along the border got their houses back, at least the side that had been neglected for a lot of
years. Every East German that came across got DM100 or 100 German marks. They hit
the stores like crazy. It was like a festival gone mad.
A little history for those of you who don't know of the European ways. First they only
have refrigerators the size of the ones Americans stick next to the bar. Second, the West
Germans go shopping every day. That way they have fresh food every day. When I went
shopping the American way I got the strangest looks. On retrospect they must have
thought I was feeding an army. I would buy 2 or 3 of everything as is our way. They
must have thought I was going to cook it all in one meal!
Now here comes the East Germans across the border. They have a DM100 in their
pockets. At first they hit the small towns near the border. They quickly emptied them
out. They moved on to the larger towns. They emptied them out then they hit the cities
like a swarm of locust buying all that they had not had in years. Sewing needles, blue
jeans, Walkmans, fresh fruit. All of it gone off the shelves. Now the West German gets
up and goes to the market to buy their daily food. Nothing is in the store and the next
shipment is due next week. So the West German has to drive 100 miles to the nearest
store every day tell the new shipment comes in. Small refrigerators, remember?
Another problem arose. When the East Germans tried to spend their East German
Marks in West Germany the West Germans would not take them. The exchange rate was
outrageous. One West German Mark (or dollar) equaled about 100 East German Marks.
So a Big Mac cost an East German 2 months pay!
Try to understand. It is like we made Mexico our 51st state. And then as every man,
woman and child came across the border we give them a hundred dollars. Think of the
chaos. There was lines of cars 10 and 15 miles long going down the autobahn at a even
50 mph. This is at night . The East German cars are inferior to the West German cars.
The tail lights look like two tiny penlights. They are hard to see. The West German
travels the autobahn at speeds in excess of 120 mph. The crashes were not pretty. Now
this line of cars pulls into towns. The German police tried to do traffic control and move
all these cars on to the soccer fields, but the police began to drop like flies from CO2
poisoning. The East German cars were equipped with 2 cycle engines like the American
lawn mower and had no emission control. They all were made from the same molds. The
East Germans mounted a radio on the floor in some of them (a luxury) or hung something
from the rear view mirrors to identify their cars.
Their were fights that broke out as the East Germans accused the West Germans of
forgetting them after the war. That was WWII for those of you who don't know which
war.
However there was good things that happen too. Like families being reunited again
after 20+ years. One of the pictures shows a bridge that has a leather factory on the other
side of town. The East block waited tell all the workers crossed the bridge and then they
blew up the bridge. This gave them skilled labor at no cost to them as they could have
blown up the bridge before people crossed. This action split up families for years. Every
once in a while as we patrolled the border we would see people from both sides of the
bridge waving at each other. Every day it saddens me about how cruel people can be to
other people.
I hope Germany gets things worked out. I know they have a long way to go as East
Germany is very polluted and economically be hind the rest of the world. I hope also that
they learned from WWI and WWII that we will kick their butts if they try to take over
Europe again.
Killer.
