Stuff Germans Do

Every culture has their nuances, idiosyncrasies, oddities, and pure weirdness. While our Saxon brethren across the pond are similar to many in the US in genealogy (in central PA specifically!), they have some habits that made me scratch my head. This post displays just a few of the many "things Germans do" that I found interesting, cool, strange, or downright weird. 

Parking on the sidewalk:

Yeah, the Germans would park half their cars on the sidewalks because their streets are too thin for streets. But just ONE side of the car, as demonstrated by this sign. 

Mixing white wine with sparkling water. It's refreshing, but basically a watered down spritzer. I liked it in general, especially since it was 100 degrees the entire time we were there.

LIVE WITHOUT AIR CONDITIONING. Record degree temps made us ECSTATIC to see this sign. Anywhere with this sign we basically were into. It's so rare in Germany to have aircon, but those that did made a killing this summer!

 Eating weird sausages covered in mayonnaise and onions. We were not opposed. Apparently this is a dutch thing.

Eating late night food (the pic below was taken past 1AM), especially döner kebab. Again, not opposed. My favorite part of this picture is Tim's evil glare on the right - MY PRECIOUSSSSSS

Eating vineyard slugs in garlic sauce. Or baked.  

EATING RAW PIG. The first night we had this I thought it was beef, which, you know, Americans would know as carpaccio or something similar. We eat rare beef, we get it, we aren't scared of it. When I heard it was pig, I admittedly freaked out a bit, but this actually turned out to be our favorite German cuisine - it's called mette. Our first encounter was after midnight at K&C's wedding. At 12:01 they rolled out a huge platter with a mountain of meat. The meat had onions sticking out of it from all over and was shaped in the form of a hedgehog. They called it mette eagle (sp?). This term became a phrase that we could not shut up about for the rest of the trip.

 The mette comes in cute little packages like this: 

BREAKFAST. They have breakfast unlike any other I have seen. They eat pate, meats, cheeses, and all kind of spreads (including mette of course!) on various rolls for breakfast. Or at least Kathy and Carsten do. Our last morning in Schwelm we made breakfast - I am pretty proud of this one. We even went to the local butcher, baker, and candlestick maker and grunted through all the orders correctly!

Use weird first response vehicles. 

Display my my favorite German word, Ausfahrt, everywhere. I am a 12 year old boy, I know.

Eat pig. Lots of it. And name stores after it, twice. 

Drink beer!They actually don't have a word for beer - they get much more specific. They have alst, pils, kölsch, lager, etc., but would never call it just beer. Why would you when each beer has a specific name? You don't want to offend the beer now, do you??

DRIVE FAST. We broke several personal best speed limits in Germany. While the picture below is blurry, believe me when I tell you we went 230km/hr. That's faster than our trains go in the states! It actually rivaled some of the other trains we took in Europe as well. It was just fast. Like, fear for your life fast. But it actually seems to work - the rule-based Germans had procedures for every aspect of driving to keep the system safe. 

 

Eating McDonalds. It's an odd late-night European pastime. One they don't feel guilty about because the meals are like 7-10 Euros and use only grass-fed, non-GMO beef. Or whatever. We ate this at midnight because it was the only thing open on our way home from Köln!

 Speak in German dialects. These two menus have the same selections, but they are written in different dialects. The one is high German and the other is Düsseldorf-ian?

We had a wonderful time in Germany. I foresee us returning, especially so we can go to other large towns like Berlin and Münich. It was very sad to leave Kathy and Carsten, but we will see them again in November for our wedding. Here's to good friends, good beer, good fun, and a lovely country!

Münster

After a week of working from home at Kathy and Carsten's apartment, we were ready for a half day Friday. The guys suggested that we go to Münster, a posh town about 100km from Schwelm that has a lot of history to it. We liked the idea and head to Münster for Friday night and stayed in a charming hotel in the town center (thanks to Carsten's connections!).

Like many German towns, there is a lot of history behind Münster. The town has to mega churches, both Catholic, in the town center. What makes them historic though, is that it's the site of many many persecutions by Catholics of non-Catholics, especially Anabaptists. This was particularly chilling for me, since my entire extended family is Mennonite, and would have fallen into this category.

The main church is beautiful and haunting. We only saw the outside, but you could tell that the building was used not just to celebrate a particular vein of faith, but to intimidate and wipe out those that did not agree with the Catholics at the time. If you look closely at the picture below, you can see cages dangling from side of the spire. This is where they would put criminals and those they did not agree with. Some dark stuff!

The town square. The church on the left is so big it doesn't even fit into pictures well!

Here is the church up close. The cages might be more visible in this one. They are the three silver metal looking things hanging from the right window just below the gargoyles at the very base of the steeple.

The town center was really charming. It appeared to be straight out of the 14th century. We happened to arrive during their town fest or stadfest, which is an annual celebration with local food vendors and other merchants. We had some really good currywurst and kartofflepuffen (Kathy if you are reading this please send me the real name of the dutch food we had!)

