Hello Radio GDR listeners! I am so pleased to bring you the first episode of two with my new friend Herta Peter. My favorite thing about doing this podcast is hearing stories from those of you who lived in the GDR. Your stories are always extremely compelling, and we welcome them with open arms. History deserves to be preserved, and Radio GDR has been here to do it.

Herta was born in Halle in 1981. While she was only 8 when the wall fell, her memories of her childhood in the GDR to two parents who lived during the country's entire existence are simply amazing. Having family in West Germany, Herta received care packages she had to keep a secret when at school. Upon reaching pension age, her grandmother was able to visit the west but could never shake the habit of whispering, a survival tactic learned in the repressive East where, like the Three Monkeys one saw no evil, heard no evil and said no evil. Just listen for her story of the Soviet tank driver who made a mess no one ever talked about.

From her memories of what she says were the "various shades of grey" she saw in the GDR, she has written and is working to publish a children's book about her memories - How the Grey Disappeared from Greyland. It's a compelling short story about the arrival of a colorful package in the land of grey, a representation of the care packages she got from the West.

In our first episode, we'll hear about Herta's life in the GDR, and in the second, we'll learn how it inspired her book and the lessons she believes life in the GDR can teach us today. Let's dive in with Herta Peter as she brings the first part of her story to life here on Radio GDR.

Our ability to bring you stories from behind the Berlin Wall is dependent on monthly donors like you. Visit us at https://www.radiogdrpodcast.com/p/support-the-podcast/ to contribute. For the price of a Berliner Pilsner, you can feel good you are contributing to preserve one of the most important pieces of Cold War history.

If you feel more comfortable leaving us a review to help us get more listeners, we appreciate it very much and encourage you to do so wherever you get your podcasts or at https://www.radiogdrpodcast.com/reviews/new/.

For discussions about podcast episodes and GDR history, please do join our Facebook discussion group. Just search Radio GDR in Facebook.

Vielen dank for being a listener!

Hello everyone! Season 4 is coming! We also have a new domain this season - radiogdrpodcast.com. Please do visit us soon to tell us your GDR story! I'll be updating show notes across old episodes so you can the same great content at our new website.

Season 4 is coming! Look forward to announcing more details soon.

Our ability to bring you stories from behind the Berlin Wall is dependent on monthly donors like you. Visit us at https://www.radiogdrpodcast.com/p/support-the-podcast/ to contribute. For the price of a Berliner Pilsner, you can feel good you are contributing to preserve one of the most important pieces of Cold War history.

If you feel more comfortable leaving us a review to help us get more listeners, we appreciate it very much and encourage you to do so wherever you get your podcasts or at https://www.radiogdrpodcast.com/reviews/new/.

For discussions about podcast episodes and GDR history, please do join our Facebook discussion group. Just search Radio GDR in Facebook.

Vielen dank for being a listener!

In this episode John Paul Kleiner (GDR Objectified blog) speaks with Attila the Stockbroker, an English poet, musician and songwriter with roots in the punk movement and socialist politics. During his forty year career as independent artist, Attila has produced numerous albums and books and performed more than 3,800 shows including many in the GDR and, after unification, eastern Germany.

In this conversation, Attila vividly recalls his visits to the East, the people whom he met there and aspects of the Workers and Peasants State which were an inspiration and other which left him disgusted.

Find Attila’s active Facebook page by clicking here.

Learn more about his books and albums on Bandcamp

There’s a great mini-doc of Attila done a few years back by filmmaker Farouq Suleiman that gives a great sense of his energy and art on YouTube here.

You can hear poem and song “This is Free Europe” inspired by Attila’s experiences at a 1992 gig in Hoyerswerda here.

Glossary of terms

Laibach: a Slovenian based music group / avant-garde art project which incorporates totalitarian aesthetics into a variety of musical styles to unsettling effect.

A-Levels: university qualifying exams for British secondary school students

John Peel was a DJ for the BBC between 1967 and 2004 during which time he helped popularize a number of musical genres including psychedelic and progressive rock as well as punk.

New Town Neurotics are an English melodic punk band formed in 1979 and whose work took a decidedly political turn with the advent of Thatcherism in the U.K. It was through his connections to this group that Attila first made his way to the GDR.

In the 1980s, the multiethnic London neighbourhood of Brixton was best known as a site of great social unrest due to widespread poverty and strained relations between residents and police. In more recent years, the area has undergone considerable gentrification, but echoes of

Buna and Leuna: in the GDR-era, these two large-scale chemical combines were essential economic drivers and creators of truly appalling environmental degradation. Read more on the impact these facilities had on the East German environment in this post from the GDR Objectified blog.

Bündnis 90 / Alternative Linke: Alliance ’90 and Alternative Left were left-oriented political movements which emerged from the foment of anti-SED protests in the mid- to late-1980s in the GDR.

Die Skeptiker (The Sceptics) are a German punk band originally formed in East Berlin in 1986. While critical of the realities of ‘real-existing socialism’, the band were keen to carve out a place for themselves in the GDR music scene and used opportunities open to them within the system (incl. officially sanctioned live shows and appearances on GDR radio and new music compilation albums) to present their music to as wide an audience as possible.

Our ability to bring you stories from behind the Berlin Wall is dependent on monthly donors like you. Visit us at https://www.eastgermanypodcast.com/p/support-the-podcast/ to contribute. For the price of a Berliner Pilsner, you can feel good you are contributing to preserve one of the most important pieces of Cold War history.

If you feel more comfortable leaving us a review to help us get more listeners, we appreciate it very much and encourage you to do so wherever you get your podcasts or at https://www.eastgermanypodcast.com/reviews/new/.

For discussions about podcast episodes and GDR history, please do join our Facebook discussion group. Just search Radio GDR in Facebook.

Vielen dank for being a listener!