REMEMBERING BERLIN 10-10-2020... AND THE BIRTH OF THE WORLD DOCTORS' ALLIANCE
Saturday, the 10th of October, was the anniversary of a special day back in 2020.
Six years ago, we'd just had another major protest in Trafalgar Square on 26th September, which police stormed. I was nearly run over by a mounted police officer and raised my hand to force a stop and, to my astonishment, it worked.
In shock, and now stood to her side, I shouted to the mounted policewoman that I was here to protect her, since she was first in line for the jab.
I won't forget the look on her face.
Nor the look on the younger male police officer on the horse next to her as I told him I was here to protect his children.
I realised what his lopsided smile meant, and shouted, "The kids you haven't had yet!", which wiped the smirk clean off his face
The march ended up back in Hyde Park, with visiting speaker Doctor Shoëning from Germany being arrested.
The next morning, I was outside the South London police station when Dr Shoening was released, and filmed his short speech.
At his invitation to come to Berlin for the 10th, I first I hesitated as was totally broke.
I then put it to the first Not On the Beeb followers, and enough was donated to get the flight.
Barely a week later, I flew to Berlin to film the great protest there (the previous one on 29th September had been reported to be 1m strong) and join the inauguration of the World Doctors' Alliance.
Without wearing a mask (makes the journey memorable!) I flew to Berlin and booked into a budegt hotel near Checkpoint Charlie. Because the hotel was empty, I was upgraded to the penthouse suite.
The hotel, though super modern, felt strange.
There was a gaping hole in the building facade that was the entrance into the building, with an inner side door leading to the hotel reception.
It turned out the building was the old Stasi police HQ.
Back in the Cold War days, this gaping 'hole' was the vehicle entrance, which explained the internal side entrance.
As I enjoyed my suite, I wondered if anyone had been tortured up here in the loft, or if the loft space had just been offices or file storage?
I'd been to East Berlin in 1988 and had returned to the UK shaking my head, saying I could never foresee the West and East Germany reuniting. In my mind, the differences between both were too big and too 'set in'.
Barely 18 months later, we all watched the wall being dismantled and I was taught a vital lesson.
"The seemingly impossinle is always possible."
After Del Big Tree's The High Wire had taken my feed from the 29th August Protest and gained 1.3m views, we arranged to also link the Berlin footage.
I was with a friend who was also filming for RFK's Children's Health Defence.
We went into the press conference for the inauguration of the World Doctors Alliance and nearly didn't make it.
Someone who is, or acts as, UK-controlled opposition tried to tell us the press conference was cancelled and sent us in the wrong direction.
Luckily, someone slipped up on a phone call, and we realised the ruse and rushed back. The German hosts welcomed us and desperately ushered us in as the announcement of the WDA had already started.
I set up my camera up fast.
I will never forget how my hands shook with anger.
I'm not very good at facing deception and betrayal by someone I'd trusted and helped and even offered accommodation to
The adrenaline surge lasted 11 minutes.
Eleven minutes? I know because the red light was on with a timer, and it was that long before I dared to touch and readjust my camera.
Just as I became calm and we all clapped after the first speech, the next issue hit.
The hotel threw us all out because there were more than the allowed six of us in a room.
I'd take a guess there were 60 of us.
A core team then reassembled at one of the doctor's house deep in the Berlin suburbs. My friend and I hired bikes and rode across Berlin to get there.
Outside, we waited our turn patiently in silence.
We were being escorted in two-by-two so as not to alert neighbours or the police.
This was a rich area.
The irony was clear.
Under our feet, as we waited, we noticed the plaques of previous Jewish owners who had been taken away to the camps in WW2.
That evening I filmed another part of the Berlin protest that had stages.
I had worked in Germany when younger, selling my artisan goods illegally on the streets.
I knew to watch my back.
My feed was live in the USA but I kept turning 360'.
Something felt off.
Not the lead compere, who was wearing a woman's mesh g-string across his face as his get around for a 'face covering'... I didnt have a clue what he was saying, but he was making us all laugh.
It was something else.
Something strange.
The crowd was shrinking, not growing.
Why?
The evening and teh acts were warming up and getting going.
I then clicked.
My eyes focused on a slight cuffufal on the very outer rim of the crowd.
Since my street-selling days, I can still spot a uniform at a few hundred meters.
The police were slowly arresting the outliers and taking them away.
I could see that many of those who couls see what was happening were also leaving.
However, others were oblivious, either drowned in the happiness of the music and freedom speeches, or simply uncaring, and stayed.
It was surreal.
When I sold illegally in the UK on the street, those of us know as "the flypitchers' would group together for safety and sell in small lines.
We were safer with more eyes
The police would often leave us alone (we were harmless), but now and then they would rush us all at once and catch who they could.
The Berlin police were using the same tactic I'd seen them use in my street days in Cologne, arresting one by one slowly and secretly.
The tactics under COVID lockdown rules were the same.
In Trafalgar Square, the UK police charged in en masse, snatching microphones and trying to grab the leaders, and we all parted like pigeons and reassembled whn they were gone.
In Germany, the police didn't cause a stampede but worked away slowly but surely, trimming the numbers and filling their cells.
I kept an eye on my back, stayed close to the stage, and kept filming.
As I've said many times before, it was a High Wire TV programme paying for the footage that caused NOTB to be born when they asked for a name on the invoice.
But it was the donations from subscribers and followers that made it all happen.
Want to help?
BOOKS - 3 SECONDS IN BOGOTÁ
This true story happened during the years I was travelling around the world selling on the street.
Click the image to read more...
Comments