What is history in Germany is reality in Hungary

A couple of weeks ago, I visited the capital of Germany: Berlin. The DDR Museum was a highly recommended place to visit, especially for Hungarians. We did visit the DDR Museum, and to be honest, it was a much more interesting experience than I expected. Here is why.

About the DDR Museum

DDR stands for Deutsche Demokratische Republik, the German Democratic Republic. DDR was the part of Germany that had been occupied by Soviet forces at the end of the Second World War. The DDR Museum is one of the most popular museums in Berlin, and it is known as one of the most interactive museums in the world.

The main goal of the DDR Museum is to show its visitors what everyday life in the former East Germany was like (the Berlin Wall, the Stasi, etc.).

Visitors can see (and hear and very often touch) every little thing that people used on a regular basis back then: food and drinks, toys, clothing, work tools, furniture, magazines (sometimes with nude photos), beauty products, and everything in between that you can imagine.

I definitely recommend checking this place out if you are in Berlin (however, the tickets are not cheap, so if you are travelling on a budget keep this in mind).

Why was this museum so interesting to me, a 24-year-old Hungarian?

History

Similarly to East Germany, Hungary was also occupied by the Soviet Union roughly around the same period (Hungary was occupied between 1944 and 1990, while the DDR existed from 1949 to 1990). Both states were members of the economic organisation called Comecon, The Council for Mutual Economic Assistance lead by the Soviet Union. It was strictly distributed what the particular states were allowed to produce, and at first, people of the Comecon states could only travel freely to the other Comecon states (and not even to all of them). Hungarians could only get a normal passport in as late as 1974. It does not come as a surprise that many things were imported from East Germany, simply because they were not produced in Hungary.

German history, Hungarian reality

I was surprised to see how many things were all too familiar to me in the museum. Mostly kitchen tools, furniture and clothing. And then it hit me where I saw all these things before: at my older relatives’ houses. During the whole tour, I was like “Yeah, my grandmother has the same pot” or “Wow this cabinet looks exactly like the one in my grandpa’s living room.” As it turned out, even I personally use the exact same mixer at home as the one that was displayed in the museum. Here it is in the museum: