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Hi everybody it's Bruce here with Travelling
with Bruce today's video is a memory of
mine regarding the country of Germany
the city of Berlin and a number of other
unique things about Germany from my
perspective to give you folks a bit of a
background here
sorry if I'm rambling on because a lot
of memories are flooding back to me
right now
it's 2017 almost 2018 now I've just
turned 62 years old I was born in Canada
in 1955 and my father in 1959 when I was
four and a half five years old was a
member of the Canadian Armed Forces
he had immigrated into Canada in 1952
from Germany he'd grown up in Lithuania
and during the Second World War he was a
young guy teenager when the war
was over he was 15 and a half 16 years
old and he was able to immigrate to
Canada seven years after the war was
over at the age of 22 came to Sudbury
Ontario was a miner and mining nickel
and did that for a couple of years for
the money then figured out that if he
returned to his roots which was a
musician he could make more money
playing music and the amazing part about
it was he could join the Canadian Army
as a musician and he ended up in the RCD
Royal dragoons in the military band and
he was a top-notch musician and was good
enough to join and made more money
playing music in the army and with
benefits then he was as a miner in Sudbury
very unbelievable anyway he joined the
army I believe about 1956 or so 57 and by
59 they found out on New Year's Eve
night I guess so New Year's Eve 1958
getting ready for 59 they found out
surprise surprise our entire brigade is
being transferred to Germany to Zoest
and it's a two-year deal from 59 to 61
and not only are the the members of the
Armed Forces going but the families as
well and here are my mom and dad both
coming over from Germany my mother
joined my father a year after he got
here and they had two kids myself and my
sister and they were being transferred
back to Germany where my parents came
from with the army all paid by the army
and they were to be paid in Canadian
dollars in Germany where you could get
four German marks for each Canadian
dollar which made you a very wealthy
person in Germany because the Germans
were still struggling to get by in the
late 50s after the war effort and all
the reparations and that type of thing
now 1959 comes along and we went across
the Atlantic on a ship and and we
ended up in Zoest Germany living in
a house and I bet you my father and my
mother were maybe a hundred kilometers
away from where they had emigrated from
to come to Canada so what a turnaround
they were able to visit with their
relatives again their brothers and
sisters their aunts and uncles and their
friends returning from Canada where they
had not seen my mother had not seen her
mother and father for six years six
seven years and her parents had never
met me their grandchildren so this was a
gift from heaven to to be able to do
this and Here I am as a five-year-old
oblivious oblivious to what's really
going on the reason we're
in Germany is because my father's in the
army and under the NATO commitments
Canada was bringing in divisions of
troops to potentially guard against the
red invasion from the Soviet Union
Germany was divided into East Germany
and West Germany we're in West Germany
we are 25 kilometers if that maybe 40
kilometers away from the front the East
German front I as a child
knew nothing couldn't have cared less my
parents were completely comfortable with
the entire situation because they knew
that the Americans were there the Brits
were there the French were there and the
Soviets were in no mood to have another
world war over Germany that had been
settled a long time ago
however within a year or so guess what
happens we were supposed to be there for
two years and then come back to Canada
in 61 and sure enough in 61 what
happens the Soviet Union and the
East Germans put up the Berlin wall and
this changed everything
my parents had talked to me about
Germany over the years the Second World
War over the years and here was another
chapter in the continuing saga of East
versus West the Berlin wall goes up
overnight unannounced and all forces of
the Allies all Allied forces are on
worldwide alert overnight and my father
is confined to base and the whole mood
of Germany changes instantly all of us
army brats and our families everything
changed it became quite somber quite
tense and a lot of people were worried
about what might happen in the next few
weeks we'd already survived the Cuban
Missile Crisis earlier now this the
Berlin wall going up and the tanks were
being brought out
and along with artillery and everything
else and all my goodness
were we going to have World War
three on our hands and were we going to
be on the frontlines we wondered if we
were going to be bugged out at a
moment's notice by the Canadian Army and
they're gonna get the wives and children
out of there and sent us back to maybe
England and eventually back to Canada
everything was up in the air unless you were
there you have no idea you couldn't know
and I have not seen a Hollywood movie
ever depict the tension and the stress
that families of army personnel suffered
or were going through when this type of
crisis happened I've seen documentary
after documentary about the Berlin Wall
and the Cuban Missile Crisis and the
east-west tensions between the Soviets
and the Americans and all East Germany
West Germany all that stuff
tens of tens if not hundreds of
documentaries have been done movies have
been done but this story was a unique to
us and how we felt on the ground of
course my parents felt terrible for all
the relatives brothers and sisters who
would be stuck there if war did break
out again because we would get out my sister
and I my mother we'd get out most likely
unless it was a surprise launch attack
of some kind and everybody was killed in
a nuclear annihilation but all of our
relatives would be stuck in West Germany
and they'd become instant refugees and
if it got bad I mean it was just there
was so much tension you have no idea if
