tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-67127936038188332812024-02-19T07:11:14.152+00:00Intercultural MusingsMargit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.comBlogger115125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-42083932867907798782017-12-12T13:21:00.000+00:002017-12-12T17:44:25.977+00:00Why Do Germans Love Merkel?<br />
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I know that many many non-Germans are baffled as to why Germans seem hell-bent on keeping Angela Merkel as their chancellor, at almost any cost.<br />
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After what she did to the country, it would seem only logical to show her the door and bolt the locks from the inside. Instead, Merkel's party stands at a very respectable 31 percent in almost all polls. And this isn't because of some very popular policies her party advocates, or because of a generally popular party structure. There is in fact <b>nobody</b> at all that anybody could name as a representative -- apart from Merkel herself. That 's why it's often called the "Merkel-party"rather than its proper name the CDU/CSU. (A name by the way, which sounds more and more hollow, there is definitely nothing Christian about that party, nothing social, and increasingly not even anything democratic anymore):<br />
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<b>So why are Germans so keen on Merkel?</b><br />
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Firstly, Germans feel comfortable with her. One of the fundamentals of the German psyche is that people MUST NOT get above themselves. They have to blend in, be like everybody else, be exchangeable, be "normal".<br />
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Ergo: Merkel with her forgettable face, her mousy hair, her just out of bed complexion, her ever same-style clothes, her squelchy health shoes and general humdrum air has something that immediately appeals to Germans: She is unthreatening, unkempt, or - as they would say: unpretentious and modest. That makes her a star performer in her nation's peculiar psychological makeup.<br />
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But Merkel doesn't just score via her provincial unkempt normcore appearance. Germans are also extremely impressed by titles and degrees, however phony. The fact that Merkel is a chemical physic, is also married to one (who is even a Professor!) many Germans find extremely impressive and admirable. Never mind that her dissertation is only partly accessible to the public, that doubts have been raised as to who the exact author was of it all, about the quality of the disposition etc etc. - never mind. For Germans, their chancellor ("Unsere Kanzlerin") is a Frau Doktor. OOOH! That is impressive! She must be right then! A scientist as well! Clever and analytical!<br />
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Merkel also - because of the two points we just discussed - comes over as extremely reliable, dependable and trustworthy. This is in stark contrast to her actual performance: Her decisions tend to be quixotic, unilateral, often based on irrational feelings and personal gain.<br />
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But as Germans are so stubbornly convinced that their dishevelled, saggy-faced near-dictator is an honest broker of their interests in the world, they will carry on voting for her, keeping her in power whatever ills she will be inflicting on the nation.<br />
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In Merkel, Germans have found their true leader.<br />
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<br />Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-65006506130367984602017-10-23T16:44:00.002+01:002017-10-23T18:22:59.557+01:00Don't Mention the Weather<br />
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Have you ever commented about the weather in Germany? It's tricky that - and full of potential pitfalls.<br />
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Let me explain: Say, on an ordinary October day, you remark: "Bit blustery, isn't it" or, in German, as of course you'd be politely speaking the local language: "Ganz schön windig heute".<br />
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The automatic reply you'd get would be: "Ja was denkst du??! Es ist Herbst!!" (Well, what do you think?! It's autumn after all!") Thump.You fall flat on your face and wonder what you did to engender such a strong reaction to an ordinary remark.<br />
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Whereas in Britain, you'd be getting any response from polite, distracted affirmation "Isn't it just" to spinning the conversation on "It really is . I even had to take my washing in this morning" or any other way of making something of the opening gambit. In contrast, the German response is automatically challenging, personal, and in attack-mode - querying your sanity that you're clearly not aware that it is indeed autumn, and what else would any sane person expect, so why on earth comment? Conversational effort rebuffed, speaker called sub-intelligent and openly put in their place. End of conversation. Best to say nothing in Germany. Which of course is the German way: If it's not "meaningful", it's best to say nothing, they argue. What could posssibly be meaningful, say arriving at the work place on a Monday morning? Angela Merkel's immigration policy?<br />
