Viewing 27 posts - 41 through 67 (of 67 total)
  • How like German's are we?
  • rossatease
    Free Member

    Well here’s a counterpoint tale, another pal of mine was in the security business, acting as bodyguard for Pop stars on tour, in this instance 50 cent, doing a Euro tour, I forget when it was, but not that long ago, anyway they’re in Munich and 50 cent wanted to go to a Gym, so my pal checks around finds a Gym explains it’s for an American Rock/Rap star and they go ‘sure, no problem.’

    So they all turn up wander into the Gym and everyone in the Gym’s face falls, my pal is perplexed and talks to the owner, what’s the problem? Keine Swartz!

    He didn’t know where to turn, but the guys go, ‘don’t worry about it dude’ and they all left.

    That’s the difference between them and us, they are still very very racist, that wouldn’t happen here.

    chewkw
    Free Member

    The ones I know are rather friendly but serious so I try not to wind them up too much in case they take it wrongly. They have the tendency to be of opposite extreme at times. :mrgreen:

    The Brits are no way near the Germans in terms of seriousness btw … 😆

    blurty
    Full Member

    Great lads, pedantic f*ckers mind.

    I give presentations on the continent:

    Belgium: 1.5 hrs, no questions
    Netherlands: 2hrs, some questions#
    France: 45 mins, f*ck off ross biff
    Germany: 5hrs. Minute detail demanded, I’ve got to go boys or I’m going to miss my flight.

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    alpin
    Free Member

    hahaah!

    i’ve lived in Germany for the last 6.5 years and been with my Germany GF for 12 (gulp!) so i think it’s fair to say that they can’t be all that bad if i’ve put up with them for so long.

    yes, they have a sense of humour, but they are less likely to laugh at the small quips and off the cuff remarks. something has to be FUNNY for them to laugh. you’ll see this in their comedian’s comedy routines. very obvious punchlines, long pauses for people to laugh. and they seen to clap a lot.. the audience that is. and then it’ll turn into some rhythmic clapping.
    [video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7iSnEBOSApo#t=32[/video]

    their radio is dire. really dire. Austrian radio isn’t much better other than FM4 (have alisten).

    i find their TV programming to be pretty crappy, too. sure they have lots of documentaries, but they seen to be 80% dubbed from English, many of them BBC programmes. and it grates me to see a German talking English for the camera and that to be dubbed back into German. some kind of irony there.

    they are very set in their ways. don’t try and phone someone at 8pm. there is a very good chance they are watching the Tagesschau, or news. and don’t call them on a Sunday evening either. they’ll be watching Tatort (Twatort?), some crime thing that has been running since the 70’s and can be summed up nicely by this:
    [video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QENcN-srE0[/video]

    as with regards to rules, as has been said above, they stick to them. in the UK we use our moral compass and common sense to get through the day to day. the rules of law are gospel in Germany. even if people know they don’t make sense they will stick to them even it that means inconveniencing themselves in the process. at 2am you will see people standing waiting at the red light to cross the road because it’s red. (ok, in berlin noone seems to give them lights much authority, but Berlin is an exception).

    bureaucracy is a pain, costly and time consuming here. for instance, just to be able to pick up our new car we had to get a new number plate for it. however this plate was only valid for five days. we had to wait for over an hour to be seen to. once we had the paperwork (12€) i could get new paltes printed (25€). then i had to go back, wait another 30 mins fro a lady to put two stickers on the plates verifying that they were indeed “proper”. this cost us another 8€. once we had the car we had to do the whole thing again, only this time they charged us 48€ for the paperwork. and the to another office to get a parking permit.
    in total i spent over five hours waiting over three separate days.

    kids start school proper at the age of 6/7. schools generally begin at 8 which means there are shite loads of noisy, rowdy, sleepy kids everywhere when you are on your way to work. schools finish at 1pm which means there are loads of shitty, noisy kids running about for the rest of the day. the youngsters (6/7 yr olds) will finish at 11am. also means there are lots of mums hanging around drinking coffee because it’s hardly worth going home. this is a bit of an issue for low income families.

    families recieve lots of time off work when their sprog is born. my B-in-L gets several months off within the first 2 years of the little ‘uns life. there is still quite a strong idea of Kinder, Küche, Kirche here.

    lots of people consider themselves Christian and even pay for the privilage. unless you specify that you are muslin, sikh, jew, other or agnostic or atheist (years ago the last two were not always accepted!) you will pay a Church Tax (lit. Kirchensteuer) which varies between 4-8% depending on where you live.
    lots of our friends (well, the GF’s friends) will dutifully go to church at Christmas and Easter. oh, and they don’t do Easter Eggs either. instead they paint hard boiled eggs. a truely disappointing fact of life here.

    taxes are higher than they are in the UK. the GF “earns” 45k€. our English friends are usually impressed by this until we tell them that she sees about 53% of this.

    they like their traditions. how much they like them depends on where you are. in Bavaria (me) for example no-one bats an exelid at a group of men trundling through town in full Lederhosen get up.

