I LOVED my 3 years in West Berlin and elsewhere in Europe during the 60's. They were pretty much recovered from WW2 but there was still quite a bit of damage to be seen. (The building I worked in at Tempelhof was pock marked with machine gun/cannon fire.) But in general there were wonderful new buildings, infrastructure and the city was alive with spirit. Totally livable in the American sense. Dirty shame what the politicians have done to Europe.
LOL! Yeah, we visited Berlin in ‘62 and had the opportunity to cross over at Check Point Charlie into the east. As a 13 year old at the time, it certainly opened my eyes as to what I did NOT want to live like. The contrast from east to west in the 17 years since the end of the war was astounding. Went to a club called the RiziBar that had phones at each table so you could call another table if you wished. I have a Berlin map from back then that I had laminated showing the barbed wire and sector divisions.