November 9th, 1989.
For the first time in decades, East German
citizens could cross into West Berlin without
any border controls.
Katrin Hattenhauer was there.
She walked over this bridge and celebrated
her 21st birthday in West Berlin, on Nov 10th.
A few hours earlier, it would have been unthinkable.
For 41 years, Germany was a divided country.
From 1961 until 1989, a wall even split Berlin
in two.
The western half was part of democratic West
Germany.
The eastern half belonged to communist East
Germany.
And it guarded its borders zealously.
Those who tried to escape were arrested – or
shot.
The Stasi, East Germany’s secret police,
kept dissidents under surveillance – even
recruiting their friends and relatives as
informants.
Dissenters were often jailed.
But that didn’t stop Katrin Hattenhauer.
As a student in Leipzig, she actively opposed
the East German regime.
She took part in the  weekly prayer
for peace, and demonstrations which aimed
to spark a peaceful revolution in East Germany.
At a protest in September of 1989, Katrin
Hattenhauer held up a banner which read:
"For a free country with free people”.
A week after that demonstration, Katrin Hattenhauer
was arrested.
She faced up to ten years in jail.
After five weeks in solitary confinement,
she was released.
She had been released, but couldn’t leave
Leipzig and was being watched.
So she fled over her building’s rooftop
and went to East Berlin.
Katrin Hattenhauer‘s pre-birthday celebrations
took her to an unexpected place – West Berlin,
for the very first time.
The whole city was celebrating the opening of  the border.
While Katrin Hattenhauer 
was in jail,
many  East German dissidents campaigned for her
release.
At the Gethsemane Church in East Berlin, they held vigils for her --
as a symbol of peaceful protest.
At the daily service, Katrin Hattenhauer sometimes leads the prayer for political prisoners:
like she once was.
Today she’s an artist, and explores themes
like freedom and courage.
And she’s working on a doctoral dissertation
about what drives activists.
