Happy Unity Day!

[Count Zero]

iguana_tonante wrote:

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This is one of the reason I really want to visit Berlin some day. Funny how I keep saying that. I guess I should really do that instead of talking about it.

Yes, you should.

[{ Emilia }]

iguana_tonante wrote:

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I'm our main source of pleasure.

Best. Typo. Ever.

[FPAlpha]

I'm not a german but i've lived here for over 30 years and was a teenager when the wall fell.

I didn't totally get the significance of it all (which teenager is that interested in politics and history?) but as the reports progressed and the situation developed it slowly dawned on how huge this actually was.

The image of people tearing down the wall is to me one of the most powerful expressions of people's desire to live free and i was happy for Germany to finally be reunited (i was only this happy for Germany when they hosted the Football World Cup and people proudly waved their German flags in public.. that was such a nice sight to see but it's a different topic).

horatio83 wrote:

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Germany committed the same error as Russia, it sold East German public assets too quickly which lead to massive corruption, West German industries wanting to crush potential competition in the East and so on.
The rule is simple, regulate before you privatize and in the current austerity climate in which the mantra is 'sell government assets to reduce public debt' it is as actual as it has been two decades ago.

My country would have been better off if it had decided to not merge so quickly and remain separated. I do like the holiday though.

No it wouldn't. GDR's economy was in shambles and was barely able to adequately support its population much less keep up with world economics.. the industry was falling apart and outdated, no state of the art industry to speak of and there were shortages often enough due to mismanagement. Additionally i don't think West German companies were scared of East Germanies industry at all.. they simply saw an opportunity to invest and so they did. It was maybe a harsh lesson for East Germany how capitalism works but change can be painful too.

What would have happened if Germany didn't unite for another 10-20 years? The GDR couldn't modernize on its own because they lacked funds and it may have led to widespread riots and flight from the East to West Germany only hastening the implosion of the GDR.

Once merged the relocation to the West still happened but Germany took it upon itself to rebuild an entire nation which is no small feat and put quite a heavy strain on an otherwise prosperous Germany. Many mistakes were made but there was no blueprint on how to do things, no prior experience.. it was basically improvise as you go along.

It's not finished by far (if it ever can be called finished) and East Germany still has many problems (including new ones that were the result of mismanaged projects) but i think it was the only way how that could have been done.

[iguana_tonante]

{ Mitt Romney } wrote:

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Best. Typo. Ever.

It's! It's! It's our main source of pleasure.

[selina]

I was a teenager back then. I remember that I saw it on the news at home how the wall came down.

[horatio83]

FPAlpha wrote:

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No it wouldn't. GDR's economy was in shambles and was barely able to adequately support its population much less keep up with world economics.. the industry was falling apart and outdated, no state of the art industry to speak of and there were shortages often enough due to mismanagement. Additionally i don't think West German companies were scared of East Germanies industry at all.. they simply saw an opportunity to invest and so they did. It was maybe a harsh lesson for East Germany how capitalism works but change can be painful too.

What would have happened if Germany didn't unite for another 10-20 years? The GDR couldn't modernize on its own because they lacked funds and it may have led to widespread riots and flight from the East to West Germany only hastening the implosion of the GDR.

Once merged the relocation to the West still happened but Germany took it upon itself to rebuild an entire nation which is no small feat and put quite a heavy strain on an otherwise prosperous Germany. Many mistakes were made but there was no blueprint on how to do things, no prior experience.. it was basically improvise as you go along.

It's not finished by far (if it ever can be called finished) and East Germany still has many problems (including new ones that were the result of mismanaged projects) but i think it was the only way how that could have been done.

When the public assets of the former GDR have been privatized it was an utterly corrupt process. Not as horrible as in Russia but still pretty bad. The corruption usually took the form of too small prices being payed for the property, i.e. buyers and the public agency (ironically called Treuhandanstalt, trust agency) conspired against the interests of the public (to get most money from privatization).
Furthermore there were some decent companies who could have survived but their Western competition wanted to crush them and of course they had the usual influence upon the government.

What should have happened? Simply a slower process. Install some protectionist measures in order to save those companies who can be saved, regulate capital markets to allow an inflow of capital but not an outflow and labour markets should of course be totally open as people wanted to unite with their relatives.
The artificially imposed exchange rate of 1:1 was of course also totally nonsensical.

China did not listen to the neoliberal nonsense of the West, slower transformed from socialism to capitalism and that's why the country is on a better path than Russia (of course I am not sanctioning authoritarianism or sweat shop labour).

[Tora Ziyal]

Happy Unity Day!

I remember being really excited when I heard it on the news. (And, btw, all of you talking about being little kids at the time are making me feel really, really old.)

[cooleddie74]

I'm not a German, of course, but I was one month into my second year of German language classes in high school when reunification occurred and our teacher had a special day of celebration to commemorate the event. If I recall, we were treated to genuine (or as close as genuine as you can get with an American woman cooking and making them using the native German recipes) Deutschlander foods.

After a lifetime of school classes that had World and European maps showing two Germanys it was a bit of an adjustment to see the first maps depicting one solid, single and reunified Bundesrepublik, but very pleasant and rewarding. That meant the Cold War was finally ending and a lot of the worst fears of my childhood and teenage years were receding and going away.

[bbailey861]

I was serving in Germany. My wife was preggers - our son was born in Germany in November, a little over two weeks after the wall went down. Coincidentally, my father was also in the military and I was in Germany in 1961 when the wall was started. I was also in Germany serving in 1980 when the 4th generation wall was completed.

[beamMe]

horatio83 wrote:

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When the public assets of the former GDR have been privatized it was an utterly corrupt process. Not as horrible as in Russia but still pretty bad. The corruption usually took the form of too small prices being payed for the property, i.e. buyers and the public agency (ironically called Treuhandanstalt, trust agency) conspired against the interests of the public (to get most money from privatization).
Furthermore there were some decent companies who could have survived but their Western competition wanted to crush them and of course they had the usual influence upon the government.

What should have happened? Simply a slower process. Install some protectionist measures in order to save those companies who can be saved, regulate capital markets to allow an inflow of capital but not an outflow and labour markets should of course be totally open as people wanted to unite with their relatives.
The artificially imposed exchange rate of 1:1 was of course also totally nonsensical.

China did not listen to the neoliberal nonsense of the West, slower transformed from socialism to capitalism and that's why the country is on a better path than Russia (of course I am not sanctioning authoritarianism or sweat shop labour).

Du bist echt ein wahrer Quell von Spass und Freude.

[KimM]

My husband was stationed in Germany and we were living right off the USArmy base in Bamberg. It was, to borrow from good ol' Joe - "A BIG EFFING DEAL!"

Our German neighbors were both ecstatic and a little apprehensive.

[RJDiogenes]

Happy Unity Day, meine freunde.

Yeah, the reunification didn't go as smoothly as one would have liked, but it was still a great day in Human history. It was the end of a bad era and the beginning of hope for peace, freedom and cooperation. Indeed, we should do that more often.

And, no, I wasn't a teenager then.

[Count Zero]

Um... You should probably look for the version that only has the third verse, not the first one with "Deutschland über alles" which we don't sing anymore (since about '45, though not everyone got the memo...). Anyway, the third verse is the official anthem.

[cooleddie74]

I already pulled it after I was reminded about the context of and sensitivity concerning the beginning. My apologies.

If I repost the anthem I'll find one with only the third verse in it.

[{ Emilia }]

Count Pony wrote:

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Anyway, the third verse is the official anthem.

Yeah, I sent poor CE a PM right away. I was also tempted to tell him that "Schland, oh, Schland" is the official national anthem now.