Is there anything in my life that I have been complicit in that, looking back through a 21st-century lens, would be seen as abhorrent? Indeed there is.

The main focus of this border was to stop anyone from defecting into the West. Attempting to leave the GDR illegally was a very dangerous undertaking. You might end up in prison for many years...or dead. At the Marienborn checkpoint alone, about ten people lost their lives trying to cross to the West.

I moved to New Zealand in 2015, and compared to the other countries I have lived in – Scotland, France and Portugal - I would say it is the fairest society of the four. Indeed, New Zealand regularly makes it into the top positions in rankings of  the most honest and least corrupt countries in the world – usually alongside the Scandinavian nations.

People were fearful, blood was shed and there was even an attempted coup d'état, but we also had exceptional and courageous people (politicians and civil ones) who all worked together with one goal: Democracy.