It's one thing to see it on television, but quite another to be there.

The 10 students from Quinnipiac University who are spending the week in Berlin, Germany to mark the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall recognize it as a once-in-a-lifetime experience whose historical relevance they can now better understand.

Darren Pruslow of Wallingford, a second-year law student, was in high school when the wall separating Western Berlin from the Soviet East came down, bringing the Cold War to an end.

No one really saw it coming at the time, said the 34-year-old former teacher, but it's great, he said, to be able to see how much has changed in the past 20 years and share the moment with Berliners who this week were dancing in the street.

Pruslow, university faculty member Peter Gallay and student David Fitzgerald, both of Cheshire, are among the delegation that traveled to Berlin as part of the school's Albert Schweitzer Institute, to attend a ceremony marking the anniversary.

"You wouldn't know that this city was divided 20 years ago," Pruslow said. "It kind of shows that a lot of can change in a short period of time."

David Ives, executive director of the institute, was invited by the Gorbachev Foundation to speak on the topic of poverty in the world and cultural differences at the 10th World Summit of Nobel Peace Prize Laureates. The conference is focusing on the topic of breaking down walls to make change globally. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev are among those offering speeches at the occasion.

Gallay, a media producer, is heading up a documentary for the university about the correlation between the anniversary and the conference.

"It was one of the most significant events of the 20th Century and people are just joyous," Ives said Monday from Berlin. "It's just a big celebration of something that was very wonderful."

Ives, a resident of New York, selected students and faculty who have expressed an interest in international news and events to join him, he said. The trip corresponds with the institute's mission to promote humanitarian values. The institute leads programs in Central America and works to bring laureates to the university. In 2007, former President Jimmy Carter visited Hamden to receive the first Schweitzer humanitarian award.

Fitzgerald, a 2007 graduate of Cheshire High School, is in awe of the occasion. Even though he was an infant when the wall came down, being able to get real life production experience, research the historic event and touch sections of the wall at the same time, was too great an opportunity to pass up. "It's a chance that I would not otherwise get," he said.

Gallay agrees. Of the nearly 200 students who attended the convention, most were European, making the opportunity a privilege for the few Americans who attended, he said

.

"To have this access," Gallay said, "is really a testament to David Ives and the Albert Schweitzer Institute."

shernandez@record-journal.com

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