"During the summer before the 4th of September, Hungary had opened its borders to Austria and many East Germans had fled, East Germans were sitting in the West German Embassy in Prague and demanded to be allowed to leave for West Germany. In a way we benefited from this situation, as almost every family in East Germany had “lost” a relative or a friend in this summer. It was a sad and depressed mood. And we had to take a stance – why was it that we as opposition were still in the country and why we thought it was important to stay and to fight for how we wanted to live in our country. Before the 4th of September most of our work as opposition had happened secretly and undercover in small groups, but at this day Gesine and I decided that we literally need “to move” out of the church if we want to start a movement and we need to give that move a face and voice, if we want others to trust, to understand and to follow. If I look back, I would say that pretty much worked out brilliantly."
-Katrin Hattenhauer, member of the GDR-opposition movement and civil rights activist, she marked the beginning of the Monday Demonstrations by demonstrating for a “Free Country With Free People."-pictured to the right
