[Tomas S.]

On the occasions when I encountered the British, on holidays in the United Kingdom and in business contacts, I didn’t find them unfriendly. But perhaps this is because I am a German (and a North German at that), and we might have other expectations than Robert or Maria (one of the people who responded). We don’t expect people to bare their souls on a casual acquaintance, either (and to the ‘How ya doing’ of Robert’s example, my reaction might be: Well, the honest answer would be, ‘Not good, I am frustrated and irritated right now,’ but that wouldn’t do as an answer to a stranger, and ‘Fine’ would be superficial, so I’d better ignore him). Perhaps what Robert and Maria complain about could be explained by the British following a mode of behavior that I am very much used to in relations with other Germans: a longish period of polite, reserved relations, followed by opening up when you have achieved an insight into the other guy’s character. Of course, if the other guy has been put off by the first stage, you never get to the second one.

User Detail :  

Name : Tomas S., Gender : M, Age : 37, City : Tübingen, State : NA, Country : Germany, Occupation : electrical engineer, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[Tomas S.]

Actually, our livers dont’t cope all that well with alcohol. According to http://www.alcoholconcern.org.uk/information/factsheets/factsheet27.htm, cirrhosis deaths are a respectable 21.5/100,000 (presumably per year) in Germany; the risk to Belgians is about half that, at a total alcohol consumption that is only 10 percent lower (see http://fathers.ourfamily.com/alcoholconsume.htm).

By the way, it’s not the Germans who drink the most beer per capita but the Czechs (see http://beerchina.com/beerenglish/comsptn_by_country_en.htm )

User Detail :  

Name : Tomas S., Gender : M, Age : 37, City : Tübingen, State : NA, Country : Germany, Occupation : electrical engineer, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[Tomas S.]

The following assumes that by ‘German’ you mean ‘grown up in Germany’ rather that ‘nth generation German-American’. Perhaps I can help you by listing a few negative stereotypes popular with educated Germans about American employment conditions. I do not claim these to be true (I have never worked for an US company myself) but such stereotypes, in my opinion, give useful insights in what is important to people holding them. So here goes; no offense meant; please don’t shoot me 🙂 1. US companies’ objectives are more short-term as German companies (e.g. this quarter’s profits instead of the next decade’s), so managers are liable to make false economies. 2. Education and training that is not immediately applicable to the job in hand is undervalued. [note: in Germany your level of formal education (school, university) and to a lesser degree of training (apprenticeship) contributes a lot to your social status, not just by way of any higher income earned because of that education and training. A case in point is that the German chemical industry likes to hire people with a doctorate for legal, engineering etc. positions because the chemists have got a PhD and might regard a non-Doctor as their social and intellectual inferior.]. 3. Managers tend not to understand what the company does (like a nonengineer being CEO of an engineering company). 4. US employers are utterly disloyal to their employees; there is less job security, both because of short-termism and because of a culture where firing someone is a normal business move rather that a last resort. [note: German labour law makes it a lot harder than US law to terminate someone, except for extreme cases like theft or outright refusal to work.] 5. Creativity and responsibility take a backseat to companywide policies. 6. Managers use false friendliness with employees. [note: between adult Germans addressing someone by his first name implies a more personal relationship than that which is implied by Americans using first names. Using first names (in German, using ‘Du’ instead of ‘Sie’) does not necessarily mean full friendship, but implies a relationship of equality and trust. So when you address a German by first name but act like an authoritarian boss you send contradictory messages.] I’d like to stress again that the above statements are not meant to be factual but to illustrate how German employees would like not to be managed.

User Detail :  

Name : Tomas S., Gender : M, Age : 37, City : Tübingen, State : NA, Country : Germany, Occupation : electrical engineer, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[Tomas S.]

According to the German constitution police is a state matter. All 16 states have their own police force, reporting to the state secretary of the interior, with the main branches – Schutzpolizei (patrols) – Kriminalpolizei (criminal investigations) – Bereitschaftspolizei (for operations like large searches, riot control) These state police forces do almost all police work. There are also three federal police agencies: – Bundeskriminalamt (BKA): criminal investigations of nationwide importance, like on drugs and terrorism – Verfassungsschutz: counter-espionage and monitoring of anti-democratic political activity (hence the most controversial of these agencies) – Bundesgrenzschutz (BGS): border, railroad and airport security Entities below state level are not allowed to have police forces. Cities usually have employees who write parking tickets but these are not police. Crimes are prosecuted by state prosecutors and punished under federal statutes. NB: source of the above is what I know as a reasonably well informed German citizen.

User Detail :  

Name : Tomas S., Gender : M, Age : 37, City : Tübingen, State : NA, Country : Germany, Occupation : electrical engineer, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[Tomas S.]

