A guided tour with Ekki along the Wall
and life behind the iron curtain
When we were interrailing and Couchsurfing through Eastern Europe, we decided to start our journey in Berlin. Even though it´s not actually part the Eastern Europe, it still made sense: the story begins and ends here – with the Wall.
Growing up in Sweden, I remember during our history lessons in school back in the 1980s how we read about how communism and the impenetrable iron curtain divided Europe in the west and east block. What went on there, on the other side, nobody knew.
When searching for a Couchsurfing host in Berlin, were lucky to find a place to stay with a man who had grown up in the eastern part of Germany. As a matter of fact, he was one of the first people to cross over to the other side – the west side, towards freedom and suddenly, the ability to travel the world. And indeed he did. At this point, he as visited more than a hundred countries.
This is an excerpt from the chapter about Berlin:
Although he has loved traveling for most of his adult life, it hasn't always been possible. Growing up in East Germany, his childhood and teenage travels – up until 1989 – were limited to just five countries: Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria. East Germans could, of course, also travel to the Soviet Union, Cuba, and other communist countries, but only through organised trips.
"Organised travel meant the secret police were with you the whole time – and that's not how I wanted to travel. I've always been a backpacker, so I hitchhiked to Bulgaria. I went as far as I possibly could, and to me, in the 1980s, Bulgaria felt like the end of the world. I also studied geography. I was a total freak, even as a kid. If you gave me an atlas, I could read it for hours. I knew loads about different countries, mountains, islands, rivers, and lakes all over the world. To this day, I haven't met anyone who can beat me in topography," he grins, taking a sip of beer.
But even though Ekki had acquired a deep knowledge of the world, it was painfully clear to him that he would never actually get to experience it. For him and everyone else who grew up in the former GDR, dreaming of faraway places like New York simply wasn't an option – it was far too unattainable.
"But sometimes, watching a documentary, you'd think: 'Oh, I wish I could go there.' My biggest dream was to see Samarkand and Bukhara in Uzbekistan. I'd seen pictures of them in books – it looked like the Orient, with blue-tiled mosques and everything. It looked amazing, like something out of Ali Baba, you know? So that was my biggest dream. And I still haven't been there," he says matter-of-factly.
Today, Ekki has more than made up for the lack of travel in his youth. As of this writing, he has visited over a hundred countries, often staying with locals through social travel platforms. In his own home, he has hosted an impressive eight to nine hundred guests – he's lost count by now. Long before the Couchsurfing community began in the early 2000s, he was already a member of earlier networks like the international Hospitality Club. When asked why he opens his home to strangers, he has a simple answer: if he can't travel the world, he brings the world to him.
I smile in recognition; it's the very same reason I once decided to become a host. The essence of travel, after all, is meeting people – and that's something you can do right at home, in your own living room.
"And maybe it sounds a little pathetic," he says with a grin, "but I like helping people. Because deep down, I'm actually quite selfish, so it makes me feel good."
In our book Sofas & Strangers, we write more about our experiences staying with Ekki in Berlin.
You could read about the book here
And here you can buy your own copy