alexanderplatz is these days the touristic heart of the capital.t was the main public square in communist east berlin. so i was born in 1990, which is a year after the berlin wall came down, so for myself and i'm sure for generation younger, there is no recollection of those news events, so being able to be here and just get a sense of what it might have been like is still quite special. by 1989, the berlin wall had forcibly divided the city for 28 years, with the communists controlling the eastern part of the city while the capitalist west controlled the rest of berlin. travel between the two was strictly controlled, and in most cases, forbidden. but i'm heading down into the u—bahn, berlin's underground rail network, which i can access with the deutschlandticket. 0k, u8 this way. ooh! now, alexanderplatz was in the east, so anybody getting on the u—bahn, three stops in that direction, had to wait on board while they got safely four stops down that way. this was effectively a ghost station. they were manned, guarded — you definitelyjust could not