'Wall Disneyland' divides Berlin

Fifteen years after the Berlin Wall came crashing down, the BBC's Ray Furlong finds heated debate is now raging in the German capital over what to do with the city's unique wall heritage.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On 9 November 1989, thousands of East Germans began streaming west as parts of the massive concrete barrier were first torn down - a moment that marked the end of the Cold War.


The new section of the wall will be torn down later this year

In the following weeks and months, the wall was almost completely pulled down and few tears were shed for the graffiti-stained, reinforced slabs of concrete that formerly divided a city and split a nation in two.

Fifteen years on, there's a campaign to get the remains put on the UNESCO world heritage list - while at Checkpoint Charlie, a businesswoman has actually rebuilt part of the wall as a tourist attraction.

That new wall has stirred emotions over how best to commemorate Berlin's Cold War history.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/3995379.stm

I was just in Berlin and there is plenty of wall left standing for tourists who care to look for it. Especially on Bernauerstrasse.

There is also a free (donations encouraged) wall museum on Bernauerstrasse in the former east Berlin. I certainly don't see any need for a rebuilt fake wall.

Berlin is saddled with the fascinating and tragic legacy of having been the sandbox in which superpowers played their games. The horror of what foreign powers are willing to put humanbeings through is still evident and raw 15 years later.

This private "museum" at the former Checkpoint Charlie is a real problem for Berlin. It is a fake tacky installation neither with historic accuracy nor the modesty expected of a memorial. The crosses, erected without even asking the families of the victims, are beyond tasteless.

A fake wall, with fake crosses, in front of a fake museum, guarded by fake US Soldiers and fake GDR soldiers; and that right next to the Holocaust Memorial :grr:

Many tourists don't know that however, and the "official" memorial at the Bernauer Straße is often ignored by them. Weren't it for the conservative spin about "upright private citizens preserving the memory of the murderous communistic regime and the wall", this tourist trap would have been removed long ago.