I was able to visit
East Germany in the early 1970s with my father, who was born in Prussia which later became East Germany after WWII.
Long story short: following Hitler’s rise to power in the 1930’s my father jumped ship from a German merchant vessel in New York harbor, and after the US joined the war in Europe he enlisted in the US Army and returned to Europe to fight Nazi Germany.
After the war ended he returned to the US to live out his life.
When I was a teen my father decided to visit his surviving relatives in his country of birth, and as a US citizen had to go through vigorous Visa requirements: only men older than 65 and children younger than 18 would be allowed to enter. He had to pay exorbitant advanced booking and registration fees, and provide an itinerary with precise locations of where he would be for each day he was in country along with the names and addresses of all relatives he intended to visit. Several of his relatives were in the military or police, and were not permitted to have a US citizen visit them.
The Visa was granted and we entered through one of a few train corridors into East Germany. I remember that the train was lively with conversation and passengers mingled and walked freely about the train. But that all changed when we arrived at the border crossing. The train passed a No Man’s Land complete with barbed wire, walls and guard towers. The landscape also changed – we had passed many small towns with clean streets, smartly painted homes, and lots of activity. But the other side looked like one big ghetto. Everything seemed to be gray and dingy. I saw very few vehicles on the roads, mostly trucks, almost no passenger cars.
Also the mood on the train changed - everyone on the train had become very quiet and no one was moving about the carriages. Once the train came to a halt at the check point, East German soldiers appeared with AK-47s. Some boarded the train while others searched underneath the train cars. When two soldiers entered our cabin, as clichéd as it sounds, they sternly asked to “zee our papers”.
We were directed to the security hall where our papers were scrutinized, our luggage was thoroughly checked, and my father was seemingly interrogated. My father had to pay what seemed like a fortune in processing fees and taxes, all in West German Marks. He also had to purchase a set amount of East German currency for each day of his visit, and the exchange rate was one West German Mark for one East German Mark (later when we exchanged back the conversion was ten EG Marks to one WG Mark). We were given a list of government-approved hotels, ‘Interhotels’ that cost many times more than what a regular hotel cost and we had to be checked-in to our room by 10pm each night.
Several times we were accosted by police while walking through the city and had to produce our papers. Once we even were escorted to a police station where my father was interviewed by what seemed to be a high government official.
I recall that our relatives still had a privately-owned business, a bakery, and that their store would sell out in only two hours after patrons waited around the corner for them to open. Unlike the state-owned stores where one day you could buy lettuce but no tomatoes and a few days later the situation was reversed, my relatives used what they grew on their farm out in the country to make pies and baked goods not available in the state-owned stores. But their success had a time limit as once the patriarch died the ownership of the bakery would revert to the government. And the income taxes were outrageous – I don’t remember exactly but I know it was well over 50%! I recently researched the subject and found that
the East German Tax Reform Law of March, 1990 reduced the confiscatory top rates for income tax from 90% to 60%! 
My relatives explained to us that
they could not stop working to take a vacation whenever they wanted – they had to put in a request to the local government to be approved, and had to go when and where they were told.
They could also not buy everything they wanted – the only cars available were an East German Trabant or a Soviet Lada… and you were put on a waiting list take could take almost a year. And if your car broke down, you had to leave it at a garage where it could take months to get the needed replacement parts.
It seemed like everyone was living a dreary, dead-end existence in East Germany. There was no motivation to doing better or having any life goals, and you did not have the freedom to do what you wanted or when. And you felt like you were constantly under observation and everything you did was monitored! I felt so sorry for my relatives
, and was glad to return to the good old US. I will never forget my Socialist experience!
What has been your experience visiting or living in a Socialist country?
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