Berlin, Germany

This is the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin.

What an amazing history Berlin has! In the picture above, K is pointing to bullet holes in a building from WWII. I can't imagine finding bullet holes on walls in Indianapolis from a war.

We were astounded by the stories of landmarks our tour guide relayed. For the people living in Berlin, it seemed as if the Berlin Wall went up basically overnight. Families were separated from each other, some on the Western side, while others were stuck on the Eastern side. Western people could enter the Eastern side, but Easterners were trapped. People went to drastic measures to reunite, or just plain escape from the Eastern side. One man and his family zip lined from a restroom inside a building where he was employed as a janitor. He sailed right over the wall, onto the other side. His little son was so scared to go that he bribed him with a new bike if they made it safely to the other side. This and other stories came to life in the museum we visited.

Here are the kids standing along the graffiti filled wall. Below is another view of the wall. It's immenseness is overwhelming.

The bricks represent where the wall stood throughout the city.

Checkpoint Charlie was where people could cross back and forth.

At one point of the walking tour we supposedly were standing directly above the bunker of Adolf Hitler.

At this eerie location, there are two levels of Berlin's past. The brick offices toward the bottom of the picture were used for Hitler's offices, and the Berlin Wall stands directly above.

We walked through the Holocaust Memorial.

Part of it seemed small, then at other times I was scared of losing my child around the next corner.

Luckily, we brought them both back home safely!