My family lived a couple of years in West-Berlin back in the 1970's. And earlier this year, I had the opportunity to travel to the German capital for the first time in more than 35 years, to help a relative move his stuff to Paris by car.

Needless to say, a lot has changed: I spent most of my time in the former East Berlin that was largely off-limits to us back in the days, except for a few day trips.

OK, I took the short U55 subway line described by Dodo to the Brandenburger Tor; around 1975, it was looking like this (minus the grafittis that appeared during the 80s):

In 2012, it's full of tourists and a couple of street artists, disguised in "Vopos" (East-German policemen):

Behind the gate, the Pariser Platz, with the French embassy on the right and the US embassy on the left.

This is Pergamon Museum and a S-Bahn train passing between the two main buildings. Back in 1975, I saw steam locomotives on the same tracks, just like the black & white picture on the Wiki page.

The Spree river, with the Fernsehturm, the East-Berlin counterpart to the Rundfunk tower from where Dodo took the first picture in the diary:

By a quirk of design, the sun reflection seen from the West looks like a cross. West Berliners nicknamed this "the Pope's revenge on Erich Honecker":

Also in the Eastern part of town, the Kulturbrauerei, a former brewery turned into cultural center:

A memorial of the wall, on the Bernauerstrasse; looks like the "no man's land" that the DDR authorities set up behind the wall has now turned into prime real estate: I saw plenty of developments under construction, but luckily, most of it is still public gardens.

This time in the Western part of town (not far from the Messe): the beautiful 18th century castle of Charlottenburg, and the statue of Friedrich Wilhelm I:

Time to drive home with our rental car: a full day of "Fahren, fahren, fahren auf der Autobahn". After a nostalgia trip in the past, I was suddenly reminded of today's reality of Northern Germany: on a freeway parking lot, a convoy of three trailers carrying you know what: