Berlin – the town I was born, the place I live, the city I love – is only one of over 100 cities, villages and places world wide called ‘Berlin’. Throughout history people have again and again called places ‘Berlin’ for various reasons – be it german missioners or colonists calling a spot ‘Berlin’ where they could build a harbour or be it german immigrants, calling their new found home after the german capital when they finally settled down in the United States of America.
In the US alone there are dozens of places called Berlin – even though many towns changed their name after the first and again after the second world war. But also in Russia and in many other countries people decided to call their city Berlin – and in most if not all cases they named it after the german capital Berlin.
Just recently a couple of german TV broadcasting stations and media institutions teamed up and produced a comprehensive documentary report which is available in different formats: as a one-piece video stream, as an interactive web-documentary and ‘in pieces’ on youtube. I highly recommend watching it since it’s really quite some entertainment – and a totally different view on “a place called Berlin”
On the website of Deutsche Welle you can watch video stream english version of the ‘linear’ documentary report split in two: www.dw.de/program/worldwide-berlin/s-101261-9798
Here you’ll find the english version of the interactive web-documentary, featuring additional clips from the world’s various Berlins: www.worldwideberlin.com/en/
And here’s the youtube channel of worldwideberlin with lots of short clips from all over the world: www.youtube.com/channel/UClcOMPrMtL9tSV2861OyVAg
Also interesting: a radio special “How Many Berlins Are There In The U.S.?” by NPR News Berlin focusing on the Berlins located in the United States of America: http://www.nprberlin.de/post/how-many-berlins-are-there-us