Tour

I've been having a very interesting day out. Having only once travelled outside Berlin - a lovely outing to Potsdam with A - today I went to Halle in the morning, and Leipzig in the afternoon. One thing I was curious to see was how the towns are marked by their East German history. 

The centre of Halle has been totally renovated - except for the many very old buildings, including some large churches. I'm always interested to see that the Communists never knocked them down. 

Then I hired a bike and cycled out of the centre, aiming for two "Monument" Turf zones - to Lenin and Yuri Gagarin! The former is looking rather sorry for itself, but the latter is loud and proud! Both monuments were on a long straight boulevard with a tram running down the middle, and identical Communist era apartment blocks on both sides - with no streets between them. As I cycled back into the city centre, the predominance of identical concrete blocks gradually gave way to older or more modern buildings again. 

Leipzig is bigger than Halle, and I've mainly been in the centre and its parks, so haven't seen such obviously East German architecture.

What both cities have are dense tram networks, which remind me of Prague and, to an extent, Sofia, a legacy that is a real boon in the current era. Conclusion: East Germany isn't dead yet! 

When I shared my experiences with И - who is back in Bulgaria - she was pleased to hear of the ongoing Communist legacy and roughly translated the maxim from the fall of Communism there that, "What we’ve built, you couldn’t even paint in the same amount of time".

Leipzig welcomed me with a quiet magnificent railway station that reminded me of places like Grand Central in NYC, and the terminus in Vancouver, but it's a much bigger place than Halle. Although there is some Communist architecture in the centre, I've spent most of the time in its lovely parks.

In Leipzig I also found a large grassy arena that was originally called "Adolf Hitler Field" and was used for Nazi rallies. It's right next to the brand new stadium for the Red Bull Leipzig football team. 

Rather tired from my active weekend, I'm currently in an Irish pub, rehydrating on German beer, watching English football. Specifically, the rather entertaining City-Arsenal game! Unfortunately I'll have to leave for my train back to Berlin before it's finished.