{"id":1932,"date":"2020-01-02T23:13:31","date_gmt":"2020-01-02T22:13:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lornemitchell.com\/?p=1932"},"modified":"2020-01-04T20:54:59","modified_gmt":"2020-01-04T19:54:59","slug":"tt2001-into-a-new-decade","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.lornemitchell.com\/?p=1932","title":{"rendered":"TT2001 – Into a New Decade"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"
New Year’s Eve 1989\/90 – Licenced – Alamy Stock Photo D: 2A84TB4\u00a0\u00a0(RM) – Fall of the Berlin Wall<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

It was the turning of the 89\/90 decade.
I was in Berlin for New Year\u2019s Eve.
Fireworks were only allowed then
To celebrate the turning of the year.
I was at a party well away from the wall
But had this urge to move up on up to it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We made it just in time!  A large crowd swarming
Five hundred metres way up to the Brandenburger Tor. 
That symbolic centre of both the wall and Berlin herself.
There was a determined push towards the gate
Both in front and behind us, surging like a tidal wave
As if the whole crowd moved with a collective psyche.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And then the fireworks began. Lighting the sky above.<\/strong>
The dark shadow of the gate ahead, I could move
Neither back, nor left, nor right, but only forwards.
As more and more people joined the push
Towards the tiny gap only created a few weeks before
On, on, on, there was no going back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I then realised I had no passport. My friend from Berlin
Was allowed to go through with no papers, but I should not.
Too late! The powerful crowd took that decision for me.
We were pushed through the tiny gap and there –
On the other side were two 12 ft replica cans of Coca-Cola!
The American marketing machine had beaten us to it!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Illegal or not, there were no guards: it was a surge to freedom.
We were discharged out onto the Unter den Linden,\u00a0
The boulevard of lime trees on the Eastern side of the gate.
A calm peace after the hectic push and scrabble.
We spent an hour or so soaking up the atmosphere
Before returning back home to the Western side.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Elias Canetti, summed up in his 1960s book \u201cCrowds and Power\u201d:
The crowd always wants to grow – it has no natural boundaries.
Within the crowd there is equality. Differences \u2026 are irrelevant.
The crowd loves destiny … it can never feel too dense.
The crowd needs direction \u2026 and moves towards a goal.
And so it was. The wall collapsed to create modern-day Europe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It was the turning of the 89\/90 decade.I was in Berlin for New Year\u2019s Eve.Fireworks were only allowed thenTo celebrate the turning of the year.I was at a party well away from the wallBut had this urge to move up on up to it. We made it just in time!  A large crowd swarmingFive hundred … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “TT2001 – Into a New Decade”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[42,100,71,67,62,124,34,52,89,57],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6DQGK-va","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":815,"url":"http:\/\/www.lornemitchell.com\/?p=815","url_meta":{"origin":1932,"position":0},"title":"On Sustaining the Gains (and Losses)","author":"Lorne Mitchell","date":"05\/01\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"You are probably past the point of setting New Year\u2019s resolutions and have forgotten the one you set last year.\u00a0 Yet when you look back a year and look forward a year, it is surprising how little changes and how much stays the same. 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If you think hard, I'm sure you can come up with at least half a dozen things you want to achieve this year. Maybe more? Write them down, and hey-presto, there you are! 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