Berlin, Germany
Understand
The foundation of Berlin was very multicultural. The surrounding area was populated by Germanic Swabian and Burgundian tribes, as well as Slavic Wends in prechristian times, and the Wends have stuck around. Their modern descendants are the Sorbian Slavic-language minority who live in villages near the Havel and Spree rivers.
In the beginning of the 13th century two towns (Berlin and Cölln) developed on each side of the river Spree. As the population grew, the towns merged and Berlin became a center for commerce and the region’s agriculture.
Since the 1600s, when large numbers of French Huguenots fled religious persecution, Berlin has welcomed asylum seekers, religious, economic or otherwise. In the second half of the 20th century, large numbers of immigrants from Turkey and communist countries, including the former Yugoslavia and Vietnam, not to mention Soviet soldiers who refused to return home, have helped to make Berlin more multicultural than ever.
Berlin is also a youth-oriented city. Before German unification, West Berliners were exempt from the West German civil/military service requirement. Social activists, pacifists and anarchists of all stripes moved to Berlin for that reason alone. Musicians and artists were given state subsidies. It was easy to stay out all night thanks to liberal bar licensing laws, and staying at university for years without ever getting a degree was a great way to kill time. In constrast with most of Germany, Prenzlauer Berg is said to have the highest per-capita birth rate in Europe.
Berlin is a relatively young city by European standards, dating only to the thirteenth century, and it has always had a reputation as a place filled with people from elsewhere. Someone who has lived in Berlin for ten years will see themselves as a “true Berliner,” looking down on the person who has only been there for five. It’s sometimes tough to find someone born and raised here! This is part of Berlin’s charm: it never gets stuck in a rut.
But it’s not all beer bashes and café-sitting. One of the most important “products” produced in Berlin by both academic and company-sponsored institutes is research. That research is exported around the world just like tangible goods. German labor is highly efficient but comes at high cost. Strong trade unions, the end of West Berlin’s pre-reunification subsidies and Germany’s dense regulatory environment forced industry to cencentrate on high quality and expensive products. Students went on strike in Berlin to oppose tuition fees in recent years. The universities have grown to their limits and most schools do not get sufficient funding. Students, housewives and self-employed people are not included in Berlin’s official unemployment rate, currently standing at a whopping 18 percent.
Some famous artists of the region and their best-known works include Lucas Cranach the Elder, Lucas Cranach the Younger, Johann Gottfried Schadow, Marlene Dietrich (The Blue Angel), Leni Riefenstahl (Triumph of the Will), Bertold Brecht (Threepenny Opera), Käthe Kollwitz, Kurt Tucholsky, Thomas and Heinrich Mann, Walter Gropius, Paul Klee, FW Murnau (Nosferatu), Fritz Lang (Metropolis), Volker Schlöndorff, Wim Wenders (Wings of Desire (German: Der Himmel über Berlin)), Blixa Bargeld/Einstürzende Neubauten, Christopher Isherwood, Gunter Grass (The Tin Drum), members of the Bauhaus architectural movement.
A certain uneasy detente still exists between some former residents of East and West Berlin (and Germany). Wessi evolved as a derogatory nickname for a West German; its corollary is Ossi. The implication here is that after reunification, the West Germans automatically assumed the way they do things is the right way, and the way the Easterners should start doing it, too. Westerners got a reputation for being arrogant. They saw the Easterners as stubborn Communist holdouts only interested in a handout from the “rich West”. Consider a shirt for sale in a shop inside the Alexanderplatz Deutsche Bahn station: Gott, schütze mich vor Sturm und Wind/und Wessies die im Osten sind (“God, protect me from the storm and wind, and Wessies who are in the East”).
Berlin, especially the former East, has evolved into a cultural mecca since the reunification. Artists and other creative souls flocked to the city in swarms after the wall fell, primarily due to the extremely low cost of living in the East. Despite the increased prices and gentrification as a result, Berlin has become a center for art, multimedia, electronic music, and fashion among other things. The particularly high number of students and young people in the city has only helped this cause. Just stroll down a street in Prenzlauer Berg, Friedrichshain, or Mitte to get a glimpse of the new East Berlin.
Berlin is a beautiful city so allow enough time to get to see the sights. A good map, such as the Rough Guide Berlin map, is highly recommended. While the public transport system is superb, it can be confusing, due to a lack of signs in some of the larger stations, so a good rail map is also essential. Roads into Berlin can also be confusing, so plan your route and drive carefully. Signs point to city districts rather than indicating compass directions, so it’s a good idea to get to know where the various districts lie in relation to each other. This also applies to cyclists.