Sightseeing with the Stasi by Ann Banks

Why did we go to Berlin for vacation? Because we had a friend temporarily in residence. Because my husband spent a year in school there decades ago and wanted to see it how it had changed. And because we could afford it, unlike the rest of Europe. Eighteen years after the Berlin wall was reduced to rubble, the city's economy is still depressed. The prices are far lower than in other European capitals -- meaning that Americans need not fear the $10 cup of coffee, as in Paris, for example. In short, Berlin is a bargain.

The city has become a mecca for creative young people from all over the world, partly because they can afford to live there. Art galleries are sprouting everywhere, especially in the formerly East Berlin districts of Mitte and Prenszlauer Berg. On our second day in the city, we visited an exhibition by the American artist Mike Kelley, who has created a spellbinding multi-media work based on the imaginary Kandor, which, you may recall, is the capital of Superman's home planet Krypton.

Berlin's art and cultural museums are world famous - and many of the most sensational ones are conveniently bunched on an island in the Spree River, which winds through the city. The ensemble of 175-year-old museums offers as intense a culture fix as anyplace I've been.

You can go to Berlin for its over-the-top techno clubs as well. And you can even go to Berlin for the waters, to borrow a line from Rick in Casablanca. The Spree River offers the agreeable possibility of circumnavigating Berlin on a sightseeing boat. We sampled all of these things except for the technoclubs, which we only heard about. (They don't really get going until well after midnight.)

Much of our time we spent trying to get a sense of Berlin's turbulent history, and its ambivalent approach to remembering and forgetting. The recent past, when much of the city was under Soviet domination, is well documented. Our curiosity piqued by the recent Academy-Award-winning thriller, The Lives of Others, we visited the Stasi Museum as well as the Stasi Archive.

The East German secret police, we learned, behaved very much as they did in the movie: steaming open people's mail, bugging anything that could be bugged, and encouraging everyone to inform on everyone else. A recently opened interactive museum devoted to everyday life in East Germany had on display an actual Trabant, the famous plastic car produced in the German Democratic Republic (GDR). But for me the most memorable exhibit was the photographic mural of 10 toddlers seated on adjacent potties - regimented toilet training, East German style. We also visited a section of the Berlin Wall that has been transformed into an outdoor art installation.

The Nazi era is treated with a surprising degree of candor and directness in Berlin. The heavily attended Holocaust Memorial and Museum deals head on with terrible history of the Third Reich. At the Olympic Stadium, Hitler's propaganda showcase, there are still-standing Nazi era sculptures, their bases ringed with swastikas. These the government has partially obliterated by filling in one arm. Although some Berliners favor demolishing the statues, others believe that the art should be left in place as a reminder of Germany's darkest past. “You can't overcome history by denying it,” said one observer.

Between its vibrant art and music scene and its active engagement with history, Berlin is an exciting place to visit. If you are in the mood to be stimulated without breaking the bank, this may be Europe's best bet.