"[In a fictional address as the new head-of-state of the DDR] Dear citizens of the German Democratic Republic... If you've lived to see the wonder of watching our blue planet from the depths of the cosmos, you see things differently. Up there, in the depths of space, the people's lives seem small and insignificant. Our German Democratic Republic seems tiny. You ask yourself what humanity has accomplished. Which objectives did we set, which objectives did we realize? Today is our country's anniversary. It's a very little country, seen from the cosmos. But still thousands of people came to us last year. People who we looked to as enemies and who want to live with us today. We know our country is not perfect. But what we believe in, inspired a lot of people in the whole world. Maybe we have drifted off course from time to time. But we collected ourselves. Socialism doesn't mean walling yourself in. Socialism means reaching out to others, and living with others. Not just to dream about a better world, but to make a better world. I have therefore decided to open the GDR borders."