Visiting Berlin’s captivating monuments

Berlin and Kölln are two cities founded in the 13th century which merged to become what is known as Berlin today and capital of Europe’s power house, Germany.Believed to have been established for geographic and mercantile reasons, as it commanded a natural east-west trade route over the Spree River, Berlin is said to have got […]

Berlin and Kölln are two cities founded in the 13th century which merged to become what is known as Berlin today and capital of Europe’s power house, Germany.
Believed to have been established for geographic and mercantile reasons, as it commanded a natural east-west trade route over the Spree River, Berlin is said to have got its name from the animal, ‘bear’. Hence, the many sculpted defiant-looking bears standing on their hind legs which adorn the city from different angles and plains.
Berlin, one of Germany’s 16 states with a population of 3.5 million people, is also the country’s largest city and its second most populous city. Located in north-eastern Germany on the River Spree, it is the centre of the Berlin-Brandenburg Metropolitan Region.
Tracing its history back to being capital of the Margraviate of Brandenburg (1417), the Kingdom of Prussia (1701–1918), the German Empire (1871–1918), the Weimar Republic (1919–33) and the Third Reich from 1933–45, the city still holds clear and dear memories of those times.
The ancient city is often described as a world city of culture, politics, media, and science, and our reporter was stunned by it sheer beauty and historical significance.

The Führerbunker
What is visible to visitors today is an ordinary looking street with high-rise buildings sitting atop what used to be an unthinkable destination for many in the Adolf Hitler times.  
The Führerbunker translated as ‘Leader’s bunker’ was an air-raid shelter located near the Reich Chancellery in Berlin, Germany and was part of a subterranean bunker complex constructed in two phases which were completed in 1936 and 1944.
It was the last of the Führer headquarters used by Hitler who resided in it from January 16 1945 before it became the centre of the Nazi regime until the last week of World War II in Europe.
Information posted on a board at the sight stated that after the war both the old and new Chancellery buildings were levelled by the Soviets. Despite some attempts at demolition, the underground complex remained largely undisturbed until 1988–89.
During reconstruction of that area of Berlin, the sections of the old bunker complex that were excavated were for the most part destroyed. The site remained unmarked until 2006, when a small plaque with a schematic was installed. Some corridors of the bunker still exists, but are sealed off from the public.

The Berlin Wall
What readily resonates in the mind of a lot of people when conversing about Berlin, is the Berlin Wall which in 1986, served as canvass to over 100 artists who made brilliant and colourful mural, stretching kilometres as far as the eyes could see.
Although it no longer exists, it still serves as a vivid reminder of history which fell on 9th  November1989.
Existing as a barrier between 1961 and 1990, it completely cut off West Berlin from surrounding East Germany and from East Berlin, until it was opened in 1989.
The barrier, according to a tourist guide, included guard towers placed along large concrete walls, which circumscribed a wide area (later known as the “death strip”) that contained anti-vehicle trenches, “fakir beds” and other defences.
It was believed in the Eastern Bloc that the wall was erected to protect its population from fascist elements conspiring to prevent the “will of the people” in building a socialist state in East Germany. But records state that, the Wall served to prevent the massive emigration and defection that marked East Germany and the communist Eastern Bloc during the post-World War II period.
Referred to in several terms, including ‘Iron Curtain’ and ‘Wall of shame,’ tourists get to ‘interact’ with the structure and leave with bits and pieces of it sold as souvenirs.

Holocaust memorial
Dedicated to the memory of Jews who lost their lives in the holocaust, the memorial is designed to produce an uneasy, confusing atmosphere, and the whole sculpture aims to represent a supposedly ordered system that has lost touch with human reason.
A 2005 copy of the Foundation for the Memorial’s official English tourist pamphlet, however, states that the design represents a radical approach to the traditional concept of a memorial, partly because Eisenman, the architect who worked on the project, did not use any symbolism. However, the impression for tourists is that it resembles a cemetery.
Unable to gain access into the information centre-cum museum, located on the site, our reporter read from the notice board the structure of the monument.
It begins with a timeline that lays out the history of the Final Solution, from when the National Socialists took power in 1933 through the murder of 500,000 Soviet Jews in 1941.
The rest of the exhibition is divided into four rooms dedicated to personal aspects of the tragedy, e.g. the individual families or the letters thrown from the trains that transported them to the death camps.
The Room of Families focuses on the fates of 15 specific Jewish families. In the Room of Names, names of all known Jewish Holocaust victims obtained from Israel’s Yad Vashem memorial which were read out loud. Each chamber contains visual reminders of the columns above: rectangular benches, horizontal floor markers and vertical illuminations.

