Where my October went

This week marks the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. November 9th, 1989 is a pretty important date for me personally since the fall of the wall and the opening of East Germany meant that my mission call to Switzerland was changed to the Dresden mission. It shaped my understanding of German culture and has had a profound impact on the course of my professional development. In the past few years it has become a marker to me of how old I have gotten as my students were born closer and closer to 1989, and their memories of the fall become more and more vague. This year a majority of my students were born after the wall fell and the event that plays a central role in my personal identity might as well be ancient history to them.

At the beginning of the semester I had a conversation with Stephan-- a local high school German teacher who also served in Dresden with me and shares my sense of identity with Wende-Germany-- that we really should do something to commemorate the 20th anniversary. It would help both of our programs and raise the profile of German studies in Utah, and give us a chance to share our experiences. Both of us think big and of course things quickly snowballed until they were nearly out of control. But in the end I think we put on a nice event. I had to coordinate for all of the space at UVU, organize the schedule, arrange for prizes and "schwag" for the participating students. Here are a few pictures of the event. We built a replica wall out of cardboard posters. There were over 150 entrants making a wall nearly 200 yards long. we filled up the Hall of flags at School. I was really pleased with the art work. Some of the students copied things that had appeared on the wall, like this series of weird faces. Others did other historical or political messages in a style that might have appeared on the wall. Others were completely creative.
I like the picture of a butterfly through a hole in the bricks that the German Club president did--thanks Cindy.





I invited the Honorary German Consulate, Charles Dahlquist to participate in our event, and he was very helpful. He provided us with cases worth of material to give away to the students--Over one hundred t-shirts, cases of water bottles, magazines, pens, pins, markers, etc. This necessitated the creation of a "Wheel of Schwag" that we used to give it all away fairly.
It was a lot of fun and my student volunteers seemed to be enjoying themselves. The prizes were a big hit with the students. Over all the event was a success. We had over 500 high school and junior high students in attendance, and things got a little chaotic from time to time. But every one had a good time. KUER radio came and interviewed me, and I made the hourly news, so I only have about 14:30 left of my 15 minutes of fame
This is Mr. Dahlquist and I at the wall. His remarks were very nice and well-thought-out. I was glad that he was able to find time to come and participate.

We had other activities as well. We had a number of presentations given by students and a woman who grew up in the east. She told of life in east Germany and brought back memories of FDJ, the Pioniere, and other youth organizations. It was very good. The student presentations were hit and miss. We showed a movie called Prager Botschaft that told about the crises at the German embassy in Prague, 1989, when thousands of east German refugees fled to Czechoslovakia to escape into the west. It went well until the scene that showed a woman's bare shoulders (that's all, I swear!!) as she sat wrapped in a sheet in bed. One of the junior high teachers promptly panicked, made us stop the movie and wanted to escort her kids out of the theater until we talked her down from the ledge.

Maybe my favorite part, however, was my friend's Trabant. The Trabi is THE icon of the communist era in east Germany and both loved and hated by the people who drove them. There are some great jokes about them here-- (only site I could find in english-the Sun's site has some inappropriate links on it though, so beware) He and I both had the opportunity to drive one as missionaries when the members bought new, western cars and didn't know what to do with their trabis. That worked great for about a month when the general authorities heard about it and shut us down. :-( A few years ago, Stephan found a trabi for sale in Minnesota and bought it. Since then he has used it in his teaching, brought it to mission reunions, and had a general good time with it--when he wasn't spending insane amounts of money fixing it.

It was a real pain arranging for permission to get it in the building, and event more trouble ensued when a couple of police officers got all territorial about it, but we brought in his car. It was a real hit. Kids got to have their pictures taken with it. Sit inside, and look under the hood at it's lawnmower-like engine.At one point in the planning, someone asked me if it would fit through a set of double doors. "Um, I don't think that is going to be a problem," was all I could reply. The car actually looks bigger in this picture because it is just kids behind the wheel. I have a picture at work (not an electronic copy, just a printout) of one of my colleagues in it--then you get a real idea of the scale. The sound the motor makes is the best part. It is only a 2-stroke engine, so it sounds something between a snow mobile and a chainsaw. Listen and enjoy