by Teresa Ringholz

Created on: September 07, 2009   Last Updated: September 08, 2009

Today I am in Leipzig. It is 1990, the Berlin Wall has fallen and it is the first time I have worked in East Germany. I'm not quite sure what to expect as I sit on the antique Russian Aeroflot plane. The rancid smell of cigarette smoke wafts through the machine. I am sitting in a "Nicht Raucher" (no smoking) section, but this is only a formality.

I just hope this relic will land in one piece as it rattles through the sky; it also seems rather drafty on the floor at the seams. I peer down at the landscape and immediately recognize that it is much different from the verdant green fertile West Germany. It seems that complete forests have been cleared away for collective farming. From the distance I see a gaping crater stretching for miles on the ground. As the plane approaches, I realize it is the open wound of strip mining. The complete mountain is gone and the grey bleeding hole looks like a cancer in Mother Earth's breast.

I've just recovered from this shock when my eyes gaze down on sterile concrete Communist apartment housing. This complex contains at least 12 buildings, each looking exactly the same, equally unimaginative, ugly, cheap and marching like monsters imposing on the grey horizon. There are no trees, no gardens, even the balconies are lacking in any kind of personal adornment.

The runway at the airport is in poor condition, chunks of asphalt crumbing to the sides, like lava overflowing the boundaries. I prepare myself for a bumpy landing as the plane "touches" down. As we taxi, the plane hobbles over the separating seams of the runway. As we rumble along, we pass another Aeroflot plane. I am told by my seatmate that it is a restaurant. I quietly wonder who would want to eat in restaurant like this, not given the reputation of airplane food! As we finally screech to a halt I think that perhaps it is time to condemn this machine to the same fate.

As I descend the stairs to the tarmac, my eyes and nostrils burn with the first smell of the brown coal-laden air. I wait for my baggage in the customs control area where rifle bearing security guards offer a welcoming scrutiny to every passenger. I wonder if the guards have heard that the Wall has come down and there isn't the need for this kind of control, but perhaps they know no other way.

Passing the glares of the guards, I exit the airport and enter my first Trabbi taxi (short for Trabant, the East German produced car). What a contrast to the Mercedes taxis in Western Germany which are commonplace.

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