The Best of Berlin “What’s your favorite city in Europe?” That was the question I asked almost every local I came in contact with while traveling around Europe. And I kept getting the same answer: Berlin. The funny thing was most couldn’t really explain why they loved the city.
32 ▶ spring 2015
So I set off for Berlin, determined to figure out what made it so special. I launched myself like a juggernaut all over the city, riffling through museums, sizing up graffiti, and experiencing the city’s famous Turkish kebab for myself. But nothing I saw or experienced quite explained Berlin’s attraction. My last night in Berlin, I watched a movie being projected on a sleek modern building downtown. The film, a documentary about the Berlin Wall, showed footage of a crowd chanting and cheering as bulldozers tore down
the hunk of cement that had divided the city for so long. I looked over and realized tears were streaming down my friend’s face. Suddenly I understood what drew people to the city: Berlin is free. The city has the feeling of a bird let out of its cage, finally free to soar. Berliners knew oppression, knew what it felt like for their homes and families to be torn apart. They’d seen severe restrictions and brutality as people died trying to escape from East Berlin to West Berlin. When the wall was torn down, the city reveled
Photo by Werner Kunz
By Kate Zeller