The town had some impressive architecture! You could just picture the balls and galas thrown at some of the old estates like this one.

The architecture at every turn was impressive. I don't know what half the buildings were, but i know they were beautiful!

More of the town center

Münster by night. We went bar hopping after all the food eating, of course. 

Here is the dom, a term for the most important church in any of the German towns. Oddly, this dom is not the primary church from the town square, but another one just down the street. At the base of the dom we saw a concert by the Disco Boys and a new German artist named Lena as part of the stadfest. It was actually really fun. Lena won Eurovision - a silly European song writing/singing competition (we have them to thank for bands like ABBA). Apparently it was the first time a German has ever won! She was good and covered some thing that I knew, and sang nearly all her songs in English.

In the town we rendezvoused with some friends from Kathy and Carsten's wedding. From left to right is Ben, Carsten, Katharina, Jordan, Anna, and me. We are missing Henning and Tim who we love, but went home just before this picture. This photo sums up our time in Germany - hanging out with dear friends and enjoying life's spoils. I can't wait to come back! But for now, it's on to Italy.

Swervebahn Wuppertal

As a transport enthusiast I am always searching for a new thrill. I particularly like antiquated transportation modes, ultra-modern new ones, and just downright weird ones. I guess I just like them all.

The swervebahn in Wuppertal Germany probably takes the cake for the weirdest form of public transport I have ever encountered, unless you count the Bund Sightseeing Tunnel in Shanghai. Suspended from the air, the swervebahn dangles over a track like an upside down rollercoaster. It twists and turns through the Wuppertal river and the little town. It's charming and unnecessary. Everything I love in old transit!

 Leaving the station:

 Coming in for landing!

 The structure is very odd to me - it seems like it could have been much more efficient as an elevated traditional train, but what do I know? I also don't care - this thing is fantastic.

Here are the supports straddling the river in Wuppertal. Apparently once the train derailed and the whole thing fell into the river. Another benefit of building traditional rail, but again, what do I know?

Obviously I had to video a portion of the ride. I get way too excited about these things. Note my awful pronunciation. Kathy corrected me all night. 

After the swervebahn ride we went to the second most important part of the evening - dinner. The place Carsten picked in Wuppertal was actually quite charming and the food was good! It showcased foods from "all bavarian countries." I didn't know what that meant, but apparently it includes Germany, Austria, Hungary, and Czech, among others (note the flags). 

The best part about the place was the interior - each table was uniquely decorated in a scene from Bavaria! We were basically in a hansel and gretle house. 

Here we are tucked away, reliving a Hans Christian Andersen fable. 

After dinner we found a RIDICULOUS local German bar that's apparently a fan of the locals. The inside was straight out of a movie circa 1940. 

I expected a fat lady to burst out from hiding somewhere and break into Vagner. This was a members-only bar, so the bartender was not really keen on letting us in, but because it was a slow night he made an exception. We were ever so grateful!

Time with my big bean is always good time. Two beans in a pod! This is one of my favorites. 

Köln

Köln is an ancient city on the Rhine that is famous for a couple of things - a gay pride parade called the Christopher street festival (we missed it by a day!), and a massive cathedral called the dom. Kathy, Carsten, and I, along with Kathys host parents gene and chuck, went to Köln to explore the downtown and see the cathedral. I've been to Europe many times and seen many cathedrals and this one might take the cake for the tallest and biggest. If not, then it's up there! 

It's two spires are massive and seem to reach forever into the sky. The architecture is a distinct style that I think predates gothic? The cathedral was started in the 1300s so whenever that period was. It has impressive sculptures and a beauty inside and out that are distinctly German. 

The cathedral is always under repair so the little bits of scaffold are unavoidable. It's ok though, Kathy removed it for us. 

Once the scaffold was removed I realized - psh, this ain't so big! I'm almost as tall!

The inside was cavernous and impressive, as any standing medieval structure is. 

Pictures don't do the vaulted ceilings justice!

The windows were very ornate and did not fail to impress either. My favorite one was the seemingly neomodern window with cubist artwork. 

The story goes that the legs of the three kings that visited Jesus after his birth are actually stored here in a gold vault. 

That aside, I couldn't get over the majesty of the structure itself. 

Flying buttresses. 

Ceilings and pillars for days! 

And of course stained glass. 

After we circled the cathedral we headed to a local beer hall, because that's what you do. This one was charming and exactly what I thought of when I envision a German pub. 

Note the chandelier above. Jordan and I need one for our apartment. 

The viener schnitzel was awesome. (Bottom left) as was the local brew. In this part of Germany it's called kölsch. It was like a lighter lager, which is right up my alley. In Germany they don't rally use the word beer - there is a local word specific to every region that you use in that area to order. Pils, kölsch, and alst to name a few. 

Germany is all about food and beer. A no brainier for me!