The author’s wife, Yvonne, enjoying her childhood

I always love hearing my wife’s stories about childhood life in East Germany. Yvonne was 10 years old when she left for the West before the wall came down (yes, it was possible to leave — just very difficult).

Modern Schneeberg, where Yvonne grew up

I was finally able to visualize her stories on a trip to Germany in 2007. The DDR museum in Dresden is like stepping into a time machine — separate and fully furnished rooms of typical houses and offices rekindled strong memories for Yvonne and provided me with a glimpse into the past. (Another entertaining look back is the film Goodbye Lenin!)

After reading another traveler’s account of his brief visit to East Berlin in 1987, I thought I’d start peppering Yvonne with more questions about what it was like to grow up in the East. The below anecdotes are strictly from her memory, the way she remembered things. I didn’t want to mess that up with any research.

Childhood life in East Germany in the 80s

1. There were no bananas. You could only get them once or twice a year, and you’d only be notified of their availability by word of mouth. So you’d have to rush to the veggie store (not a veggie store as we know it — just cabbages, potatoes…anything grown locally) and stand in line to get your one banana per person in your household.

The ubiquitous Trabant (Kombi model)

To stretch the rations, Yvonne’s mum would quarter the banana, slice it thinly and serve it on bread to her and her sister.

2. You couldn’t buy strawberries from a store. If you wanted them you had to go and work in the fields picking them for hours. You were allowed to buy a certain portion of the ones you picked.

Yvonne remembers her mum telling her, “Don’t worry about picking, just eat as many as you can!”

3. Luxury items were priced way out of proportion to people’s salaries. A black and white TV might cost 10 times a person’s monthly salary; a 200g bag of coffee would cost around $20.

4. If you wanted to buy a car — most likely the ubiquitous Trabant — you had to wait years. Like, 10-12 years. So people who turned 16 (although you had to be 18 to drive) would put their orders in to get their mitts on a car when they were in their late 20s.

5. Yvonne remembers visiting the Baltic Sea twice in her childhood for vacation. They didn’t have much choice of where they could go. Holiday homes were usually linked and subsidized through work and you could obtain use of them once in a while.

6. You could only watch one of a few state channels, but radio waves know no walls (well, except maybe lead ones), so those close to the border were able to pick up signals from the West.

Luckily, Yvonne’s family was able to, so they had some access to the West’s news. Obviously, this was all very hush hush.

7. Every child was part of the Pioneers: Grades 1-4 were Blue Pioneers, 5-7 were Red Pioneers, and grades 8-10 graduated to the Free German Youth (FDJ).

When you first arrived to school, all the students would stand at attention and salute the teacher.

The teacher would say, “Be prepared!”, and the students would reply, “Always prepared!” before giving the salute, and then the day began.

Every 7 October, Yvonne — along with all the other Pioneers — would join in the parade commemorating the birth of the GDR. They dressed up in their Pioneer outfits, waved flags and flowers, and cheered.

Yvonne taking a bath in the sink.

8. Yvonne’s home had no bathtub or shower, only a sink and a toilet. She was fortunate enough to have a grandma with a bath, so once a week they would make their way there. Hot water didn’t just flow out of the taps though.

The water was heated by charcoal stove. A big water tank sat next to the tub with a little stove underneath where charcoal had to be shoveled in. The charcoal was delivered a few times per year by a big truck. They would leave a big pile of it and the residents had to shovel their portion of the coal into their allotted space in the basement.

Even at her own house without tub or shower, they needed to heat the water this way. They lived on the fifth floor, so Yvonne remembers having to walk all the way down to the basement with a couple of buckets and back up with them topped full of charcoal.

The fonder memories

It wasn’t all trying though. Everyone had a job, school lunches were free, after-school care was free, people were generally happy, necessities were extremely cheap, and there was more community spirit than there is nowadays. In those times, there were no Joneses to keep up with.

COMMUNITY CONNECTION

For a beautiful photo essay on modern Berlin through an ex-pat’s lens, check out Paul Sullivan’s Berlin 20/20: A Photo Tour of a Reunited City.

To find out how Berliners are going to celebrate this November 9, check out Two Ways to Celebrate the Fall of the Berlin Wall.

Do you have any of your own stories to tell? Share with us below!

Wedding photos by Philip Chang

I could write about how not to spend money on a wedding — getting married at City Hall or eloping to some far flung place. But this is for those who want to have a more “traditional wedding” without having to take out a second mortgage on their home.

Below are some tips on where and how you can save some cash in planning your wedding, and still make it the beautiful and classy one you always wanted.

