My visit to East Berlin

Day 41: West Berlin - Sunday, July 10, 1988 We knew we'd had a weird day the day before when Alan told me he'd dreamed of shoving against a wall, and woke up to find himself pushing my back. I never noticed this, and to this day can only take his word for it that the story is true. I'm inclined to believe Alan, because it helps explain why it was such a struggle to get up Sunday morning. But we did it. This was the day Alan and I had set aside to enter a world we could barely dream of. After hearing about life in the communist world all our lives, we were about to step behind the iron curtain and see some of it for ourselves. The ritual was very straightforward. We went to Checkpoint Charlie again, this time to actually pass through. To go from West to East Berlin, you pay 25 marks (not quite $14) for a visa for that day, then convert another 25 West German marks to East German marks. Since East German marks are not a solid currency, and aren't to be taken from the country, the West to East money conversion is a colossal rip-off. Oh, and we had to stand in a long, slow-moving line, an important part of the communist experience. Alan and I took several precautions once we were in East Berlin; we took our situation extremely seriously. My ex-girlfriend had been to East Berlin, and while she was there, an East German policeman stopped her bus and checked everyone's passport. When the guard got to her, he TOOK HER PASSPORT AND LEFT THE BUS. She was nearly in tears, with no idea if the man would return, terrified that she might never be allowed to leave the country.

Alan and I would have none of that. The first thing we did when we entered East Berlin was find the United States embassy, which was about two blocks from Checkpoint Charlie. Every step we took, we kept in mind the shortest route to our embassy. We were also extra conscious of our passports. Me, I kept mine in my underwear, and I'm not ashamed to say it. I wanted to know at all times EXACTLY where my passport was at all times, and that was a great way to be sure. In reality, there didn't seem to be any danger. In fact, East Berlin had a Planet-of-the-Apes type desertedness about it. My parents visited the Soviet Union in 1976, and my father says that if you feel asleep and were transported behind the Iron Curtain, you could tell you were there. Dad would never use the word "vibe," but that's what he meant, and Alan and I had just walked into something which must have been very close to that. During the film at Checkpoint Charlie, the narrator said East Berlin had a population of 1 million. Alan and I sure didn't see any of them. Four lane streets were bereft of traffic. We saw one boat scooting through a channel in the city. There were barely any pedestrians, and for all we could tell, the ones we saw were tourists like us. The sites of East Berlin only add to the emptiness. They used to say that everything in the communist world is gray. It's really true. The place had no bright colors AT ALL; everything was gray, dark brown, or black. The brightest color there was a muted blue. The only green was from the vegetation. Forget red or yellow. East Berlin wanted to do better. Well, actually, they didn't want to do better; that costs too much. They just wanted to LOOK like they wanted to do better. Several buildings are encased in scaffolding, as though repairs were going on. Except Alan notice that the scaffolding was rusted out; if you took two steps up it, the whole shebang would've come down around your ears. "Just think," Alan said, "this is the part of town that's spruced up for the tourists!" The Brandenburg Gate stood impressively but distantly behind an iron fence; it was in the off-limits neutral zone. Berlin University looked like a haunted mansion behind its detailed iron gate. There were few places of business, and nothing was happening. We found a huge parking lot, maybe a fourth the size of the gigantic lot around the Astrodome; it was maybe one-tenth full, the rest a concrete wasteland. Granted, maybe East Berlin is better on weekdays. There were a number of statues in the area, but even they were grim and lifeless. A mounted warrior fought a dragon next to an apartment building. It depicted action, but certainly not urgency. An octagonal fountain-like structure with four small pairs of wrestling bears along its edges was the only outdoor art in East Berlin that portrayed playfulness. Alan and I agreed that the tribute to Marx and Engels said a lot about the communist world. The pioneer thinkers of socialism were captured in a life-sized iron sculpture, Marx seated, Engels standing. The statue, save for the figures, is all flat surfaces and right angles; the pedestal was a perfect square. It was the single coldest, most lifeless piece of art it has ever been my misfortune to see. "And that's the East Germans' idea of a tribute!" Alan joked.