PotsdamerPlatz
PotsdamerPlatz is one of Berlin’s important public square and traffic intersection in its city centre, down the road from the famous Brandenburg Gate and the Reichstag.
Once a major intersection hub in Europe, it suffered the devastation of the Second World War and was deserted during the Cold War era when the Berlin Wall bisected its former location.
Its history is traced to 29 October 1685, when the ‘Tolerance Edict of Potsdam’ was signed, following permission granted by Frederick William, Elector of Brandenburg-Prussia from 1640 to 1688, for large numbers of religious refugees, including Jews from Austria and Huguenots expelled from France, to settle on his territory.
According to records available to tourists, between 1735 and ‘37, after Friedrichstadt’s expansion was complete, an excise wall, initially made from a wooden palisade at 17 km long and 4.2 m high, was erected around Berlin’s new perimeter and later replaced with a brick and stone wall, pierced by 14 gates (later increased to 18), where roads entered the city. At this point, taxes were imposed on commodities passing through, especially meat and flour.
With the Brandenburg Gate, holding its own, another road that later became more important started out in the Middle Ages as a lane running out from Berlin to the hamlet of Schöneberg.
It is said to have later developed into part of a trading route running right across Europe from Paris to St. Petersburg via Aachen, Berlin and Königsberg which Elector Frederick William made it his route of choice to Potsdam, the location of his palace in 1660.
Daily, a stagecoach is recorded to have plied Berlin and Potsdam beginning in 1754, regardless of its poor state. Frederick II after ascending the throne built a new palace, the Sanssouci, at Potsdam between 1744 and ‘47, followed by the new palace between 1763 to 69.
The road was modified to be fit for a King, and his household which made it Prussia’s first all-weather road before it became PotsdamerStrasse; its point of entry into Berlin through the customs wall. It later metamorphosed into the Potsdamer Tor (Potsdam Gate) around which PotsdamerPlatz was to develop.
Today, it’s a beehive of architecture, high rise buildings, lighting and side attractions amongst others; all contending for the attention of visitors and tourists.

The Museum Island
Home to five of Berlin’s museum houses built from 1830 to 1930, the Museum Island is situated in the River Spree and is a UNESCO World Heritage site.
Currently undergoing restoration and renovation, it was an interesting afternoon for our reporter when she had lunch at the Restaurant Jolly just beneath Angela Merkel’s residence which is  adjacent to one of the museums, Pergamon.
With only two police officers guarding the premises, passersby posed to take photos of the premises as they also asked questions on the history of the vicinity.
Originally a residential area, dedicated to “art and science” by King Frederick William IV of Prussia in 1841, the island was extended under succeeding Prussian kings. After 1918, it became a public foundation and are currently maintained by the Berlin State Museums branch of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation.
Another symbol of Berlin located on the Island is the Berlin Cathedral which is adjacent to the Lustgarten. It was Emperor William II’s ambitious attempt to build a protestant version of Rome’s St. Peter’s Basilica.
There are also ruins of houses from some of the earlier Prussian royal families as well as St. Hedwig’s Cathedral, Berlin’s Roman Catholic cathedral.
According to a tour guide, a first exhibition hall was erected in 1797 at the suggestion of the archaeologist Aloys Hirt and in 1822, Schinkel designed the plans for the Altes Museum to house the royal Antikensammlung, the arrangement of the collection was overseen by Wilhelm von Humboldt.
It was in the 1990s that a consensus came up for buildings on the Island to be restored with intentions by Peter-Klaus Schuster to turn the Island into a Louvre on the Spree. Today it’s a UNESCO World Heritage site.
Brochures on the Island informed that the contents of the museums were decided on as follows: The Pergamon, with the Greek altar that gives it its name, retained much of its collection and was defined as a museum of ancient architecture.
The Neues Museum presented archaeological objects as well as Egyptian and Etruscan sculptures, including the renowned bust of Queen Nefertiti.
The Altes Museum, the oldest on the island, displayed Greek and Roman art objects on its first floor and hold exhibitions on its second floor.
The Bode Museum’s paintings went from Late Byzantine to 1800. And, for now, the Alte National Gallery, when reopened will cover the 19th century.
Reconstructions are expected to be completed by 2020 after which the Gemäldegalerie’s painting collection will be transferred to the Bode, and a new annex, and Museum Island will present all art from the ancient civilizations through 1900.
The James Simon Gallery, a $94 million visitors’ centre designed by the British architect David Chipperfield, is being built beside the Neues Museum. It will in turn be linked to the Neues, Altes, Pergamon and Bode Museums by an underground passageway decorated with archaeological objects.
The southern section of the island, south of Gertraudenstraße, is commonly referred to as Fischerinsel (Fisher Island) and is the site of a high-rise apartment development built when Mitte was part of East Berlin.