Free cherry blossoms

1. Keep the guest count down

Do you really need to invite your third cousin twice removed’s little niece? Stick to those who you keep in touch with on a regular basis. If you haven’t broke bread with someone in over a year, it’s probably not appropriate for them to partake in your day. We kept the guest numbers down by limiting the invitees to immediate family and the closest of friends.

Yes, you may rub some people the wrong way, but this is your day. You have your reasons, and they should be respected.

To take that further, we split the wedding in two parts: ceremony/dinner and par-tay. Half the guests came after dinner to celebrate with us, which also helped keep costs down.

2. Make your own invitations

Another nice thing about keeping the guest count down is you need fewer invitations. This means you should have time to make and send them out yourselves. If you’re crafty like my wife, you can make unique and special cards. We included a blank page in the invitation and requested that the guests make it their page in our guestbook and to bring it to the wedding.

With the time they had we received some really thoughtful and colourful pages to insert into our guestbook. Much more personal than just a couple sentences and a signature, or, worse, drunken words of advice.

3. Use your contacts

If you think about it, you probably know someone who has some handy skills you could take advantage of. Maybe even a friend of a friend. An old high school chum who I occasionally ran into agreed to do our flower arrangements (it just so happened she is a florist). In lieu of payment, we invited her to the wedding.

Friends and family were also more than willing to chip in as they could, some coming to the venue early to help set up decorations and chairs. And speaking of venues…

Barclay Manor in Vancouver’s West End

4. Find a cheap venue

While the big ballroom with floor-to-ceiling glass and a panoramic view over the ocean is ideal, it’s going to be expensive. Find a place that doesn’t normally do weddings.

We scored a beautiful heritage house and struck up a nice little relationship with the events coordinator. We negotiated a great deal and had extra access to the venue for planning purposes and also cleaning up post-wedding.

5. Be your own DJ

Sorry DJs of the world, but you aren’t needed here. We sent out an email to our guests and asked them for song requests. I then mixed everything together myself with MixMeister. It was easy to use and it was fun putting it together, plus it makes a great memento. We still have the original file and dance to it on our anniversary.

At the wedding, you can play this mix from your iPod or laptop. We rented a mixing board and big speakers for party level music. We also got a dancing colour light.

Professional DJ for $1000 or this set-up for $80? You decide.

6. Don’t go pro

It’s not always a case of “you get what you pay for”. We’ve all heard the horror stories of professionals providing less than adequate service. But it also works the other way round. You can get some seriously good service for a discounted price.

Photographer: We found one just starting out in the biz and so was offering a deep discount while he built up his profile. He came with an assistant (with his own camera too) and was with us for eight hours.

Plus, he was willing to give us all the images he (and his assistant) took throughout the day instead of just a set amount of prints.

The “homemade” wedding cake

Videographer: Also a newbie, but as this was his first wedding he offered to do it for free to get his portfolio going. The end result was fantastic and he was extremely professional, polite, and took great care of us.

Caterer: Try a culinary school to keep your catering costs down. If you’re in Vancouver, check out Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts. My mouth is watering just thinking of the food they dished up that night.

We found a cheap and cheerful bartender off Craigslist, where we also found the photographer and videographer. Just make sure you meet with them at least a couple times to make sure you’re comfortable with them.

7. Make your own cake

This is not for the faint hearted, but you can save heaps here. Rather than a sugary, fluffy cake, use one you actually like. We used a tuxedo cake (from Save-On Foods) square base, with a round raspberry and white chocolate cake on top, offset in the corner for artistic purposes. And, of course, decorated it.

8. Find some good, cheap booze

Who says you have to spend over $20 a bottle for some good wine? We tested a bottle or two each week, which was fun in itself, and found a red (Chile) and a white (Germany) for around $10. Same goes for the sparkling stuff, no need for the Dom Perignon.

9. Finally, recoup the costs

I don’t care what people say, I think it’s perfectly fine to ask for cash gifts, especially when the guest knows where it’s going (i.e. travel funds). You can also mix it with a registry of sorts for things you actually need.

Other random things we did to keep the costs down:

We rented a white PT Cruiser — modern, classy AND cheap — and I asked a work colleague to be our chauffeur. We “pruned” the cherry blossom trees around town for some free and beautiful center pieces (do this under the cloak of night).

All unopened bottles of booze and mixers were returned to the liquor store and Safeway, respectively.

Also, Yvonne’s wedding dress was so last year. But it was also so not expensive. And it was so gorgeous.

COMMUNITY CONNECTION

If you’d rather plan a destination wedding than go the traditional route, Matador has the Ultimate Guide to Planning a Destination Wedding.