Frommer's recommended a museum for which portrayed art and history from a Soviet perspective, suggesting that the evils of the world were brought on by capitalism, while communism has made the world a better place. There were several nice displays there, including some fine paintings, stained glass windows, and particularly models of a knight mounted on a horse, both clothed in authentic plate mail armor. But Alan and I never came around to the Eastern Block's point of view. All the displays were in German, so we could not read these alternate viewpoints even if we were inclined to believe them. We wanted to buy a souvenir program; after all, we had 25 East German marks to spend that wouldn't do us any good when we left. But all the literature was in German, so we decided against it. Our next major stop was a World War II memorial for the Soviets. Here was one place where we could forget about who the good guys and the tyrants were and remember for a moment that we're all humans. Plus, the Soviets were on our side for most of World War II. The room we found was simple, almost stark, but nonetheless moving. It is indoors, with one unmarked door as an entrance. No pictures were allowed. The walls were bare. One guard oversaw the memorial. A small flame, the only light in the room, a pining flicker in the center in a rectangle, was surrounded by theatre-type ropes. This was all there was to see; Alan and I didn't have to stay long. The memorial didn't inspire all the emotions such things often do, probably because it wasn't for our own countrymen. But we definitely left with feelings of respect. Since we had to spend the funny East German money, and we had to eat, we had lunch in East Berlin. This was truly an experience. People can preach the evils of capitalism until the sun burns out, but I won't pay attention unless they've had a meal at a restaurant in communist territory.

Alan and I found a restaurant that was open, which was an expedition all by itself. We could tell it was a restaurant because we could see the people seated at tables while others dressed in white shirts and black trousers were bringing them food. We couldn't tell by any signs or menus because there weren't any. The door was wide open, so we could see plainly everything that was going on in the place. But we couldn't see anyone resembling a maitre-d'. Alan and I stood outside the door, along with half a dozen other tourists, waiting to be invited in and seated at a table. We waited. We could see plainly that tables were available, but no one was invited in. The other tourists left in their particular groups, but Alan and I waited. No one invited us in to sample their cuisine. No one shooed us away, either. Nobody cared if we were there or not. After fifteen minutes, we decided to seat ourselves, finding a table next to the far wall of the restaurant. This part of the restaurant was very dark even at midday; the room was lit only by the sunlight invading through the front door. Eventually, a waitress approached us, almost like she couldn't figure why we were there. We asked for menus; the waitress responded by rattling off a list of choices so fast we couldn't tell where one dish ended and the next began. After our third request, the waitress left in a huff and gave us one menu to share. We ordered soon afterward, then waited for our food. And waited. We ran out of things to talk about while we waited, and when Alan Cooley runs out of things to talk about, that's headline news. We wondered aloud whether lighting a flare would attract the help's attention and get us some service. Just as we were ready to take a walk on our order, the food arrived. It was not worth the wait. The food wasn't TERRible or anything, but it wasn't exactly flavorful. It wasn't really memorable in any way, especially in the context of the rest of the restaurant experience. Finally, we had to wait a ridiculous amount of time for the check. I think we could have walked on it and no one would have noticed. But we had twenty-five marks of East German money that wouldn't do us any good anywhere else in the world, and this meal figured to be our biggest chance to use it. We finally asked for a check, and they gave us one. Then we had to complain to get our change. The coins they gave us were made of aluminum; they were so light, they seemed more like play money than anything else. I don't think we tipped. While this obviously didn't hold true for the restaurants, most of the best tourists sites in Berlin were in the East. Alan's and my highlight was the Pergamon Museum. It’s the most well-preserved Greek temple in existence and it’s in East Berlin; it survived so well, they built a museum around it rather than disturb it.