Brandenburg gate
The Brandenburg Gate is a beehive of activities happening all at the same time as tourists throng the an 18th century neoclassical triumphal arch mercilessly.
One of Berlin’s most popular monuments, the gate is the monumental entry to Unter den Linden, the renowned boulevard of linden trees, which formerly led directly to the city palace of the Prussian monarchs.
Commissioned by King Frederick William II of Prussia as a sign of peace and built by Carl Gotthard Langhans from 1788 to 1791 it was a casualty of World War II, but was fully restored from 2000 to 2002 by the Berlin Monument Conservation Foundation.
With foundations of the Berlin Wall still visible on the roads surrounding it, the Gate during the post-war Partition of Germany, was isolated and inaccessible immediately next to the Berlin Wall.
The Brandenburg Gate is often a site for major historical events and is today considered a symbol of the tumultuous history of Europe and Germany, but also of European unity and peace.
“In the time of Frederick William (1688), shortly after the 30 years war and a century before the gate was constructed, Berlin was a small walled city within a star fort with several named gates: Spandauer Tor, St. Georgen Tor, Stralower Tor, Cöpenicker Tor, Neues Tor, and Leipziger Tor (see map). Relative peace, a policy of religious tolerance, and status as capital of the Kingdom of Prussia facilitated the growth of the city,” tour guides revealed.
Made up of 12 Doric columns, six to each side, forming five passageways, atop the gate is the Quadriga, a chariot drawn by four horses. The new gate originally named ‘Peace Gate’ has played different political roles in German history including party symbol for the Nazis.
When the Revolutions of 1989 occurred and the Wall fell, the gate symbolized freedom and the desire to unify the city of Berlin.
On 21 December 2000, the Brandenburg Gate was privately refurbished at a cost of six million Euros.

Television tower
For many who haven’t visited the German capital but know Paris’ Eiffel Tower, Berlin’s The Fernsehturm (TV tower) at Alexanderplatz is its synonym.
One of the city’s tallest structures, it stands visible from almost all points of Berlin at 368 m (1,207 ft).
Built in 1969, tourists get a bird’s eye view from its 204 m (669 ft) high observation floor. From this spot visitors can view the Karl-Marx-Allee heads east, an avenue lined by monumental residential buildings, designed in the Socialist Classicism style.
Adjacent to this area is the Rotes Rathaus (City Hall), with its distinctive red-brick architecture. In front of it is the Neptunbrunnen, a fountain featuring a mythological group of Tritons, personifications of the four main Prussian rivers with Neptune on top of it.
Initially intended to be 365 metres (1,198 ft), it was elevated to 368 metres (1,207 ft) after the installation of a new antenna in the 1990s.
The tower is Europe’s fourth tallest freestanding structure, after Moscow’s Ostankino Tower, the Kiev TV Tower and the Riga Radio and TV Tower.
At 203 metres (666ft) it has a revolving restaurant and a visitor platform which is also called the panoramic floor in the middle of the sphere and on a clear day, above the ground, visibility can reach 42 kilometres (26 miles).
The Telecafé restaurant, rotates once every 30 minutes, as against the initial plan for a once an hour rotation. The speed according to a tour guide was later doubled following the tower’s late 1990s renovation.
Visitors get a thrill of the height from inside the two lifts in the shaft that shuttle them up to the sphere of the tower within 40 seconds, with a 986 staircase lurking around.
The TV tower is said to have had several architects at various stages with construction beginning on August 4, 1965 and test broadcasts beginning four years later.
Receiving no less than a million visitors annually, the tiled stainless steel dome of the edifice, ‘Pope’s Revenge’, when the sun shines produces a crucifix like reflection. This is just as much a wow for guests as its 40 second ride up its heights.

