The Berlin Wall fell 25 years ago, but Germany is still divided

> So how did someone from West Berlin travel to, say, Frankfurt by car?

There were few approved transit routes from West Berlin to West Germany. So you could get a transit visa (which you had to pay for in west german currency) upon getting on one of those routes and present it to exit the GDR again (you weren't allowed to leave the transit route midway, and if you took to long to pass through, you'd be questioned). Note that transit between West Berlin and West Germany is different from simply crossing between the two Germanies[0], which was relatively easy for est german citizens, but particularly difficult to do for east german citizens.

> What was to stop someone from East Germany doing the same thing? The wall only went through the city, right?

The wall may have only gone through the city, but there still were border checkpoints[1] outside of Berlin.

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crossing_the_inner_German_borde... [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inner_German_border

One thing that I never understood is that in order to make this happen, planes had to fly above the USSR controlled East Germany, what prevented the soviets from just shooting down every plane since it was their airspace at the time?

> 25 years is a very short time to expect some of the longer term economic and cultural changes to take place.

And yet, the GDR only existed for 40 years.

The original article published in the German newspaper Die Zeit has the graphics with numbers. The article and the graphics are in English. http://zeit.de/feature/german-unification-a-nation-divided

I do not know why the Washington Post removed the numbers in their graphics...

I think, one of the reasons, many in Eastern Germany turn to right wing parties or groups, is that they see it as alternative to the capitalistic system, which is represented by the other parties. The other alternative, the left wing side was made unpopular by the fall of the so called "communistic system" and the saying, that Communism has lost, sticks to the people. So they turn right wing. Of course, the right wing parties are no real alternative to capitalism, but that is difficult to comprehend.

Even Hitler himself presented the NSDAP as alternative to the US capitalism in the 30s. On the surface, it was, but when you looked deeper it was some kind of "undercover capitalism" under the hood of a movement that claimed to be social and unite the people -- but in reality it united some people, by tearing the whole apart, by finding some new foes, the rest of the people should feel as one. But this was an illusion from beginning.

I think, the right wing parties and groups do the same today again. They find the problems, the people have with capitalism -- and capitalism did not treat the eastern people well after the fall of the wall -- and use it as cheese in their big mouse trap.

Yes, Germany is still divided in my opinion today, because the rulers did not understand that the people need more than only bananas and some money in their pockets to go shopping.

Many women -- it is said -- even had an abortion in Eastern Germany after the fall of the wall, because unemployment was pressing so hard and in spite of German laws, some employers pressured them to do so. With unemployment still high and wages still lower than in the western parts, it is understandable, that many people don't feel to comfortable with a system that gives money, but once again no hope to those people. In the old system, they lacked bananas, but they had peace of mind and did not have the pressure to beat their neighbors. I heard many times, that people where much more friendly and helpful with each other in the old system, than they are today.