Heading along the traffic-filled road between the S-Bahn station Greifswalder Straße and Danziger Straße, it’s impossible to miss the imposing bronze monument set amid a field of concrete slabs. Especially when one notices the conspicuously outdated high rise apartment blocks looming in the background.

The heroic figure staring defiantly into the distance in front of you is Ernst Thälmann, one time leader of Germany’s communist party. His memorial guards the entrance to Ernst Thälmann park, one of the last socialist prestige projects to be completed by the East German government in Berlin.