More than four decades after Carmen Rohrbach tried to swim away from then-communist East Germany, she has no regrets, despite being caught and sent to prison.
Rorbach, now 71, always wanted to be a researcher. As a child, she learned to ride horses, hoping to one day tour Mongolia. Her dreams were shattered when she graduated in biology in East Germany.
She applied for research projects in Cuba, Mongolia and Siberia, but was rejected. Escape seemed like the best way to take her chosen path so she hatched a plan to row to Denmark.
One night in 1974, she and her friend set off from a camp off the coast of northeastern Germany, but ended up having to sink a rubber boat to avoid being seen. They swam all day and night.
"It's unbelievable - I still can't imagine we swam that much," she told Reuters.
During their second night at sea, they found a buoy and thought they were saved, but were picked up in international waters by an East German warship.
Rorbachova was sentenced to 32 months in prison for attempting to escape. In the end, she was deported to the west before the end of her sentence and did not get a chance to say goodbye to her family.
"I got the feeling that I betrayed my country. However, when I was in prison, I thought: 'No, it was worth risking my life for this regime'".
Since her release in 1976, Rorbach has traveled extensively writing books. She is glad that she grew up in the communist German Democratic Republic (GDR) before fleeing in her early 20s, because it gives her a better appreciation for democracy and freedom.
Swim, dig, climb
Rorbachova is not the only person who tried to escape from the East by swimming. This was also attempted by Hubert Holbein, who was sometimes called the "son of a capitalist" by his teachers at school because his parents were businessmen.
As the winds whipped the water one November day in 1963, Holbein swam with a mask and snorkel 1,5 kilometers from Potsdam in the east to Wonsi in East Berlin. It was a risky move: he knew that some people had been killed trying to escape in that area.
However, he managed to reach the western part of the divided city, where he helped build a tunnel through which 60 people, including his mother, escaped.
Others were not so lucky. Thomas Drescher grew up in the East and knew he didn't want to spend the rest of his life behind the Iron Curtain. Together with a friend, he climbed the Wall with a ladder.
Drescher, who was 21 at the time, knew it was over when the light shone on him. The border guard pointed the machine gun.
"There was a shepherd dog with him, which growled, and then he said - I still remember the exact words - What the hell is this? We replied: "We don't want to cause problems, we just want to be free," Dresher said.
He spent nine months in prison and was released 16 days before the fall of the Berlin Wall. He doesn't regret that decision. He now talks about his experience to young people in schools and church groups.
"If you lose your freedom, then you notice it. If you have freedom, you quickly get used to it".
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