THE candles the people held shattered the darkness of that night in the German capital Berlin. Thousands of people walked past their divided history and called for unification. Their voices were not audible in this picture, but the features of their faces told of iron determination. These faces and these candles were snapped by intelligent cameramen and presented this week at an exhibition the German Embassy in Cairo held at El-Sawy Cultural Centre on the Nile in the quiet quarter of Zamalek to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. The exhibition contained tens of such photos that capture seminal moments on the way to the unification of east and west Germany in 1989. The photos snap the peaceful developments of the pre unification period and the longing of Germans living on both sides of the Wall for unity. Titled ‘From Peaceful Revolution to German Unity', the exhibition drew scores of reporters from Egypt. German Ambassador in Cairo Michael Bock was there. Other dignitaries, such as the Chairman of the Egyptian-German Friendship Association Reda Shita were also there. Shita said the fall of the Berlin Wall had consequences that did not stop at the borders of Germany. "On the contrary, this event augmented democracy the world over," he said. Some of the posters in the exhibition capture German protest movements in east Germany and the struggle of these movements to forge the long-awaited unity.
