Not only tourists, but also many Berliners find it hard today to locate where exactly the Berlin Wall stood. After its fall, German authorities tried to make its traces disappear. The big construction work that took place changed the sight of the previously uninhabited, minefield areas round the wall at the eastern part of the city.
On the occasion of the 15th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the second Reportage Without Frontiers documentary presents the efforts of a small group of people to preserve the traces of the wall, as a part of German history.
Despite all efforts to forget about it, the wall still exists in people's minds and still divides Germany in two: the "Ossies" (former Eastern residents) and the "Wessies" (Westerners). The "Ossies" complain about the arrogance the "Wessies" displayed as winners, and the latter ones accuse their East German "brothers" of holding on to their old communist habits: no will to work and help them lift the weight of the union.
So, 15 years later, a wave of nostalgia for the wall and the old German Democratic Republic appears. The former East German Communist Party won over 30% of votes in the recent elections at the eastern states and many Germans openly say today that they would prefer for the wall to have never fallen. The program's camera was at the "East Zone" bar in east Berlin, that is decorated with pictures of - communist leader - Eric Honaker. It also serves revolutionary drinks and a type of East German Coca Cola that is again in fashion. At the "Nostalgia" parties, impersonators of former communist leaders are treated with enthusiasm and all transactions take place with old East German marc, that are today out of circulation.
A factor that increased the gap between the two germanies and made East Germans feel disadvantaged against West Germans, were the revelations about Stasi, the famous East German secret service, with which many East Germans cooperated. The most shocking story is that of Vera Wollenberger, a popular East German dissident that had been expelled to the west with her husband and three children. Mrs. Wollenberger, who became a member of parliament after the union, led the effort to open the Stasi records, and was the first one to study her own: it was only then that she understood that the one who had been betraying her was her husband!
The documentary features interviews with Vera Wollenberger, and an exclusive and rare interview with her ex-husband, Knaud Wollenberger...
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