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| Letter from Germany: Tommy's house | Letter from Germany: Tommy's house |
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| Like any other city, Berlin is not immune to the floods of developers' cash that can wash away historical buildings, streets and communities that somehow survived Speer's grand plans, British bombs and Russian tanks, leaving bland, globalist dross in their wake. Resistance against the rising tide of upmarket towers and gentrification is widely manifest, from graffiti telling yuppies to clear off, to locals uniting to defend remnants of the Berlin Wall rather than let developers conquer them with flats. | Like any other city, Berlin is not immune to the floods of developers' cash that can wash away historical buildings, streets and communities that somehow survived Speer's grand plans, British bombs and Russian tanks, leaving bland, globalist dross in their wake. Resistance against the rising tide of upmarket towers and gentrification is widely manifest, from graffiti telling yuppies to clear off, to locals uniting to defend remnants of the Berlin Wall rather than let developers conquer them with flats. |
| Not far south of the Brandenburg Gate, on the semi-surburban street of Wilhelmstrasse, stands a building that could be an unremarkable 1900s apartment block yet has stood strong against all creeds of religious and political violence, and now flourishes in loving, glorious colour. This five-storey building is enveloped, from the lawns round its sides to the roof, in a massive, gorgeously surreal mural of a huge sky. On one side is painted a ziggurat of TVs, displaying events ranging from ice hockey to a man slipping on dog poo. On the other side the bright sky sucks up the surrounding conurbation while on the front, a man with a massive spliff falls from the clouds. | Not far south of the Brandenburg Gate, on the semi-surburban street of Wilhelmstrasse, stands a building that could be an unremarkable 1900s apartment block yet has stood strong against all creeds of religious and political violence, and now flourishes in loving, glorious colour. This five-storey building is enveloped, from the lawns round its sides to the roof, in a massive, gorgeously surreal mural of a huge sky. On one side is painted a ziggurat of TVs, displaying events ranging from ice hockey to a man slipping on dog poo. On the other side the bright sky sucks up the surrounding conurbation while on the front, a man with a massive spliff falls from the clouds. |
| This is Tommy Weisbecker Haus, a squat named after the 23-year-old anarchist killed by West German police on 2 March 1972. Weisbecker had been part of a militant group at the heart of the violent maelstrom that beset West Germany in the 1960s and 1970s, when government crackdowns on leftwing protests left many young people feeling the state was run by unreconstructed Nazis in hock to the US. Resistance escalated to bombing and shooting US military bases and high-ranking state officials, a movement for whose members the Haus – once a convent and hospice – would be a stronghold. This, in a half-city surrounded by Soviet troops and run by lethally skittish authorities, was defiance indeed. | This is Tommy Weisbecker Haus, a squat named after the 23-year-old anarchist killed by West German police on 2 March 1972. Weisbecker had been part of a militant group at the heart of the violent maelstrom that beset West Germany in the 1960s and 1970s, when government crackdowns on leftwing protests left many young people feeling the state was run by unreconstructed Nazis in hock to the US. Resistance escalated to bombing and shooting US military bases and high-ranking state officials, a movement for whose members the Haus – once a convent and hospice – would be a stronghold. This, in a half-city surrounded by Soviet troops and run by lethally skittish authorities, was defiance indeed. |
| For all that, the Haus passed its 40th anniversary this year and has matured and mellowed into a co-operative in which no single political standpoint dominates. It's now respectable enough to be marked out not for police attention but for tourists up the Berliner FernstehenTurm – although, as I was politely reminded, it's also a home - a Haus that, now in its prime, will reach three score and 10 thanks to a new 30-year lease. | For all that, the Haus passed its 40th anniversary this year and has matured and mellowed into a co-operative in which no single political standpoint dominates. It's now respectable enough to be marked out not for police attention but for tourists up the Berliner FernstehenTurm – although, as I was politely reminded, it's also a home - a Haus that, now in its prime, will reach three score and 10 thanks to a new 30-year lease. |
| Still, there's room for youthful largesse. As I turn for one last look at the Haus, beneath the painted spliff I glimpse a sign in a bedroom window proclaiming "FUCK YOU". | Still, there's room for youthful largesse. As I turn for one last look at the Haus, beneath the painted spliff I glimpse a sign in a bedroom window proclaiming "FUCK YOU". |
| Every week Guardian Weekly publishes a Letter from one of its readers from around the world. We welcome submissions – they should focus on giving a clear sense of a place and its people. Please send them to weekly.letter.from@guardian.co.uk | Every week Guardian Weekly publishes a Letter from one of its readers from around the world. We welcome submissions – they should focus on giving a clear sense of a place and its people. Please send them to weekly.letter.from@guardian.co.uk |
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