double streets, mendacious and delusive streets
vasarą skaičiau the city & the city, labai taikli ir graži knyga.
A common form of establishment, for much of Besźel’s history, had been the DöplirCaffé: one Muslim and one Jewish coffeehouse, rented side by side, each with its own counter and kitchen, halal and kosher, sharing a single name, sign, and sprawl of tables, the dividing wall removed. Mixed groups would come, greet the two proprietors, sit together, separating on communitarian lines only long enough to order their permitted food from the relevant side, or ostentatiously from either and both in the case of freethinkers. Whether the DöplirCaffé was one establishment or two depended on who was asking: to a property tax collector, it was always one.
šiandien, bežiūrėdama, kaip reikės važinėti, radau tokį:
Friedrichstraße station, though served by western lines and located in East Berlin territory, was not a Geisterbahnhof. Instead, it served as a transfer point between U6 and several S-Bahn lines. Western passengers could walk from one platform to another without ever leaving the station or needing to show papers, much like air travellers changing planes at an international airport. Westerners with appropriate papers (visas) could also enter East Berlin here.
The Bornholmer Straße S-Bahn station was the only ghost station not located in a tunnel. It was situated close to the wall nearby the Bornholmer Straße border crossing. West Berlin trains passed through it without stopping. East Berlin S-Bahn trains passed the same station close by on different tracks. The tracks used by western and eastern trains were sealed off from each other by a tall fence.
Another oddity was Wollankstraße station. Like Bornholmer Straße, it was an S-Bahn stop served by West Berlin trains but located on East Berlin territory just behind the border. However, Wollankstraße was in use and accessible for West Berliners, as one of its exits was open to a West Berlin street; this exit was exactly on the border line, a warning sign next to it informing passengers about the situation. Its other exits towards East Berlin streets were locked.