Robert J. Fouser Columnist The Korea Herald
In eastern Germany, October is a time to celebrate and remember the 1989 democracy movement that brought an end to the repressive East German regime.
Leipzig, where the pro-democracy demonstrations began, hosts the annual "Lichtfest" (Light Festival) to commemorate the candlelight vigils to protest against police violence towards pro-democracy demonstrators.
German Unity Day on Oct 3 is a national holiday to commemorate reunification in 1990.Apart from the busy October commemorations, cities in eastern Germany have markers and museums to tell the story of the democracy movement and the history behind it.
In Dresden and Leipzig, markers note where demonstrators gathered in the fall of 1989 and both cities have exhibitions in former offices and prisons of the East German Ministry for State Security or Stasi.
Leipzig has a museum on post-war German history that deals with the division, the development of both German states and the collapse of East Germany.
A museum in Dresden displays an extensive collection of material objects from East Germany that offers a window into everyday life.
In the streets, the remnants of East Germany are easy to spot. A porcelain mural depicting East Germany as a workers' paradise still adorns a long wall of a concert hall in the centre of the city. Large, uniform apartment blocks surround historic city centres.
The late 1980s witnessed important pro-democracy movements: the Philippines in 1986, South Korea in 1987, Poland in 1988.
In 1986, Mikhail Gorbachev, the new leader of the Soviet Union, started a series of economic and political reforms. After years of tension, the United States and the Soviet Union had begun a new era of detente in the mid-1980s. The pro-democracy demonstrations in East Germany occurred in the context of these sweeping changes.
http://www.straitstimes.com/opinion/thinking-about-october-1989-in-east-germany-and-north-korea
