When the wall came down, I was in 9th grade and I was taking German 1 in school. We stopped all regular lessons so we could talk about history and everything that was going on.
One day a few weeks after the wall came down, our teacher told us about a project (pre-internet, by the way) that a German Language teachers group had decided to start. We, the American German Language students, could write letters to German Chancellor Helmut Kohl requesting German penpals. I think everyone in the class did this.
Weeks and months later, we found out that the Chancellor's office had been swamped with BAGS of letters from American students requesting penpals. The Chancellor had to hire staff just to handle the mail.
As a thank you, we all received posters of the people standing on and around the wall. I found the poster again recently, in the garage when we were cleaning it out. He also sent a letter in both English and German, saying that because of our initiative we were now part of the history that surrounded the events.
Months after that I got my penpal. Her name was Kirstin and she was from East Berlin. We corresponded for years. I still have her picture somewhere.
What is your German Reunification story?
1 comment:
This is also one of the few historical events that I remember. I must have been in Middle School at the time... not a particularly great time.
Anyway, I thought it must be something... but being that age, I didn't really know. At the time, all I knew was that my dad was trying to learn German, my brothers had taken it in HS, and that most of our Family was German.... Lat I found out we were really Swiss-German, so +.
I remember see the wall come down in pieces, the demonstrations, the news coverage, but I didn't really know anything about it. But, somewhere in my hearts, I knew it was a big, good thing.
I also vividly remember the Challenger explosion, 9/11 obviously, and the day that Canada gained independence from Britain officially.
Post a Comment