The East German Sandmann

Today is the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, and I’m here in Germany visiting as many new German babies as I can. I lived in Eastern Germany after reunification, and all my German friends are in the middle of a late baby boom — just like my friends back home.

One thing that keeps coming up: it turns out that if you grew up in East Germany and start raising kids now in a unified Germany, you miss your old toys and children’s characters. In the absence of Barbie and My Little Pony and other such Western decadences, East Germans had a staple of homegrown cartoons and comics, few of which were overtly political (unlike, say, Assud the Hamas Bugs Bunny, who promised to “eat the Jews” after Farfur the Gazan Mickey Mouse was “martyred” by Israeli soldiers).

Of course, what happened in Germany after 1989 was less a Reunification than a complete cultural takeover by West Germany, and children’s literature and television wasn’t spared. Which is why I was so happy to see Sandmann lying near little Frieda’s crib in Luebeck. He was a little action figure based on the beloved East German children’s TV character, a kind of sleep-Santa with a billygoat beard and a satchel of sleep-sand that he uses to put children to bed. Today as in the former GDR, the Sandmann comes on TV for 10 minutes twice a day–at 5:50pm and 6:50pm–tells a good-night story, and then tosses a bit of sleep-sand to all the kids at home. The best part is the GDR-original song, a sweet little ditty that will haunt your dreams like another pseudo-German, Freddy Krueger.

Actually, Sandmann was such a beloved character that even before the Wall came down, West Germany copied him and started running its own version. Which is perhaps why he was allowed to live (my admittedly biased East German friends said the West’s Sandmann was basically the same, just that he told slightly more boring stories). Another survivor, for older kids: the Mosaik comics led by Abrafaxe, a trio who look like the offspring of Asterix and Smurfette. It’s now the best-selling comic in both Eastern and Western Germany

Now, I’m not saying that I’m going to run out and get a Masters of the Universe Battle Hawk for Nico, but there is something nice about having some touchstone characters from your own childhood around. The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Babar, whatever: It doesn’t take much. Continuity is nice. So today I’ll be thinking of the things that haven’t changed in 20 years, like Sandmann.