It was my first time in Germany.Oct 75 I had just loaded up on the bus to go to the replacment company when I saw the first of many mil. trucks in camo. It was that odd camo that was in place at that time frame. It was the dirty sand with green and black in big spotchs. I ask myself what kind of camo is that, a wanbe desert como in Germany? Wierd

Somewhat...alien, but in a few days..it was heaven.

You have to take into account that I had PCS'd from Ft.Polk and the 5th ID...was stationed with the 218th in VII Corps in Bad Tolz...I had my own room, a balcony, and view of the Alps every morning. What's not to love?

My first impression came while settling in at the local gasthouse (hotel) my first night. There were only two TV stations and someone had tried to crash the gate at Berlin to escape from the east. It looked like a faded blue Scooby-Doo Mystery Machine sort of van. The film was taken from the W.Berlin side, some distance away. The guards fired up the van and you could see bodies being pulled from the front doors. My first thought was, "People are dying trying to escape." It was a sobering thought.

Another sobering thought, my August LES just adjusted my longevity. It's been 26 years this week since I first enlisted and 27 years next month since I put on my first pair of combat boots.

I waited until 1984 to read thre novel "1984," right at the time I was sent to Berlin. Everyone said Orwelle's predictions for the future were way off. For the rest of the world, perhaps, When I crossed over into East Berlin within two days of my arrival, his predictions were dead balls on. VoPo's and certainly StaSi would follow us around, trying to intimidate us. Big Brother was definitely evident everywhere - cameras mounted on all of the buildings around Alexanderplatz, Soviet Liason vehicles always seeming to be idling near an intersection before you even got to it. And of course, like the book, the Sovs were busy changing history by airbrushing people out of photos and deleting any mention of them in the history books.
My impressions of West Berlin were much more favorable. A plethora of excellent cafes, the AVUS (great for racing bikes up and down on in the middle of the night) and of course the girls.
All you needed then was a good haircut, a pretty good command of the German language, and a hot bike. Those were the days. Of course, being stationed there lost some its charm when Major Nicholson was murdered. and when LaBelle's was bombed. Contrary to what a former Armorama member thinks, it was no party. We ran the wall, did wall patrols locked and loaded. and screwed with the Sovs at every opportunity. Then we would drink beer and make trades with those same Sovs when we took the duty train through the DDR.
My first impressions will always be my best memories of Berlin. I went on a three day pass from Afghanistan in '03, and it had changed to much I hardly recognized it. The East had caught up with and in many ways surpassed the West. My old Kaserne was a museum, and a lot of my favortie haunts had changed ownership. Still, I can't wait to go back.

I first arrived at Rhein-Main in '81, as the bus took me from Frankfurt to Geissen I remember thinking that the German countryside was beautiful, but every hilltop seemed to have something military on it. Back then Germany looked like some vast military post, but with very good beer!

My first impression of Germany was great. After arriving at the Frankfurt airport, my sponsor drove me and my wife to Zirndorf, the village where our kaserne was. As we drove into the half timbered town right after lunch, the whole downtown was blocked off for the Fasching parade. Good stuff!
Robert, you were in Berlin when LaBelle's was bombed? So was I. My battery had replaced the Berlin Brigade battery so that it could go to the West and fire. We were half way into our month in Berlin when LaBelle's was bombed. We had 11 guys wounded to include my jeep driver who had a chunk taken out of his thigh. Me, the BC, and XO spent all the next day driving around Berlin trying to find all of our people since they were taken to civilican hospitals all over the city. Up till then, our Berlin trip was a nice change from all the Graf rotatations. After the bombing, it was a totally different atmosphere.
George

well i got to Bamberg, Germany in Jul of 05 and deployed to iraq OCT 05 to Oct 06, then Jan 07-Mar-07 to Afghanistan (got injured and had to come back) spent all the way up to Aug of 08 gettign better, then went back to Iraq and now im going home. i missed out on alot of traveling i was planning on doing but got to see so much i woudnt have without the army. Bavaria is so beautiful im going to miss it alot but overall i thing Germany was a blast.