It's been 18 years since the Wall came down, and now capitalism's choking the communist architecture in East Berlin with an orgy of logos at Alexanderplatz, and its high unemployment has inspired an anti-capitalist voice to speak up, responding directly to those logos with bold, unavoidable statements from spray cans.
The realisation that capitalism isn't as great as they were led to believe has made some East Berliners nostalgic for the past in the GDR, as if when they look back, they find it wasn't so bad. Of course they don't want a communist dictatorship to return or the spying Stasi (secret police) with their little microphones in rocks and bird boxes, but their harmless cultural icons. Like the Ampelmann - the little green and red traffic light man. He was going to be replaced by West Berlin's version, which is the same as the one we get over here and in the US, but there was a public outcry, and the beloved Ampelmann was saved.
These little traffic light men seem to characterise the difference between the tourists who prefer to visit West Berlin and those who'd rather stay in East Berlin. The Ampelmann's got far more personality and you'd definitely rather go out for a night on the town with him than his boring, straight and somewhat stiff western counterpart – now that guy really needs to loosen up. I bet he's rubbish at dancing and would stick out like a sore thumb at a squat party.
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