Following Dirk down the sidewalk along Karl-Mark-Allee, a boulevard built during the days of the German Democratic Republic, and looking at the pre-fabricated apartment buildings, I imagined what life was like in a 1949 – 1990 East Berlin behind the Berlin Wall. Admittedly, I am ignorant when it comes to historical events around the GDR, a totalitarian Communist dictatorship, but with each step during the tour, Dirk painted a vivid image of what that life looked like through engaging the five senses.  Dirk Engelhardt is a journalist who has lived in Berlin for about 30 years and has done so much research on what life was like behind the Wall that he has researched and published a guidebook about East Berlin during the GDR days (currently only available in German). He has also written other travel guides, such as 111 Places in Barcelona That You Must Not Miss. I found him through Airbnb’s Experiences options which connects travelers to locals for authentic experiences. I’m not a fan of big groups and the tour group consisted of a young couple from the Pacific Northwest and me.    During this nearly three-hour tour, through the use of the five senses, Dirk brought the former East Berlin to life. Sight: Seeing Architecture and Design of the GDR Obviously, this walking tour of East Berlin was a very visual experience which beings the World Clock in Alexanderplatz, a major gathering point and transportation hub, and Dirk quizzed participants on whether we thought specific buildings were built before, during, or after the GDR. Within the experience, I learned how to determine if a building was built during the GDR. The best I can describe it is the Mike Brady Style of Architecture. I don’t think Mike Brady Architecture is a “thing” but in my warped mind it is. I’m referencing Mike Brady of the 70s sitcom The Brady Bunch, who was an architect, and the design has distinct angles and long rectangles, somewhat similar to the Sarasota School of Architecture which is of a similar time period. In addition to Kino International (a cinema which screened state-produced films at the time, today it’s an art house and was screening a film called The Florida Project, which I thought was a little ironic), some of the other buildings I saw with this style of architecture were a Soviet Union-era restaurant called Café Moskau, and Neues Deutschland headquarters, which was the official socialist newspaper and today is a bit more mainstream (there was a way, cool non-stop elevator called a paternoster. I didn’t get to try it out but Dirk demonstrated), I also viewed a mural with specific socialist message and prefab apartments which could be built in a day. There were really so many interesting sights on this tour including a billboard advertising LKW Tatra Motokov on top of an apartment building on Karl-Marx-Allee. Tatra is one of the oldest auto brands in the world, a Czech-based company founded in 1850. Many buildings lining Karl-Marx-Allee in East Berlin had billboards, it was a way to promote a product (although, products were limited and controlled by the government) during the military parades. I learned this particular billboard is the only one left and the residents of the apartment building insisted it remain as a reminder. She Said “Ja” While waiting for the tour to begin, I witnessed something beautiful. I was snapping photos of the Fountain of International Friendship and didn’t realize what I was witnessing until after the fact, a couple got engaged in front of the historic monument! (Built in 1970) Sound: Listening to History and Music Sight and sound are pretty obvious for a walking tour and...