Archives: My Favorite Thing

Joe Giacoponello of Garden City remembers being in Berlin on business 17 years ago months after the collapse of the Berlin Wall. While visiting the spot where the wall had stood, he couldn't resist taking a piece home as a souvenir. Giacoponello, 67, has since retired from the hotel business, but he recently had Newsday staff writer Daniel Bubbeo check in with him about his historic artifact:

What made you take part of the wall home?

It was about midnight, and a few of us had just come from a business function. We decided to walk to the wall [site], and at this point you could climb up to the top. At the top, there was a promenade, and you could look over from the East side into the West side. At one point, I looked over, and there was an East German guard down by his post. ... He had a machine-gun in his hand, and he was looking up at us, and we were looking down at him. I thought it was extraordinary to think of all these people who had been killed trying to escape from the East to the West, and here we were up there promenading along while this East German guard was looking at us. So I picked up this piece and decided to keep it as a memento of that moment.

Did you notice anyone else grabbing a piece?

I don't remember, because it was night. ... But I keep thinking - with all the security they have at airports today - if I would have been able to get this piece home at all. It might have raised a lot of suspicion.

What was the mood like in Berlin then?

Around the wall, it was very exciting. There were people mulling about, even at that time of night on both sides of the wall. There were a number of people up at the top of the wall in that particular spot just kind of absorbing the history. ... Doing something that had never been done before on a scale like that was the thrill of it all. It was a very special moment for me. (Newsday / Alan Raia, Newsday / Alan Raia / March 26, 2008)