Down the Road

Photographs and stories by Jim Grey

Tag: Berlin

  • Wanted by the FBI

    A story of the time I was wanted by the FBI.

  • Captured: Inside the Olympic stadium

    Down the Road is on hiatus, returning Monday, 26 September. I’m rerunning old posts in the meantime. I spent the summer of 1984 in Germany on an exchange trip with other Hoosier high-school German students. While the trip’s purpose was to immerse us in the German language and culture, we did travel around Germany a little.…

  • Wanted by the FBI

    On my flight to Germany in the summer of 1984, engine trouble forced us to land in Düsseldorf rather than in Frankfurt as planned. Because Düsseldorf expected no international flights that day, nobody was working in customs. My passport went unstamped, and I waltzed into Germany uncounted. How very un-German. Several weeks later, my group…

  • It happened at the Wall

    Germany was still divided in 1984. We could not know that in five years the Cold War would end, marked dramatically on our televisions by video of East Germans spilling over the Berlin Wall and through its checkpoints. We had all seen photos of it in our history books, of course, and maybe even in…

  • Captured: You are now leaving West Berlin

    It was hard to go far in Berlin in 1984 without the Wall hemming you in or blocking your way. My tour group followed it across the heart of the city to the Brandenburg Gate, which in those days stood just inside East Berlin. The white railing was the actual border between east and west;…

  • Wanted by the FBI

    I’m kicking off 2012 with a blatant rerun from May of 2007. It’s a funny story. Enjoy, and happy new year! When I was 16, I spent a summer on an exchange program in Krefeld, Germany with 30 other teenaged Hoosiers. On the flight over, engine trouble forced us to land in Düsseldorf rather than in Frankfurt…

  • Re-integrating joy

    My recent post about my renovated elementary school reminded me of this post I wrote when my blog was new and almost nobody was reading it. It shares some memories of Kindergarten in that school. So I’ve dusted it off, edited it a little, and added photos. My dad once told me that I was…

  • Captured: Inside the Olympic stadium

    I spent the summer of 1984 in Germany on an exchange trip with other Hoosier high-school German students. While the trip’s purpose was to immerse us in the German language and culture, we did travel around Germany a little. We spent most of a week in Berlin seeing the sights, including a stop at the Olympic…

  • It happened at the Wall

    I spent the summer of 1984 in Germany on an Indiana University exchange program with 29 other Indiana high-school German students. I lived with a kind and patient family in Krefeld for six of the seven weeks I was there; we young Hoosiers spent the seventh week in Berlin. Germany was still divided in 1984.…

  • Wanted by the FBI

    When I was 16, I spent a summer on an exchange program in Krefeld, Germany with 30 other Hoosiers. On the flight over, engine trouble forced us to land in Düsseldorf rather than in Frankfurt as expected. Düsseldorf expected no international flights that day, and so nobody was working in customs. My passport went unstamped;…

  • Re-integrating joy

    My dad once told me that I was the most joyful little boy he had ever known. During my first few years, he said, I seemed to constantly have a big beaming smile on my face, and everything seemed to make me happy. Now, I’m sure I didn’t enjoy it when I got in trouble…

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