Quotes from John Kampfner

In an interview with the main tabloid, Bild, in November 2004, shortly before becoming chancellor, she was asked what emotions Germany aroused in her. She replied, 'I am thinking of airtight windows. No other country can build such airtight and beautiful windows.

Merkel is the opposite of ostentatious. She has kept her small cottage near her home town of Templin, goes to her customary hairdresser in Berlin and from time to time is seen grocery shopping. She devours art. She sometimes phones her one or two favourite museum directors directly to ask them if they wouldn't mind staying open a little longer so that she can see a particular exhibition without any fuss.

After the Wall