The temple steps, even under the museum light, were gorgeous white marble, surrounded by columns and the remains of an intricate mural of sculptures. Important parts are symbolically missing. Zeus strikes a regal, warlike pose while facing Heracles, except Heracles is missing, and Zeus has no head. Athena flew among angel-like creatures; Athena was missing her face, but unlike everyone else in the mural, she was wearing clothes. Athena was a large figure at the Greek Temple. Twenty feet tall, in fact. Along with the mural, the museum featured a room full of Grecian artifacts and statues, including a twenty-foot tall statue of the goddess of war and wisdom, standing on a six-foot pedestal. Athena must also have been the goddess of balance, because the statue had no arms. Since Athena was my favorite Greek god when I was a boy, I wanted a picture of this towering statue. There was only one thing slowing me down.... There were several little old ladies on the prowl throughout the East Berlin. They're there to take your backpack as you enter a museum. They're at the entrances to the public restrooms to be sure you pay for using the facilities. (You'd be amazed how much being charged for using the restroom, even if you're using funny money, can affect your decision of when to go.) And the ladies are seated throughout the museums, using the only chairs available. My father had told me about these old ladies. He believes they were World War II widows who were given these simple jobs because, after all, communism DOES guarantees full employment. These women otherwise would have nothing to do with their lives, so they put in a day's work taking backpacks, collecting toilet fees, and telling tourists not to take flash pictures. There was just such an old lady sitting 30 feet to my left as I stood admiring the 20-foot tall statue of Athena. From the background my dad had given me, I expected that her entire job description was to be sure no one took a flash picture. And I didn't know how to turn off the flash on my camera. I stood about 50 feet in front of Athena, held my camera to my face, then looked to my left at the old lady. She smiled. I took a few steps forward and backward, to get Athena properly centered in the frame, then glanced at the old lady again. She was still smiling. I held my camera with both hands, then looked to my left one more time, as if to say, "look, I'm serious. I'm really going to take this picture. Are you SURE that's okay with you?" She nodded, still smiling warmly at me. So I took the picture. *fLASh* The old lady lunged from her seat like Wilma Rudolph, waving both hands in front of her in the universal sign language for "NO," and saying "no flash" in about seven different languages. (Language number three was English.) I nodded my head repentantly, and put away my camera. She returned to her chair and sat down, her face shining with the contented, satisfied smile of a woman who'd performed her duties to perfection.

The temple was very extensive, including two-story areas. There was a courtyard designed for public speaking, where steps led up to a stage-like area elevated 20 feet off the ground. The elevated platform consisted of a semicircular extension, ornately and uniformly decorated, jutting into the courtyard in front of it. All was constructed from stone. From here, it was easy to imagine a priest or politician addressing a large throng of citizens. One of the most impressive exhibits was the mosaics. These were huge mosaics; one was 45 feet tall and built like the entrance to a medieval castle. It featured golden animals; five rows of animals; horses, donkeys, and deer; each three feet tall. They stood out against the dark green backgrounds; the simple color scheme belied the intricacies of the minuscule tiles making up the designs and backgrounds. The whole experience at the Greek temple was a pleasure. Most of East Germany was unquestionably a valuable experience, but the Greek temple was the only part we could sincerely call "enjoyable." We left the Greek temple about six hours after we'd arrived in East Berlin. By then we were more than ready to leave. Alan and I had waded through the East German Vibe for six hours; after a late night at Quasimodo's, plus five weeks of travelling, we were too drained to stand any longer, even if we could find something else to see. Now I started to get nervous about the money. Usually that means fear of running out of money, but here I was worried about having too much money, even having ANY money. It is illegal to take East German currency out of the country. And I still had almost 15 marks left. I don't know what they do to you if they catch you, but I was in no way curious, if you hear what I'm saying. We even asked one of the guards about this; he reminded us that you're SUPPOSED to put your East German money in a bank. Gee, thanks, guy. This was Sunday. The banks were closed. (Just like all the restaurants.) This could get ugly, I thought. Alan and I walked away for a while before trying to get through the line. Alan was a braver man than I; he decided to take the money with him, figuring they weren't likely to strip-search him or anything. While in line, he got to talk with a West German man who was going home after visiting his East German girlfriend. He kept a bank account in East Berlin, which had built up a considerable sum of nigh-inconsequential money due to his 25 marks/a pop visits. Me, I spent several minutes in a near panic before frantically tossing my change into a garbage can. In one sense at least, it was a wise move; I felt a little less nervous about going through the line when I wasn't trying to smuggle currency out against the law of a land where human "rights" only referred to your hands and feet. Fortunately, I didn't succeed in throwing away ALL my money; I accidentally left a few coins in my pocket. Doubly fortunately, no one caught me with them. I didn't find them until I'd emptied my pockets in my hotel room in West Berlin.