    their bier is good, but i prefer an Ale.

    they have a very strong drinking culture. so strong in fact that it’s normal to have a beer for breakfast, lunch and dinner. i think their beer consumption is high, yet bringe drinking is rare and i rarely see any alcohol induced fisticuffs in town. when i do it’s usually drunk Septics or Aussies.
    they have a more responsible attitude to drink. that’s not to say they don’t get rat-arsed, . perhaps it has something to do with letting the youngsters progress slwoly. from 16-18 you are allowed in the clubs, but have to leave your Ausweis (ID…. another sacred part of life) at the door. you can drink wine or beer, but no spirits. at 12 you are expected to leave. at somepoint the old bill will come round and collect all the IDs that haven’t been collected. then you’ll be in trouble.

    the police seem to take their role in society very seriously. very few of them come across as normal people. you couldn’t approach a copper as you would in the UK calling them “mate” or the German equivalent.
    you are not allowed to swear at anybody, either… well you are, but you can’t say “you’re a f-in idiot”, but you can say “i think you are a f-in idiot”. and don’t give someone the finger, either. a friend had to pay out over 900€ after giving a bus driver the finger (tbf, the bus driver had just almost hit him, but he was riding through a bus station and so technically in the wrong :?).

    they like to plan things. this goes for everything in life. from meeting friends, going on holiday to work projects. they are not a particularly spontaneous bunch. the idea of a last minute holiday sends shivers down their spines.

    and the stereotype of them being punctual… well, it’sa stereotype for a good reason. one of the few times stranges will do more than exchange words is when a bus is late. people will look at the time and start tutting before saying “the bus is late. AGAIN!” when in fact the bus is rarely late.

    and the thing about them not saying much to one another is an odd one. in general they don’t speak much to strangers. yet when entering a shop or approaching a a bus stop they will say “Servus/Hallo/Guten Tag” to everyone there and then remain quiet for the rest of the time.

    and they NEVER thank the bus driver which really grates me.

    they seem to love going to the doctors or pharmacy. if they haven’t been for a week or more i think they get withdrawal symptoms. there are an awful lot of hypochondriacs here.

    parents will wrap their kids up in coats until mid May or until it’s at least 20°C outside. i have a theory that this is why so many of them are such pussies when it comes to the cold and get ill so easily. lots of my work associates can’t get their head around me wearing shorts in November.
    and an awful lot of blokes wear scarves. something i just don’t get.

    Germany like to slate the typical English food (yet lap up Jamie Oliver :?), but their own traditional offerings are not that far off our own. and they can’t do chips (which, like in the States means crisps.. idiots. called crisps because they are crispy). generally chips are like Macdonald’s fries. it’s a sad situation.

    and they don’t eat much beef or lamb. but to make up for that they eat vast quantities of pig. like loads of pig. they even have minced pork (admittedly better than minced horse, granted) and try to pass that off in a lasagne. weird.
    nor do they eat much chicken. instead they eat turkey. lots of turkey. which is crap, IMO.

    BUT…. there are an awful lot of things Germany has going for it.

    the road and rail infrastructure is generally very good. i think i’ve only experienced potholes like in the UK when driving through Berlin. Berlin is poor. rather than rapair the roads or the pavements they put up signs inforning you that the road or pavement is in bad condition…

    but this is generally confined to Berlin.

    the provisions made for cycling is very, very good. you can cross the country without having to mix it up with cars (or at least not very often).

    things generally just work.

    the Germans lead a much more active lifestyle than people do in the UK. there are few out of town shopping centres/supermarkets. instead they have more, smaller shops locally.

    most of the employed Germans i encounter are happy in their jobs. their employers look after them and the laws in place protect their rights and working hours.

    living standards are higher than in the UK, IMO. Life costs more, but you generally earn more, too.

    on the whole it’s a good place to live. like anywhere there are idiots and people that fit the stereotypes.

    i’m happy here.

    Klunk
    Free Member

    Germans will read the manual before turning it on, we turn it on then jump to the bit we need in the manual and ignore the rest as irrelevant.

    hora
    Free Member

    When friends say ‘come round about 2.30’… Im there at 2.25. Same punctuality with work. Thats normal but it grates mrshora. Loads of Brits are like me. Its called being anal.

    Trying ringing your folks after 8pm. They think it must be an emergency no?!

    On swine flesh (as friends call it)…..yes they are obsessed with it second only to beer!

    konabunny
    Free Member

    “Innit. They even try and create unions when it would be easier not to.
    http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/7/10/chattanooga-volkswagenunion.html”

    That’s a land grab, isn’t it? Create a tame company union before an actual AFL-CIO union manages to organize? The whole point of VW locating in the south was to avoid labour unions (and to suck up tax breaks).

    alpin
    Free Member

    oh and i forgot….

    viewing platforms.

    was sceptical at first. still am, TBH. but they are sometimes very rewarding. i just left a perfect brown cumberland on the shelf.

    not so great after a night on the tiles.

