Wednesday 3 October 2018

tag der deutschen einheit

To meditate a bit on Reunification Day, I went to the next village over, Hermannsfeld (previously), the first settlement just across the former border and visited the preserved ruin of a patrol tower (Grenzturm—elsewhere) and peace Cross (Weltfriedenskreuz—the inset lettering reads “may peace reign”) erected a top the Dachsberg.
Though surely not unsafe but surprisingly accessible, I was discouraged—owning to the fact that was by myself—from exploring too deep into the sublevel and it the tower itself, there was a chronology of World War II and DDR-Zeit and one could go up higher in the tower but again—out of caution, I didn’t think I could manage the heavy hatch and balance myself on the stairs, so I just peeked inside.
The Day of German Unity (Tag der Deutschen Einheit—not really the commemoration of der Deutsche Wiedervereinigung, though sometimes used interchangeably especially as a political signal like referring to the former East collectively as die neue Bundesländer, as goal had been realised previously) marks the formal accession to the terms of agreement in 1990.
Alternatives for the holiday were considered including the fall of the Berlin Wall in November of the previous year, but as that momentous event coincided with the German Fateful Day, marking a host of dreadful and pivotal happenings, this other administrative occasion was selected instead.