you're under well if you're my age are
younger first of all you probably just
don't know if you're 40 years of age or
younger you haven't got a clue what this
was about what it was like
the Soviet Union as it was disintegrated
back in the Reagan era in the George
Bush era and so you just don't know
the tension that surrounded this whole
thing but East Germany West Germany oh
my god what a tension-filled situation
now to connect this to Berlin because I
want to connect this story to Berlin
that's where the wall went up Berlin is
a city that's located
in what was East Germany the Soviets
captured Berlin at the end of the Second
World War the Americans could not get
there first
the French couldn't get there the Brits
couldn't get there the the Canadians all
the allies had swept through Italy had
swept through France Belgium the
Netherlands and they were headed east
and they had entered Germany along the
Rhine and we're coming into what was at
this point now in the 60s West Germany
they had liberated a lot of German
territory but the Russians were coming
from the east and they had revenge on
their mind and it went right to the
heart of German power which was Berlin
they wanted to be the country to topple
the Berlin government to get Hitler and
shut that thing down and they
concentrated their moves predominantly
towards Berlin and in the meantime the
Allies they were trying to salvage as
much of Western Europe as humanly
possible because going forward the worry
was as soon as the war is over the two
sides the Russian side the American side
which were theoretically allies in the
Second World War would instantly become
adversaries as soon as the war's over
we aren't pals anymore and lines will be
drawn in Europe and Churchill for the
United Kingdom or De Gaulle for France and
the Canadian Prime Minister plus  Roosevelt
Roosevelt the United States and eventually Truman
they knew they had to get as much of the
territory of Europe under Western Allied
control as possible otherwise it could
be lost to their Soviet Union and
history bore it out because Poland and
Czechoslovakia Hungary Romania Ukraine
all these countries that the Germans had
invaded were all retaken by the Russians
and the Russians didn't give it up they
didn't withdraw their troops back to the
Soviet Union they stayed and they
created puppet communist States all over
the place and eventually they created
East Germany so when the war was
over the Allies did get to Berlin
eventually but the Americans the French
the Brits the Canadians they got to the
western half of Berlin inside what
became East Germany so Berlin the city
of Berlin was an island in the middle of
East Germany separated by about a
hundred and twenty hundred fifty
kilometers of distance to the West
Germany border and the city of Berlin
itself was now carved up into zones
occupation zones and they were
controlled by the Russians the US the
French the Brits and for a number of
years from 1945 until 1960 61 for you
know 15 years Berlin operated as an
island city and Germans could come and
go West Germans could come and go into
West Berlin Easterns could come and go
into East Berlin and they could actually
cross into each side of Berlin there
were a lot of East Germans that worked
in West Germany or West Berlin I should
say and they would just walk over or
bicycle over or take the subway or a bus
and go to work and then at night back to
East Berlin and live there but as time
went on it became obvious that East
Germany was an economic wasteland the
opportunities for doctors lawyers
engineers nurses anyone with skills was
greatly diminished in the East you could
work in West Berlin and make much more
money get paid in Deutsche marks and
then your deutsche mark was much more
valuable than the East German mark and
what began to happen was East Germans
began to leave East Germany and move
into West Berlin or West Germany if they
could get out across that border while
the East German government and the
Soviet Union had to put a stop to divert
the brain drain the talent drain and it
finally came to a head in 1960-61 when
overnight the East German government put
up the wall and so going forward in time
what I didn't realize is a five six
seven year old
who was the significant of all this
because in 60 61 when the wall went
up we were supposed to get ready to go
back to Canada the two year hitch for my
dad was up from 59 to 61 all of a sudden
that was canceled we had to stay another
year and it was decided that after that
that deployments would last three years
at a time so that the next group of
soldiers and families that would come
into Germany into NATO bases in 61 they
would stay until 64 and then from 64 to
67 and so on and we ended up leaving
Germany in 62
so in 1962 my father and mother my
sister and I we took a boat back to
Canada and returned back to to Canada
and left our others behind but in 62
things had settled down greatly the wall
was was now up and tensions had been
lessened our forces weren't on alert
anymore but going forward I heard all my
life from age 7 8 9 10 all the way
through my teenage years 20s and 30s
when my parents and their friends got
together who were of course other
Europeans who went through the war we
heard stories about the Soviets we heard
stories about the Germans we heard
stories about the Polish and then of
course we would hear stories about East
Germany versus West Germany because we
too had relatives that were stuck in the
East even after the war certain members
of my family my fathers family my mother's
family were not convinced by the Western
European friends and relatives to get
the hell out of the Eastern Europe they
thought naw everything will be fine
it'll all settle down and it will all
eventually be reunited and we'll all be
fine again little did all of us know and
particularly those in the East that it
wouldn't be until 1989 that there would
be reunification most of the relatives
had passed away of old age by that point
or were quite elderly and certainly
their offspring had never known the West
like of course we did anyway so I had
heard all of these stories about the