It's a weird sensation when you enter a place roughly 6,000 miles from your residence and it feels like home. I saw John Denver on Late Night with David Letterman once after Denver had returned from the Soviet Union and he described the same thing: he knew he'd been to a strange place when the man who sang "Thank God I'm a Country Boy" landed in New York City and it felt like home. Alan and I got a taste of that sensation that Sunday. When we returned to West Berlin, we'd never seen anything so beautiful. The tackiest advertisements were gorgeous; I'm no fan of Coca-Cola, but that huge sign I saw in West Berlin was actually uplifting. It was RED!!! A REAL COLOR!!! It felt like we hadn't seen that much red in years. More than that, since it was advertising, it represented CAPITALISM!!! Hard currency! Free market supremacy! Real choices about purchases! Not to mention free speech, freedom of religion, freedom of assembly, etc. It got better, too. On our way to the hotel, we stumbled upon a street festival! Bustling people! Crowded streets! Celebration! Berlin doesn't stop! (West Berlin, I mean; East Berlin doesn't start.) Several blocks of streets were closed off to vehicular traffic, allowing pedestrians to wander at their leisure to a lot of cool booths, with games and all manner of food, but it was shutting down around us; we'd come in on the tail end. Too bad. There are some gorgeous women in West Berlin, too. We found a great dinner place - again. We were beginning to take for granted good food in Germany. (Make that West Germany. People INSIDE the Wall know how to run a restaurant.) East Berlin really made an impression on both of us; we discussed some of that over dinner. Every country has its barriers, even if it's landlocked; we spent some time on the illegal alien problems in Texas with which we were so familiar. But our problem in the U.S. is how - or even should - we keep people from coming IN. Take whatever side of that argument that you will. East Germany's problem was how to keep people from leaving, and their solution of choice was guns and stone walls. Every country has its barriers, but most don't include guns. Money, bureaucracy, yeah, but guns? And why would anyone want to keep people in a place they don't want to be? That's a good definition of prison, right? Alan and I knew the answers, all right. But we sure didn't like them. There were things I didn't like about Greece, but that country had life. (Boy, did it.) East Berlin was like an open-air funeral home which had been abandoned for 25 years. East Berlin is in no way the same as West Berlin. How did anyone manage that? I was really looking forward to getting back to the States.

