U2 drives deep into germany/ the manager finds his manger/ fly the friendly skies/ larry brings down the berlin wall/ a video shoot is planned/ bono goes ton ton/ a guest editorial by johnny rotten

paul mcguinness elects not to fly to Berlin on the Zoo plane. The autobahn presents him with a rare opportunity to let his Jaguar rip, and he intends to take it. There is a secondary motive for the manager's intention to split off from the tour in Ger­many; he wants to find the place where he was born. Yes, the cat's out of the bag. Like Colonel Tom Parker, that alleged Southern gentleman who turned out later to be an illegal immigrant, Paul McGuinness was born in the Rhineland. Unlike Colonel Tom there was nothing surrepti­tious about Paul's nativity—his father was stationed in Germany with the occupation forces when the future mogul made his first grand entrance on June 16, 1951. Paul follows his directions to the town of Rintein, where he pulls into a gas station and asks another customer if he can direct him to the British Military Hospital. The other customer knows exactly where the hospital is; he's an obstetrician. The doctor points out the way to the hospital and then notices the license plates on Paul's Jaguar. With some embarrassment the doctor tells Paul that he will have to report him, as those are Irish plates and, well, the IRA has taken a couple of cracks at this military installation. Paul hands the doctor his card and says, "Here's my name and number, do what you have to."

The rest of the tour party is passing overhead in the luxury of the Zoo plane, a 727 with a big "Z" painted on the tail fin. All the seats on the plane are first-class size, and arranged in rows of two, facing each other with aisles wide enough for horse racing. The PA plays Prince,

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Guns N' Roses, and Luka Bloom. The Sunday papers are laid out, the flight attendants are piling on the food, and the drinks come in crystal flutes and goblets. Traveling like this makes you realize how little the usual tension of air travel has to do with the actual flying. If you take away the traffic, bag checking, flight delays, hectic terminals, and cramped on-board conditions, the up in the air part is kind of fun. It would be worth driving the Zoo plane to Berlin.

Coming into the city the mood darkens considerably. U2's caravan of cars swings around a park filled with white wooden crosses, a hasty memorial to the victims of AIDS. Thirteen thousand experts are con­vening here this week for the Ninth International Conference on AIDS, and their view is pessimistic. The more they learn about this new plague the farther off a cure seems to be.

Like Parisians and New Yorkers, Berliners have a superficial gruffness that can be startling when you've gotten used to the friendliness of the outlying areas. Right now Berlin is going through an identity crisis and the streets crackle with the feeling of a collective psyche on the edge of a nervous breakdown. The city has probably had to endure more symbolic weight in the last half century than any place could bear, and the cracks are showing. After Hitler, after destruction, invasion, and conquest, Berlin woke up to find itself the split symbol of the clash between communism and capitalism. East Berlin was subdued by the Soviet-sponsored police state. West Berlin was colonized less brutally but no less totally. The NATO countries were faced with the dilemma of how to keep West Berliners from deserting the city in the face of impending Soviet invasion and the thousand inconveniences of being isolated from the rest of the free world. Many families could not be enticed to stay under any circumstances—parents want their children to be safe, not symbols. To hold the rest of the population, Berlin offered government-subsidized apartments and other official enticements. Young men who chose to live in Berlin were exempted from national service. That drew the young and single, artists and free spirits, who in turn transformed Berlin into a bastion of twenty-four hour a day excitement, entertain­ment, and stimulation. West Berlin became the most progressive city in Europe, a constant reminder to the gray dominion in the east how much fun they were missing.

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