As promised I'm going to go a little bit slower and more in depth with my vacation posting rather than posting one giant broad post on it.
Like I said, we were in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, which is one of the former East German Bundesländer (Federal States). At first glance, it doesn't really look that different at all. There are still the same trees and road signs and everyone still speaks German. But there are differences. The DDR (Demokratische Deutsche Republik) was communist, and the stereotypical apartment blocks are still there. My host mom mentioned that, growing up, everyone lived in more or less the exact same apartment. Some people just had two bedrooms, or three, or four.
There are also a lot less people in East Germany. It's actually something of a policy problem for Germany. Up until the fall of the wall, Neubrandenburg had over 100,000 residents. It now has just under 45,000. There just aren't jobs or industry in the Eastern states. It has a lot of complicated reasons behind it and the fault isn't just the communist system, the West German takeover of the economy was rather unfriendly as well.
But anyhow, Neubrandenburg's city walls managed to survive WWII, even though the Cathedral and most of the old city didn't. They were really quite neat, even if somewhat restricting of traffic. Minden tore theirs down a hundred years ago to make way for growth, but Neubrandenburg managed to work around it. There are four gates, one at each of the compass points, and they looked great.
One benefit to not having people in eastern Germany is that the environment is amazingly clean. Neubrandenburg is on the Tollensesee, and you can see straight through it. My host father said that its true even in the middle of the lake, you can see several feet down. And the area around Neubrandenburg is still very agricultural. Nord Rhein - Westfalen, the state where I live, is one of the most densely populated areas in Europe; it was a big contrast.
Lots of lakes in the Mecklenburg area and we drove to a town on another lake, Waaren an der Müritz. Just to go around and look and it was really pretty, but a bit stormy and cold.
I apologize for the lack of pictures. I kept forgetting my camera and am not used to me phone yet, half of the pictures were upside down!
Like I said, we were in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, which is one of the former East German Bundesländer (Federal States). At first glance, it doesn't really look that different at all. There are still the same trees and road signs and everyone still speaks German. But there are differences. The DDR (Demokratische Deutsche Republik) was communist, and the stereotypical apartment blocks are still there. My host mom mentioned that, growing up, everyone lived in more or less the exact same apartment. Some people just had two bedrooms, or three, or four.
There are also a lot less people in East Germany. It's actually something of a policy problem for Germany. Up until the fall of the wall, Neubrandenburg had over 100,000 residents. It now has just under 45,000. There just aren't jobs or industry in the Eastern states. It has a lot of complicated reasons behind it and the fault isn't just the communist system, the West German takeover of the economy was rather unfriendly as well.
But anyhow, Neubrandenburg's city walls managed to survive WWII, even though the Cathedral and most of the old city didn't. They were really quite neat, even if somewhat restricting of traffic. Minden tore theirs down a hundred years ago to make way for growth, but Neubrandenburg managed to work around it. There are four gates, one at each of the compass points, and they looked great.
One benefit to not having people in eastern Germany is that the environment is amazingly clean. Neubrandenburg is on the Tollensesee, and you can see straight through it. My host father said that its true even in the middle of the lake, you can see several feet down. And the area around Neubrandenburg is still very agricultural. Nord Rhein - Westfalen, the state where I live, is one of the most densely populated areas in Europe; it was a big contrast.
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| A car advertisement floating in the harbor |
Lots of lakes in the Mecklenburg area and we drove to a town on another lake, Waaren an der Müritz. Just to go around and look and it was really pretty, but a bit stormy and cold.
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| Waaren and der Müritz |
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