I feel like I need an in-between answer for the Berlin Wall. I was 12, so I remember it, and I remember the news coverage ... but I don't think I quite realized at the time just how significant it was. I understood what it was about, knew that it was a good thing and was happy -- but it wasn't until I was older that I realized how cool it was.
When I was in college, I took a course titled "History 373 -- The Age of Ascendancy: U.S. Foreign Relations Since 1945." The final, basically, was to summarize the course. After three hours of writing (about the Truman Doctrine, the Bay of Pigs, Vietnam, etc., etc., etc.), my brain had turned to mush, so I summarized the fall of the Berlin Wall thus: "And then the Berlin Wall came down and everyone was happy" and drew a celebrating stick figure. I got an A in the course. :)
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When I was in college, I took a course titled "History 373 -- The Age of Ascendancy: U.S. Foreign Relations Since 1945." The final, basically, was to summarize the course. After three hours of writing (about the Truman Doctrine, the Bay of Pigs, Vietnam, etc., etc., etc.), my brain had turned to mush, so I summarized the fall of the Berlin Wall thus: "And then the Berlin Wall came down and everyone was happy" and drew a celebrating stick figure. I got an A in the course. :)