Simone - A tragic story about friendship and loss in Berlin
Simone - A tragic story about friendship and loss in Berlin
secrets in the family
Berlin, at the end of the 1980s. Two young women, Simone and Anja, celebrate, dance, travel and fall in love with the east of the city. They grow up and enjoy their lives until the wall falls and everything changes at rapid speed. Simone travels through the world while Anja gets a child, married and begins to work. Although they live apart, they don't lose sight of each other. Until the day that Simone takes life and Anja remains.
Who was Simone? And why did she take this step? In order to find answers to these questions, the author Anja Reich takes a journey back to her friend's life and her own. She speaks to relatives, friends and experts, searched through letters, diaries and other documents and summarizes the result of this search in a book.
The book "Simone" by Anja Reich will be published on August 15, 2023 on the publisher. In an exclusive preliminary print, this article offers an insight into the beginnings of history.
One day before her death, Simone Anja called again. Anja remembers exactly what it was like, but she didn't have time back then. At that moment she stood in the hallway of her apartment and had her hands full. Her son played on the floor, her sister ran over, her mother talked to her father. Anja secretly watched her out of the corner of the eye.
It was in October 1996, her son's fourth birthday and her father's 58th birthday. Although they had their birthday on the same day, they had never celebrated together. Anja's parents had divorced when she was six years old, and after that she was rarely able to see her father. For a long time she didn't even know when he's her birthday. In her family there were certain things that were talked about and others that were not talked about. The things that Anja interested belonged to the latter category.
When her son was born, Anja remembers that her sister said to her: "Our father also has his birthday today". That day he came to the hospital and for the first time since the divorce, Anja saw her parents together again. They stood on their son's bed and looked at him. Anja thought it was a sign to bring the family together again.
That should be that time on October. Anja left the editorial team earlier than usual, picked up her son from the daycare center and returned home. The doorbell rang at five o'clock. Her father stood before. She hugged him and noticed how his bar stubble scratched. He smelled of pipe tobacco.
"Happy birthday," said Anja.
he stroked her cheek and asked how she was doing. Anja replied that she was doing well and that she has a lot to do. Then she regretted her answer because she remembered how her father would have liked to do. His institute had recently been closed and he had lost his work as a chemist. To pass the time, he picked up Anja's son from the daycare center every day and took excursions to the Natural History Museum - as with Anja and her sister.
Anja remembers how her son got coming when she spoke to her father. Her father gave him his gift. It was a video cassette that Anja's son already had. He threw himself on the floor and started screaming. Anja's sister suggested exchanging the cassette. Anja's mother took her father off her father. At that moment, Anja would have loved to scream.
Suddenly Anja's husband asked if everything was okay. Anja says that of course this has nothing to do with Simone, but she tells it because she is looking for explanations why she noticed nothing when Simone called her. She was busy with herself and was stuck in the past, so that she did not notice what happened in the present.
The phone rang when Anja's family just wanted to start dinner. It was an old landline phone with a stripping connected to the listener. Anja rang the bell, hoping that the caller would give up at some point. But the phone rang on.
Finally, Anja's husband lost his nerves and picked up the listener. Anja watched as he was on the phone and laughed. He seemed to enjoy the break from the children's birthday and Anja's family experiment. Anja was about to sit down with the guests when she heard her husband "Simone" whisper.
Simone! Anja and Simone have known each other in Berlin-Lichtenberg since their youth. Anja used to have been with Simone's brother. When the relationship was over, Simone and Anja remained friends. Simone wrote cards, bought gifts and sometimes surprisingly visited Anja. Their appearance was impressive - large, slim, dark hair, almond -shaped eyes and eyebrows that almost grew together. Simone was often thought to be a Spaniard or South American because her mother was Czech. She spoke fluent Spanish, Russian and French, danced tango and salsa, visited hairdressing salons, played guitar and went on vacation with her parents.
Anja remembered that there was no one as well as Simone in the GDR. She lived the life she had always dreamed of - a life without defects. Simone was an "East Berlin High-Society Girl" for which the wall fell at exactly the right time. With ZW