And we’ll never leave you at the altar– check out 16 Places to Stretch Your Honeymoon Dollar too.

For those of you who have already passed this stage and are on the next phase, you’d best read the Expectant Mom’s Guide to Travel.

How about you? Do you have any wedding money saving tips to share?

Pop them in the comments below!

October 15 was the second annual National Ride to Work Day in Australia. The state of Victoria has been at it for 14 years, but the event has now gone nationwide. National Ride to Work Day is designed to promote awareness of this green and healthy alternative mode of transportation.

Last year 25% of registered riders on National Ride to Work Day were first-timers. Of those freshmen, 29% were still riding to work five months later.

More stats from last year’s event: 299,151 kilometers were diverted from cars to bikes and the atmosphere was spared an estimated 89.17 tons of greenhouse gases.

The numbers don’t lie: the program works.

Making the move

National Ride to Work Day was the perfect opportunity to make my move from train to bike; the last step in my transportation Green Revolution.

I’m no stranger to cycling. I don’t have a car, so if I’m not on a tram, you can find me pedaling down the street with a pannier full of fresh fruit or my tennis rackets slung over my shoulder.

I’ve always thought that biking to work would be a big headache. Lugging around a change of clothes, showering at work, and changing again to ride home didn’t appeal to me. How would I find it?

Photo by celesteh

A natural rush

I discovered I can cycle in the same time it takes to catch a train and amble into the office. And what a way to kick off the day. Who needs coffee? After a quick shower I felt refreshed and energized.

Bike routes and cycle lanes are examples of how cities can show they are serious in coaxing people out of their cars. Melbourne is great in terms of room for bikes on city roads.

But despite dedicated lanes and pathways, most locals will tell you it’s dangerous to ride a bicycle. Why is that?

Crash course in bike safety

When I lived in Vancouver I knew an avid cyclist. One day he kissed his wife and newborn son goodbye and said, “I’ll be back shortly”. Next thing he knew he was in the hospital.

Someone blindly opened a car door as he was cruising by. He caught the corner of the door with his chest, opening a gaping wound, and flew before breaking his wrist on impact with the road.

A couple k’s faster, a few inches to the right, and who knows how it would have ended. He was indeed a lucky man.

We don’t need no education

Apart from providing a strip of asphalt, more should be done to ensure that riders make it safely to and from the office. Driver (re)education and awareness are needed. Right now, biking in the city is akin to those cop training simulations in Police Academy films.

But instead of cardboard pop-ups, it’s a ton of metal on wheels. You’re rolling ahead cautiously and out of nowhere, BAM! a parked car’s door swings open, or ACK!, you’re almost sideswiped as a driver fails to shoulder check.

Photo by kirstykat

The fact is: many drivers don’t respect cyclists. They do things like speeding by and then cutting you off to make a turn. My personal favorite is when they pull out from behind and gun it past rather than passing cautiously. I can imagine their thoughts as they white-knuckle the steering wheel: “Please don’t hit him, please don’t hit him.”

In the same breath, I will also berate riders who don’t respect the rules of the road. Acting unpredictable, swerving between vehicles, and blocking traffic unnecessarily are behaviors that drive motorists mad. We all have a part to play in keeping the relationship amicable.

Who we can learn from

In countries like France, Spain, and Italy, cyclists are revered. In the French countryside, you can’t drive a few clicks without a road sign reminding drivers to give riders a wide berth.

Motoring through the Pyrenees you will encounter groups of cyclists. No one passes them unless it is absolutely safe. Cars line up like a slow road train and follow the pack, but patience rules here. There’s no honking or fist-shaking. Vehicles and bikes live in harmony.

It’s imperative that the culture in bike-unfriendly cities changes. No one should have to feel scared they’re going to meet their maker while they’re simply making a right turn.

Photo by rhurtubia

Well worth the effort

Despite the inherent danger of being on the road with cars, bicycling is a relatively safe activity. In the end it is up to you to be vigilant on the road.

Obey the rules, stay alert, be visible, and please…WEAR A HELMET.

From a financial perspective, it is also worthwhile. I save $1,456 per year in transit costs by riding my bike. If you pay for hot water, have the company foot the bill by showering at work. If you go to the gym solely for a cardio workout, cancel your membership.

It is a rewarding mode of transport. Your body will thank you. The earth will thank you. I’m sure even drivers will thank you; after all, they are one car closer to work in the traffic jam.

If the option is there for you, I say ride with it!

Community Connection

Looking for tips about biking while traveling? Check out Hal Amen’s 8 Steps for Self-Supported Bicycling Tours.