Which were the differences between West and East Berlin?

Elections 2013 http://berlinwahlkarte2013.morgenpost.de/

During the time of the Berlin Wall, the differences were profound. Here is the summary of a typical visit made in 1974. I remember going all by myself one night to the Berliner Ensemble, Bertolt Brecht's famous theater about two blocks north of the Friedrichstrasse Station. Obviously the money was different. I had to trade a specified number of Deutschmarks for East German marks (Mark der DDR) in the transit. I don't remember the exact rate, but I knew that I could have received a much better rate using the black market. At the play (Fruehlings Erwachen), the crowd wore almost identical clothes and absolutely no blue jeans. The colors were largely pale blues and light green and the clothes seemed poorly styled for a group actually attending the theater. I was clearly one of the younger people in the theater (in my 20's). I went to a restaurant before the performance and had the first meal I ever ate in a restaurant that advertised that it was smoke free. The meal was standard German fare. Passing through Friedrichstrasse S-Bahn and the "Palace of Tears" (Tränenpalast) was an unforgettable experience, especially when I was questioned for about 15 minutes by a border guard due to the Westroman (novel from the west) I had in my jeans pocket. The biggest difference was the lack of neon signage and the general lack of color on the East Side. After an evening in East Berlin, the return to the West was almost blinding with the lights, traffic, and neon signage in West Berlin along the Ku'damm, even in the 70's. At the time, it seemed like a pilgrimage to visit East Berlin. I had spent some time in Prague in 1970, so the experience was not a singular one. I feel truly blessed, however, to have been given the opportunity to visit East Berlin in that era. Even today, I generally stay on the east side (Pankow) when I visit Berlin.

A lot of people, from Spain, Italy, now are moving to the East :) Mostly, in the far far east, Marzahn or Köpenick, are a lot of people from Russia. in Lichtenberg, there a lot of Asian people. In the East the transport is mostly with M(tram) in the west it's mostly bus; S-Bahn and U-Bahn are on both sides of the city. There are some area in east like, 'Prenzlauer Berg', Friedrichshain where the "hipsters" live. Of course the Neukölln Is more let me put-it this way: "extravagant". In every intersection in Berlin, there is a great change that you will found a supermaket(Rewe, Netto, Aldi, Penny Markt, Reichelt, Edeka, ...)