Filming a revolution
Berlin: I was reporting from this city 20 years ago, when the Wall came down. It was an unforgettable experience, which I have tried to describe below. You can also watch below an excerpt of the report I filed then for Panorama.
This time I am in Berlin to report on the anniversary of the fall of the Wall, and I've been revisiting the scene of some of the events I witnessed in 1989.
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The following account is based on notes I made at the time:
On the evening of 9 November 1989, I was at the back of a hall in East Berlin when Guenther Schabowski, a party official, used these words: "If you want to go, you are free to leave."
It was difficult to know what he meant.
I returned to my hotel and mid-evening I heard loud voices. I picked out the word "Freiheit" - "Freedom" - shouted over and over again. On the street, people, couples, groups were tumbling out of apartment buildings. Many were young, their faces alive, daring to believe. We headed through the dimly-lit streets towards Checkpoint Charlie, one of the crossing points to West Berlin.
Suddenly, it seemed, we were no longer individuals but a crowd, drawn close by an unspoken hope. As we neared the checkpoint we slowed. From the West German side we could hear cheering, the sounds of a party, of celebration. In that moment, defined by a distant sound, some around me knew their world had changed and they embraced, their tears running on to the shoulders of friends.
Ahead of us were East German guards, edgy and uncertain, standing back in the shadows. Beyond them, on the other side of checkpoint Charlie was a bear, a dancing bear. Someone placed an East German border guard's cap on its head and the crowd laughed and drank from bottles.
Then a middle-aged couple walked past me towards the crossing and just kept walking. Two ordinary anonymous people. The crowd fell silent and watched this slow agonising walk into history. The guards did not stop them. They just checked out. On the West German side there was a roar and the couple were swallowed up in celebration. A man hugged me and we never exchanged a word.
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With my cameraman and producer we walked towards the Brandenburg Gate. In front of us was the wall and a line of police. A man in a black leather jacket and blue jeans appeared on top of the wall. He stood there, legs apart, his arms outstretched, his fingers spread in a gesture of victory. Some East German guards turned a fire-hose on him but it seemed half-hearted and soon others were on the wall, stamping on it, revelling in their defiance.
As we waited, I noticed army trucks arriving and border guards began moving to our right and left. They were clearly visible, back-lit by an orange light. We all feared that shooting might start and we looked for cover, but the guards stood around as if waiting for orders. Then some young men jumped off the wall into East Berlin and walked towards the police lines where we were standing. They were smiling and offered their hands to the police, who stood there bewildered. And in those gestures of hesitation, of uncertainty, the authority of the German Democratic Republic, with its feared secret police, the Stasi, crumbled.
It is the curse of authoritarian regimes that at the moment they reform themselves and relax their grip they are at their most vulnerable. The crowd around us sensed it and was no longer afraid. A couple with a sparkler walked towards the wall, shrugging off police requests to stay back, but the request had been polite, pleading, and it only encouraged others to follow. They showed no hostility towards the police, they just humiliated them.
The police held their lines but the people streamed through. They were pulled up on to the wall and stood there looking down on two sides of a divided city. A man was passed a pickaxe and began chipping pieces off the wall. Surely now, I thought, force would be used, but it was already too late. The crowd had tasted freedom and without terrible bloodshed it could not be taken from them. We stayed there most of the night, filming a revolution, savouring the moments when every stranger was a friend and anything seemed possible.
I'm 
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