    MSP
    Full Member

    Well here’s a counterpoint tale, another pal of mine was in the security business, acting as bodyguard for Pop stars on tour, in this instance 50 cent, doing a Euro tour, I forget when it was, but not that long ago, anyway they’re in Munich and 50 cent wanted to go to a Gym, so my pal checks around finds a Gym explains it’s for an American Rock/Rap star and they go ‘sure, no problem.’

    So they all turn up wander into the Gym and everyone in the Gym’s face falls, my pal is perplexed and talks to the owner, what’s the problem? Keine Swartz!

    He didn’t know where to turn, but the guys go, ‘don’t worry about it dude’ and they all left.

    That’s the difference between them and us, they are still very very racist, that wouldn’t happen here.

    Bullshit!

    alpin
    Free Member

    ^^ +1

    welshfarmer
    Full Member

    QUOTE “oh and i forgot….

    viewing platforms.

    was sceptical at first. still am, TBH. but they are sometimes very rewarding. i just left a perfect brown cumberland on the shelf.

    not so great after a night on the tiles.”

    😀 😀 😀 I wonder how many get this reference? I had one in my flat in Stuttgart. Laying down some paper in advance definitely saved a lot of deft brush work….

    alpin
    Free Member

    Yup… Top tip, that.

    alpin
    Free Member

    and the women aren’t as fat and are generally better looking, IMO.

    people don’t have as much style, mind. they don’t necessarily carry themselves that well.

    martinxyz
    Free Member

    oh, and they don’t do Easter Eggs either. instead they paint hard boiled eggs. a truely disappointing fact of life here.

    Same as us up here in the dire part of the country that is the Highlands of Scotchland then.

    hora
    Free Member

    oh, and they don’t do Easter Eggs either. instead they paint hard boiled eggs. a truely disappointing fact of life here.

    We used to do this. ALOT as children/growing up. Its only over the last decade and a half that I’ve seen the monster push of chocolate. Lately its in the shops wall to wall months before Easter.

    The power of retailers.

    rossatease
    Free Member

    MSP – Member

    Bullshit!

    Oh I’m sorry, you were there then?

    Clearly something I missed you know about, shall I ring 50 cent and tell him it’s fine he can come back to Munich now? (by the way Munich and say Hamburg or Cologne are very very different places)

    Or are you saying if he turned up at a Gym over here someone would say the same thing?

    tomhoward
    Full Member

    Oh I’m sorry, you were there then?

    Neither were you…

    hora
    Free Member

    Two pastey-white cyclists are fighting over a big blackman. Only on STW 😆

    nemesis
    Free Member

    hora
    Free Member

    As a epilogue to the German football teams great adventure. They land in Berlin and are treated as heroes whilst on the sameday we retain the services of Roy Hodgson with ‘do as you did against Italy’.

    Why not give him a fat bonus too?

    nemesis
    Free Member

    Was it Roy’s fault? I’d suggest that England Football’s problems have next to nothing to do with Roy.

    hora
    Free Member

    We seem to have a succession of well paid football managers. None have been truly worldclass but all well paid.

    Would the German mentality allow this? As noted in the final commentary- no real notable ‘world stars’ (i.e. Big superstars) in the German squad yet they all play as a team. Thats key- the manager getting the side to play team football as a unit.

    nemesis
    Free Member

    Does the manager do that or the system that put them together and got them to that position? The German team was based around the German team that won the U21 world cup…

    Similarly, Belgium seem to have overperformed and that’s being attributed to the system, not the manager.

    Besides, the England manager deserves a decent salary for all the crap thrown at him because people think like you do – eg he can actually make up for a crap team/system. 😉

    hora
    Free Member

    Or make a 300k a week striker actually score A goal.

    ransos
    Free Member

    Class. In England the Officer would automatically be suspended.shoot you dead and pretend you’re a terrorist

    WackoAK
    Free Member

    viewing platforms.

    My mate in Vienna calls it “The Joby Shelf”

    andytherocketeer
    Full Member

    Or make a 300k a week striker actually score A goal.

    what are you talking about? the goal of the game is possession isn’t it, with the outcome decided entirely by the Stato statistics judges innit?

    The gym story sounds like grade A BS to me.

    And defo a sheet of Andrex on “The Joby Shelf” if you would like it to be swept away swiftly. I call it the cairn platform.

    Oh and definitely never do gesticulations in the car (or if you really must, never make them visible). If 2 people report it (is the offended and one of his mates), you get an automatic visit from the Polizei.

    Being better at grammar is probably something to do with being sticklers for rules? (Although some jobsworths must make up rules for themselves to have something to stick to, or use commonsense – certainly had that when I moved to Germany, bought a car, registered it, and then the day after registered at town hall – apparently a not allowed sequence, but he still let me register the car, so it can’t have been a rule/law).

Viewing 27 posts - 41 through 67 (of 67 total)

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