After dinner, Alan was in the mood for one more night out. And we're talking NIGHT OUT, meaning dancing. Alan had heard of a place called Big Eden, a "hip" disco celebrities supposedly frequented. This didn't exactly sound like My Scene, so I applied what I call my Kick-in-the-head Test, an analysis I invented to compensate for my tendency to be a stick-in-the-mud. If I'm confronted with a social invitation to an event in which I wouldn't participate on my own initiative, and I have no moral or scheduling conflicts, I apply an inclusive criteria of whether the event in question sounds better than a kick in the head. If it does, I go ahead and accept; usually, things aren't near as bad as I expect and I open myself up for a pleasant surprise. The Big Eden passed; it didn't sound lethal, and it was only one night out of my life, so Alan managed to talk me into going. Well, Big Eden is a disco, just like it advertised to be. You'd think Sunday night would be a slow night for a disco, but the Big Eden was just about packed. Lights shown around us in every color except white, but the room still looked dark. My faded blue jeans looked fluorescent; my shoes, faded to a dark gray by years of sunshine, looked almost solid black, darker than the day I bought them. Alan's attire took on a special glow, too. For all complexities of the ceiling lights, the floor was not elaborate; a dance floor centered in the room, booth-style tables on either side, a couple of bars on each end of the room, video games and pinball machines in one corner. Somehow, it wasn't as bad as the disco on the ship, if only because I knew I wouldn't dance with Alan. Once we'd checked the place out, Alan started mingling, testing to see if his English could get him some company for the dance floor. While Alan tried out his moves, I tried out the pinball machines. I'm not much for video games, but I'll play a little pinball if it's available; I'm sure I was brainwashed into this predisposition by the song "Pinball Wizard." I put in a one-mark coin and played a game, trying to get a sense of the so-called "body table." During my second game, the right flipper on my machine busted. As the ball careened around all points of the machine, my right flipper sat helplessly, completely unresponsive to the urgings of the index and middle fingers of my right hand. Pinballs to my left could be saved; pinballs to my right bounced off my stationary right flipper, occasionally to my eager left flipper, but usually out of play. I took this as a sign, and gave up any efforts to claim the illusory pinball crown. Reverting to wallflower mode, I found a bar which wasn't open for business on a Sunday night, and moved a barstool around it to face the dance floor. A video screen fell into my sightline as I sat, frustrating me with an eMpTy tV-type station showing some decent videos (Stevie Ray Vaughan's "Couldn't Stand the Weather," for instance) while the speakers blared interchangeable Euro-disco songs so bad they were curling my hair. (Here the Big Eden proved no different from the disco on the Atlas.) The low point for me was Dead or Alive's useless "You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)," with an overmixed, underimaginative synthesized bass-drum part that instantly places the song on my all-time worst list even without considering its other crimes.

From my seat, I kept seeing out of the corner of my left eye someone coming toward me. Several times, I glanced that way and saw no one there. The way the lights work in that corner of the Big Eden disco, a pair of blue ovals would cross each other on the floor, rotating counterclockwise around the disco. When I wasn't concentrating on them, they looked like the shoes of someone walking toward me. The silly lights kept bugging me the whole evening; I never did train myself to ignore them. It was under these visually and audibly hostile surroundings that I began work in earnest on the lyrics of "Melanie Says." I feared the music around me might influence the song in some heinous way, but it turned out to be a non-factor. If anything, the melody of the chorus of "Melanie Says" resembles the bridge of "Sad Songs," the closing number on Lou Reed's Berlin album. (The resemblance is purely accidental - Berlin sounds like NOTHING we heard at the disco that night - and hardly noticeable, so I'm not ripping Lou off.) To be fair, I should mention that Reed's influence didn't end there. The title of my song follows a pattern Lou used on several songs, such as "Candy Says" and "Stephanie Says," recorded with the Velvet Underground, "Caroline Says I" and "Caroline Says II" recorded by Reed as a solo artist, and "Lisa Says," which he recorded with and without the Velvets. ("Caroline Says II" is a rewrite of "Stephanie Says." "Caroline Says I" and "Caroline Says II" both appear on the Berlin album.) If you've been paying any attention at all to the last few chapters, you know who this song is about. Although it's quite wordy, the structure of "Melanie Says" is quite simple. Each verse described opinions or rumours about Melanie, one of the most talked-about members of the Europe class. Each chorus sums up the thought in the verse, then quotes Melanie with a contrary idea. The point is that somewhere in the din of babble and speculation about Melanie, and even beyond some of her own actions, there's a tiny, quiet voice telling you exactly what she's about, if you'll train your ear to listen. I did take some artistic license by speculating about certain facts. Although the verses are all pretty factual, none of the quotes are direct except the first. So I didn't know for certain that Melanie felt unloved by her own parents, like the final chorus says. I felt bold enough to write the song in such specifics for three reasons.

