bottles, children in rags, alcoholic parents, and jokes about incest.