Actually the appellation ‘Roman Catholic’ is also used in Germany (the official name for the denomination is ‘roemisch-katholisch’, or ‘rk’ for the tax forms). This is to distinguish it from other churches which also consider themselves Catholic, notably the Old Catholic church that broke away after Vatican I (1870) – for further information see e.g. http://www.alt-katholisch.de/index-e.html . There are also other Catholic churches, especially in East Europe – see http://www.tboyle.net/Catholicism/Cath_Links_Various_Churche.html

User Detail :  

Name : Tomas S., Gender : M, Age : 37, City : Tübingen, State : NA, Country : Germany, Occupation : electrical engineer, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[Tomas S.]

Could you be more specific? I think I am reasonably well read in German literature, and I did not notice such an undue emphasis yet.

User Detail :  

Name : Tomas S., Gender : M, Age : 37, City : Tübingen, State : NA, Country : Germany, Occupation : electrical engineer, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[Tomas S.]

This is by no means a unique feature of English. Examples:

Milano (Italian) = Mailand (German) Moskva (Russian) = Moskau (German) Mainz (German) = Magonza (Italian) Aachen (German) = Aix-la-Chapelle (French) One reason might be to make the name better to pronounce. Another aspect is that the name in the foreign language often derives from an earlier version of the local name. Curiously enough, new alternative names seem not to be coined anymore. When we Germans encounter a geographical name that has no established German alternative, we try to pronounce the original name (more or less successfully), even if we risk getting our tongue in knots.

User Detail :  

Name : Tomas S., Gender : M, Age : 37, City : Tübingen, State : NA, Country : Germany, Occupation : electrical engineer, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[Tomas S.]

In Germany, definitely not. It might be listed in the more comprehensive kind of calendar, but I don’t think a lot of people are aware of it. Curious, since the public opinion on the United Nations is that it is a good thing.

User Detail :  

Name : Tomas S., Gender : M, Age : 37, City : Tübingen, State : NA, Country : Germany, Occupation : electrical engineer, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[Tomas S.]

We usually shake hands when meeting someone for the first time or in a formal situation, say hello when meeting someone for the first time in the day, and just nod or do nothing otherwise.

User Detail :  

Name : Tomas S., Gender : M, Age : 37, City : Tübingen, State : NA, Country : Germany, Occupation : electrical engineer, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[Tomas S.]

I am not sure your assumption about language is right. It is perhaps telling that there are proposals in the Usenet newsgroup soc.culture.german every now and then to require all postings to that group to be in German – the rationale being to keep the Nazi posters out, most of whom know no German…

It is true that a lot of wannabe Nazis expect to get a sympathetic reception from Germans. That is possibly because they get their picture of Germany from the more stereotyped kind of World War II films. Of course that is offensive to us.

User Detail :  

Name : Tomas S., Gender : M, Age : 37, City : Tübingen, State : NA, Country : Germany, Occupation : electrical engineer, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[Tomas S.]

I can offer no information on the U.S. side, but it might be of interest that the European “South” stereotype is the same as your “North” stereotype. Also, in Brazil, “North” means “nearer to the Equator,” while in the United States and Europe, “South” means “nearer to the Equator.” So a common stereotype might be “warmer climate equals lazy, poor, but warm-hearted people.”

User Detail :  

Name : Tomas S., Gender : M, Age : 37, City : Tübingen, State : NA, Country : Germany, Occupation : electrical engineer, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[Tomas S.]

1) The government did not need to prove anything. You needed to prove you were not of Jewish ancestry. The least you needed was to have documented that none of your grandparents was Jewish (in order to keep your job, own a business and not eventually get sent to a concentration camp). More documentation was required in some cases, e.g. to own a farm you had to prove you had no Jewish ancestors within the last 200 years. The ancestors’ religion was documented in the church books (up to the 19th century) and later in the person’s register of the town. By the way, church affiliation is registered the same way today: If I’d want to leave the Lutheran church, I’d go to city hall, not to the pastor. That’s because registered church affiliation determines if you pay church tax (some 8 percent on top of income tax), and to whom. This is generally not considered an invasion of privacy, as church membership is thought of as a thing of public life.

How Jews in the occupied countries were singled out I’m not so sure. It was probably a combination of public/church records, and in Eastern Europe possibly also of living in a Jewish ghetto.

2) It probably wasn’t worth the risk of being caught in a routine ID check and being sent to a concentration camp sooner rather than later.

3) The issue is perhaps confused by the fact that Judaism does not seek to make converts, unlike the other major religions. The Nazis definitely thought in terms of race (it was no help if your parents had converted to Christianity). It was mostly the same for pre-Nazi anti-Semitism. Nowadays in Germany, the term “Jewish race” is only used by neo-Nazis (generally the very concept of race is considered to be racist. This website’s response form with an optional field “Race” would definitely be considered racist in a German context).

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Name : Tomas S., Gender : M, Age : 37, City : Tübingen, State : NA, Country : Germany, Occupation : electrical engineer, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

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