museums i recently visited iv

On my last day in Berlin, I went to the second to last museum on my list: the GDR (German Democratic Republic) Museum.1 This museum was created to commemorate and showcase to future generations how life under the GDR was like which is something it does exceptionally well. This museum is unique among those contemporary history museums I’ve been to so far. It has complete recreations of certain aspects of life and a lot of vintage tech on display—even a cinema. As soon as you enter the exhibition, you are greeted by a miniature model of the Berlin Wall. I didn’t know there was so much empty space between the two walls despite being at the memorial the day before. There is a wall with cylindrical top pieces, a lot of empty space with surveillance towers in the middle, then a wall of barbed wire, some space, and then a fence (probably belonging to the building it borders and not present everywhere). Beyond the wall on either side, the city looks normal. It’s weird thinking how a wall…