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MELANIE SAYS by Mark Kusenberger every man wants to be with Melanie with her green eyes on her magazine face they like to build a rep just to talk to her but no one takes the trouble to hear what she says many men want their way with Melanie she takes what she likes and that is that just when they think they're going downtown she stops them in their tracks some people think that all the rides are free Melanie says "That's not really me I do not put up with that garbage" Mel is a flirt, and boy, she knows it she can play that game any way you like some people think that's all there is to it they don't see what's behind the poses she can strike no one seems to wonder what she is thinking they like the package, and that's all they want they miss out on her lighter side and her poetry only too happy to keep their callous front some people think that she's the dizzy kind Melanie says "I have a mind and I know how to use it" but now it's time to party time to drink the night away and maybe dance if there's no pain no use feelin' sorry if you're movin' fast enough you need not wait to change lanes Melanie's sister has got it all she's lived a life just like a story told lucky enough to get it right the first time a heck of a yardstick to measure a soul Melanie's tried to step out of the shadow and she's made mistakes along the way somehow she's never felt she's forgiven no one will let her erase yesterday some people think they know what Mel should be Melanie says, "I can only be me but I think that's worth something...." but now it's time to party time to drink the night away and maybe dance if there's no pain no use feelin' sorry if you're movin' fast enough you need not wait to change lanes Mel and her parents do not see eye-to-eye though she wouldn't trade them for any other set but Mom and Dad want another like her sister somehow Mel is trial to accept Mel says "I don't know how else to do it I know I've cheated and I know that I've lied but each mistake from the start to the finish I did it all tryin' to win you to my side" some people think she's fighting to be free Melanie says, "That's not it at all I just want my parents to love me"

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First, I was respecting the limits of my medium. James Taylor says that songwriters can never be absolutely accurate in their songs; the mere act of couching your words in rhyme and melody precludes journalistic integrity. (Never mind post-modernist definitions of reality.) So I felt free to embellish and speculate in order to complete the story. Even if I got a detail or two wrong, I could end up with a good song that could speak to SOMEBODY'S reality. I might as well try, because my "Melanie" in the song wasn't quite Melanie Sullivan anyway. At least that's how I looked at it. (Interesting thoughts, considering how much Wally valued me for, and I quote, "writing the truth.") Second, my confidence in my own understanding people and the events that shape them had grown tremendously during the trip.

Most importantly, my instincts led me to that ending; it practically appeared on the page without my thinking about it. The ending was so powerful, when I realized what I'd written, it made me shiver.

Just before midnight, Alan bored of the club and decided to leave, which was fine with me. Given what I was doing, I didn't really need to be there, although since I'd almost finished "Melanie Says," Big Eden wasn't a complete loss. Alan and I took home some propaganda pamphlets promoting the Big Eden for souvenirs. According to them, Paul McCartney went to Big Eden once. At first, I wondered if McCartney wrote any tunes during his visit. Judging from his picture, I doubt he could write his own name while he was there....

West Berlin has Burger King at midnight; Alan and I picked up sodas there. (Drinks were steep at Big Eden.) We were about to spend our last night at the Hotel Viola, or "Hitchcock's" as we were affectionately calling it. The next night, I'd sleep on a train. If all went well, the following night, I'd sleep at home. As much as I would miss West Berlin, I was ready to do that.

At 1:40, I finished "Melanie Says" and I was pretty pleased with it. For my devotional that night, I read Matthew 18:11-14, the Parable of the Lost Sheep. You probably know this one: there's a shepherd with 100 sheep. When one is lost, he leaves the rest of the flock, searching mountains and valleys until he finds the one missing lamb. When I finished reading, I placed the pocket-sized Gideon Bible on the nightstand next to my journal, my travel alarm, a bottle of aspirin, and the Hard Rock teddy bear.

I wondered how Melanie will react to "Melanie Says."

This trip had been a trip.