project of Play Area Pankow. Other projects include a neighborhood center, a permaculture program and brightly- covered playwagons. This is the only children’s farm in former East Berlin, but one of five in the city. In their struggle to survive, a support network has developed among the various farms and playgrounds. All alternative projects in the city are faced with rising costs and dwindling support, but on the East Side the people also have to deal with land ownership questions, some of which date back to the 1930’s. The Pinke-Panke sits on land owned by an agency that is not ready to give it up. Nonetheless, the project proceeds. I boarded the train with my bike to travel north. There were many others with bikes going out to the edges of Berlin to ride in the country. After getting off the train, I continued along the border. I saw small garden colonies, which are associations of people who rent or own small garden plots to work, relax, and sometimes live in. I found a small tent, some tables and a sign: Lydia’s Wall Oasis. I stopped to take a closer look. Lydia looked at me suspiciously as I took photos of her business, but after ordering a beer and sitting at one of her two tables she seemed more comfortable with me. Lydia went back to working in her garden, which is only a few feet away, but on what used to be the other side of the wall. I am left alone for a few moments with my beer, sitting in the shade of Lydia’s awning, which on such a hot day really was something of an oasis in this border wasteland. She owns a cooler, an electric burner for boiling sausages, and a radio. On the tables are small, handmade cardboard signs asking visitors to please call if Lydia is in her garden. While I was there, a few others stopped to enjoy a drink and sausage. Lydia is one of millions of individuals struggling to adapt to a competitive western culture. Some find success, a lot more experience frustration and failure, but many are extremely resourceful and creative. Most find the rapid changes more destabilizing than exciting; unemployment and explosive anger are on the rise. The West is increasingly indifferent to the plight of the East, burdened by its own problems. Amidst these challenges, creative expression such as Pinke-Panke, the Parliament of Trees and that of the artists who took over the guard tower seems ever more precious. Later in the evening, I went back to the tower and the Mutoid Waste Airport 92 show. A scrapped MIG fighter plane is positioned as if diving into the base of the tower. There are reworked tanks, planes, rockets and other unrecognizable but threatening structures scattered everywhere. There is music, food and drink. There are bonfires, costumed people juggling, eating and breathing fire. Some of the animalistic machines too are breathing or throwing fire, threatening the crowds. A few machines travel through the crowd, moving slowly, while others move quickly as if they might maim or kill. After a few hours, a fighter plane is towed slowly through the crowd. It is wildly painted, with wings on fire, and flames shooting out of its tail. Some are riding the plane, some flogging it with chains, while hundreds of others walk alongside or behind it in a large procession. Drummers beat out some frantic rhythms to accompany the hoard. The fighter plane comes to rest in front of a stage, to face the music. Would these be the rituals of a post-militaristic culture? Can we work through the accumulated angst and horror of fighter planes, nuclear rockets, and military madness? The rituals are premature. Some are apparently not ready to retire the war machines, overlook national boundaries, and move on. But all the wars and walls have made the rest of us ready, and anxious, to rebuild our communities. RAIN Spring 1993 Volume XIV, Number 3 Page 35
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