Charlottenburg Palace
Schloss Charlottenburg is the largest existing palace in Berlin, originally commissioned by Sophie Charlotte, the wife of Friedrich III, Elector of Brandenburg in what was then the village of Lietzow.
First named Lietzenburg, it was designed baroque style by Johann Arnold Nering consisting of one wing which later evolved into 2 ½ storeys with a central cupola.
Currently undergoing renovation, the façade was decorated with Corinthian pilasters with a cornice on which statues sat at the top. Iconic for its gardens, the premises serves as tourist haven and also venue for movie shoots, important meetings of senior officials, amongst others.
One gets a feeling that it’s the Palace of Versailles which isn’t completely out of place as King Friedrich I in Prussia built this in the likeness of Versailles after he had studied its architecture.
Named in memory of his wife Sophie Charlotte, who is still celebrated in today’s Germany after her death in 1705, an Orangery was built to overwinter rare plants. In the summer, when over 500 orange, citrus and sour orange trees decorated the baroque garden, the Orangery was often the gorgeous scene of courtly festivities.
Records state that the palace was badly damaged in 1943 during the Second World War. In 1951, the war-damaged Stadtschloss in East Berlin was demolished and, as the damage to Charlottenburg was at least as serious, it was feared that it would also be demolished.
However, following the efforts of MargareteKühn, the Director of the State Palaces and Gardens, it was rebuilt to its former condition, with gigantic modern ceiling paintings by Hann Trier.
From 2004 till early 2006, Charlottenburg Palace was the seat of the President of Germany, whilst Schloss Bellevue was being renovated.
Readily assessable to all who come by, the Mausoleum of Queen Luise who reigned with her husband, Friedrich Wilhelm III, its garden Tea house, Belvedere, and swans in the artificial lake beyond are an awesome encounter especially as the environment changes in nature in anticipation of the coming winter months.

Victory Column
Designed by Anton von Werner, Berlin’s 67 meter high Victory Column was constructed on a base of polished red granite, supported on a hall of pillars with a glass mosaic.
Consisting four solid blocks of sandstone, three of which are decorated by cannon barrels captured from the enemies in war, a fourth ring decorated with golden garlands was added in 1938–39 as the whole monument has been relocated.
According to a tour guide, the relief decoration was removed at the request of the French forces in 1945, probably to prevent the Germans from being reminded of former victories – especially the defeat of the French in 1871. It was restored for the 750th anniversary of Berlin in 1987 by the French president at that time, François Mitterrand. However, several sections remain in France.
The foundation is decorated with four bronze reliefs showing the three wars and the victorious marching of the troops into Berlin.
Probably one of the most mobile monuments of the world, the Victory Column, according to tour guides, originally stood in Königsplatz (now Platz der Republik), at the end of the Siegesallee (Victory Avenue).
At the same time, the information states that the column was augmented by another 7.5 metres, giving it its present height of 66.89 metres. The monument survived World War II without much damage. The relocation of the monument probably saved it from destruction, as its old site – in front of the Reichstag, at exactly 1500 metres, from the proposed new north-south triumphal way of the Nazis in line with the Imperial Victory Avenue in the Tiergarten – was destroyed by American air raids in 1945. Without a British-American veto, the French would have dynamited the monument after the war.
Bordered around by a street circle, the column is also accessible to pedestrians through four tunnels built in 1941 to plans by Albert Speer, who likewise increased the width of the road between it and the Brandenburg Gate and designed the new Germania which was scheduled for construction after the victory obtained in the war.
Via a steep spiral staircase of 285 steps, the physically fit may, for a fee, climb almost to the top of the column, to just under the statue and take in the spectacular views over the Tiergarten including the Soviet War Memorial, 1946, in line with the Nazi proposed north-south triumphal way by Speer and Adolf Hitler.
The golden angel atop the column often called, ‘Golden Elise’ was featured in the music video to U2’s 1993 ‘Stay (Faraway, So Close!)’ and inspired Paul van Dyk’s 1998 trance music hit, “For an Angel”; the column was also featured in his music video during the Love Parade in 1998. The Victory Column is meant to represents the girl’s absent father, the episode’s main criminal and multinational terrorist, Angel’s Feathers.