Nine-mile ‘wall’ of illuminated balloons released into the night sky as Berlin celebrates historic quarter-century.
On the 9th of November Berlin celebrated
Published by auntyuta
Auntie, Sister. Grandmother, Great-Grandmother, Mother and Wife of German Descent I've lived in Australia since 1959 together with my husband Peter. We have four children, eight grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. I started blogging because I wanted to publish some of my childhood memories. I am blogging now also some of my other memories. I like to publish some photos too as well as a little bit of a diary from the present time. Occasionally I publish a story with a bit of fiction in it. Peter, my husband, is publishing some of his stories under berlioz1935.wordpress.com View all posts by auntyuta
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AuntyUta 
Fascinating reports. My daughter married in May 1990, and relatives from Berlin brought a lump of concrete from the Berlin Wall as a special wedding gift. Incidentally, I have seen only one reference to the fact that 9 -10 November is also the anniversary of Kristallnacht in 1938.
Hi Cat,
Peter and I listened on the internet to a lot of the speeches that were held on the 9th November. I remembered that Angela Merkel referred to the Kristallnacht in one of her speeches. It took me a while to find it, but I think this is it. I think this is a very good speech.
http://jpupdates.com/2014/11/09/germans-merkel-remembers-fall-berlin-wall-kristallnacht/
German’s Merkel Remembers Fall of Berlin Wall, Kristallnacht
November 9, 2014 7:55 PM by Sol Rieger
As Germany celebrated the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall on Sunday, Chancellor Angela Merkel says that the day can’t just be a day of joy. Calling it “a day of shame and disgrace” Merkel noted that November 9 is also the anniversary of the infamous “Kristallnacht.”
In 1938, Nazi paramilitaries launched a pogrom against the country’s Jewish population in what became known as Reichskristallnacht — the “Night of Broken Glass.”
Merkel remarked that the fall of the Berlin Wall teaches a lesson that “we can change things for the better — that is the message of the fall of the Berlin Wall.”
“The Berlin Wall, this symbol of state abuse cast in concrete, took millions of people to the limits of what is tolerable, and all too many beyond it,” she said. “It broke them.”
“Little wonder that after the border opened, people took apart the hated structure with hammers and chisels. Within a year it had all but vanished from the city scape.”
A million people were expected to attend Sunday’s festivities in Berlin, which included an open-air party at the city’s Brandenburg Gate and the release of hundreds of helium-filled balloon strung along a 15-kilometer (9-mile) stretch of the former border.
Remarking the Kristallnacht pogroms, Merkel said that “That was the opening note for the murder of millions,” adding that on Nov. 9 each year “I feel not just joy, but the responsibility that German history burdens us with.”
AP contributed to this report.
The fall of the wall and the reintegration of Germany has been successful beyond my wildest dreams. Would that other regions of this world could work together as well to solve their many differences.
That the fall of the wall could be peacefully achieved was really a dream come true, Linda. It is always better to find peaceful solutions, isn’t it?
For a lot of things we could find peaceful outcomes if we were all prepared to work together more in a peaceful way. I am totally against any kind of violence. Most of all we should respect each other even it we are very different from each other.