East Germany ‘Ostalgia’ Going Strong

Travel Blog  •  Julia Ross  •  09.11.08 | 2:35 PM ET

imageI loved the 2003 film Good Bye Lenin! for its darkly comic take on nostalgia for Cold War-era East Germany. Now it seems “ostalgia” has worked its way into Berlin’s tourism infrastructure: Time reports that the craze has spread to themed pubs, “Ostel” hostels and “Trabi safaris,” which ferry tourists around East Berlin in the much-maligned Trabant (pictured).

We’ve seen no evidence that dreams of an East German theme park, widely reported several years ago, were ever fulfilled.

Still, what’s next? Midnight raves at Checkpoint Charlie?

Photo by jtriefen via Flickr (Creative Commons).

Tags: Europe, Germany

Julia Ross is a Washington, DC-based writer and frequent contributor to World Hum. She has lived in China and Taiwan, where she was a Fulbright scholar and Mandarin student. Her writing has appeared in the Washington Post, Time, Christian Science Monitor, Plenty and other publications. Her essay, Six Degrees of Vietnam, was shortlisted for "The Best American Travel Writing 2009."


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