east and the west and Berlin and
so when the opportunity presented itself
in
2008 for me to go to Berlin for the
first time I went and I took my daughter
with me who was just turning 20 at the
time and I got to see Berlin in person
for the very first time in 2008 I was
able to return again in 2015 for three
visits in one year and I was able to see
Berlin with my wife first hand for a
much longer period of time and I so
enjoyed it and I was so fascinated and
curious about what part of Berlin was
East Berlin
what part of Berlin was West Berlin and
I want to see the difference through my
own eyes for myself having heard all of
the stories though my
relatives and my parents all those years
ago unfortunately my father passed away
in 2000 and he never he and I never got
to talk about this trip he had long been
gone when I finally got to go but I
remembered a lot of his stories and
words of the times and the and how
things have changed and what had
happened and of course from his
perspective as a member of the Canadian
Army now you know talk about full circle
he was a refugee in the Second World War
and he was a member of the Canadian
Armed Forces in 59 60 61 62 unbelievable
so that is a bit of a memory situation
for me in Berlin and Germany as a whole
I really didn't realize until I grew up
and even in the last few years I really
it didn't hit me how linked I am to so
much of what has happened in Germany
over all those years through the Second
World War and thereafter and so when I
was able to visit Berlin three times in
2015 and the last time I was in Berlin
on my own for two-and-a-half weeks I had
no children to worry about I didn't have to
worry about my wife's wants needs and
desires I was in an apartment I had a
bike I had a transit pass and I had
Berlin all to myself for two-and-a-half
weeks to discover the city and its
history
what a
gift this was none of my friends that
I've grown up with and known an adult
life have ever had this situation
happened to them where they could for
two and a half weeks be alone in a
foreign city and just look around all
you want I know friends of mine who had
the wonderful one or two week vacations
in Europe and they would see two or
three countries and two or three or four
or five cities but to be in one and this
particular city
what a treat this was and to see the
sights of East Berlin like potsdamer
platz and the Berlin Wall what's left of
it and the the former East Berlin
apartment blocks Stalin Ali Karl Marx
Ali the big TV tower was such a unique
thing for me to see they call that the
Fernsehturm TV tower I just call it
the big tower it's 110 stories tall the tallest
structure in Germany I use it as an
observation point I knew where I was in
the city when I could find that tower places
like treptower park where the Soviet War
Memorial is 80,000 Soviet soldiers died
taking Berlin and tens of thousands of
their bodies are there it's kind of like
the Arlington National Cemetery for the
Russians on foreign soil however to have
seen museum Island again that was in
East Berlin after the war was over today
it's beautiful the Brandenburg Gate
where Reagan made his famous speech tear
down this wall I saw the old West
Germany City Hall where President
Kennedy said Ich Bein ein Berliner
there's a plaque there to that speech
he died five months after making that
speech in Dallas that was really
something to see that and how the
Germans revere him and Reagan the Reichstag building where the Parliament of
the Germany is held today I got to see
it as well the various parks
the
Spree River and of course then I got
to experience modern Berlin with the
Sony Center and all the changes that
have been done I was amazed from just
2008 until 2015 the changes in the
Berlin Wall area through Berlin that had
been made in those seven years the
build-out is unbelievable cranes
everywhere construction cranes just
everywhere in Berlin it's a dynamic
place if you ever ever think of taking a
holiday and you just don't know where to
go and you want to see something unique
get over to Berlin Germany and check
this city out whether you're a German
background or not whether you know
anything about the Second World War or
not the Cold War or not just go it will
be a revelation for you to see such an
incredible place with such unbelievable
history we're talking history from the
1100s and forward I'm only talking to
you today about history from the 1950s
until 2015 Berlin is so much older than
that has so much more to show you the
museums are endless boat tours
everywhere it's perfect for cycling you
just rent a bike and go the transit
system is world-class no North
American city can hold a candle to the
transportation systems in Germany and
particularly Berlin no North American
city would ever be able to spend the
kind of money that Germany spends on
their systems it's it's unbelievable
infrastructure you want to see
infrastructure go to Berlin Germany and
see how it's done
and then tell your politicians back home
to get off their butts and do it right
because boy do the Germans know what
they're doing phenomenal place
phenomenal memories I can't recommend it
more highly I can't wait to go back
people say to me well Bruce you've been
to Berlin three four times why don't you
see some other German cities and I'm
going yeah I'd love to but I haven't
seen all of Berlin yet
but I will I will see Munich I will see
Frankfurt I will see other cities in
more detail when I get the chance but
Berlin is a place you want to go on your
own or with your significant other
or with your kids you can certainly do
that as well
the area around Berlin is amazing and of
course the electric train system that
the Germans have high-speed trains Wow
what a treat that is to get one or ride
in one of those systems anyway this has
gone on long enough
we're at 20 to 23 minutes I got to get
off thanks for listening to this long
memory deal about Berlin if you like my
video I don't know if you would but if
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the next story that I have for you on
Travelling with Bruce take care
everybody bye bye