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Consequently, silence is a major part of...German conversation (1). But back to our example, as there's more to it than the sheer rudeness of speakers.There's also a complete intercultural breakdown: People in Germany aren't aware that seasons aren't so clear-cut everywhere as they are in continental Europe: Spring: Mild - Summer: Hot - Autumn:Windy - Winter: Cold. The "4 seasons in a day" concept for example, so prevalent in Britain and Ireland is totally unknown to them. Therefore, a rather bovine attitude towards the seasons is preordained. It is as it is. No need to comment. Es ist halt Herbst! Ja. isso.<br />
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(1) I shall be wrting about silence -"Schweigen" in a separate post. It is of immense importance when understanding German society, history, and even current political events.Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-39800115933862278152017-07-28T10:04:00.001+01:002017-07-28T10:05:33.265+01:00Why Is It So Easy to Manipulate Germans?<br />
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Yesterday on Social Media (that's how a lot of stories start nowadays!) a German chap, early 60s, a historian with a PhD was telling me off for saying German media were propagating government viewpoints. Assuming I was British and therefore (!) wouldn't know much, he prodeeded to give me a lecture about freedom of the press in Germany. How German media was founded Precisely!! in order to counteract government propaganda because of all the wonderful lessons learned from National Socialism. And so on and so on. <br />
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Why is this important and what does it tell us about Germany today?<br />
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Because it shows that Germans - highly educated and informed as they are - understand nothing of how communication works.<br />
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Few Germans know what an advertising agency is and what it does. Ask them about PR-agencies or media agencies and you will draw a total blank.<br />
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How can anybody expect a nation which can tell you everythig about the Enlightenment and what great lessons of "Mitmenschlichkeit" to draw from it (all said with a Bridget Jones style earnest nodding of the head) but knows nothing about press conferences, "Kamingespräche" between PR-agencies and journalist, the workings of ad placement by media agencies and so on and so on be expected to take a stand against what's going on in their country? They are like naive children repeating what their mummy has told them. Fully expecting to be praised because they are so learned - gut aufgepasst!<br />
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Germans are singularily badly equipped to stand up to the manipulation - by the media, by the government - that's going on under their very eyes. #sad<br />
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Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-54996758923233448362017-03-16T11:16:00.001+00:002017-03-16T11:19:09.651+00:00The Mysterious Mr.Knaus<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I suppose the first thing I noticed about Gerald Knaus, author of the "Merkel-plan" to make Syrian refugees legal via an exchange system with Turkey, was the fact that he frequently mentioned being an Oxford graduate. Not the fact, mind, that he attended the august university - why shouldn't he - clever chap that he undoubtedly is? No, it was more that he kept on saying he had studied "in Oxford". I have never come across anybody saying that before. You study "at Oxford", certainly not in Oxford.<br />
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Which led me to cast a closer look at Mr. Knaus's CV in general. (Liberally shared btw, all over the internet - Mr. Knaus likes to lay open every step of his most adventurous life, and clearly enjoys talking about himself.) But before we do that here, let me tell you about a the only "personal" exchange I had (via twitter) with him. <br />
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Curious as to his time "in Oxford" (and because we might have overlapped there) I asked him which college he had attended. His reply, and I quote verbatim : "<i>The nicest, the one with the Olympic rower". </i>Which of course left me as baffled, as when after this very amicable exchange, I was subsequently blocked by Mr. K. [1]<br />
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But let's look at what Mr Knaus is telling more illustrious people than me about his education. An interview he gave the Austrian station ORF provides us with interesting insights. Mr. Knaus tells the audience, he went up to Oxford in 1988 - bafflingly without having done his A-levels. He left school, he said, at age 17 and spent a year in Paris. Having been admitted to Oxford, he sits his A-levels independently, cramming "in cafés". And hey presto, an Oxford undergraduate is born. [2]<br />
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We have to pause here and ask how this is even financially possible. Mr. Knaus comes from an extremely modest background. His father was a railway employee.[3] A scholarship is wellnigh imposssible - as an independent extern sitting A-levels out of context, he would probably not be on anybody's radar. OU offers scholarships, but as far as I know only British nationals are elegible. And here we have to mention a very embarrassing fact which would in any case weigh heavily against Mr. Knaus being offered an open scholarship form Oxford or any other British institution:<br />
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Even now, after years of training and speaking, his English is very very poor indeed. His pronunciation is abysmal - he still says "wiff" for example for "with". His vocabulary is restricted. And - most importantly - he cannot express himself well in written English. You can easily check this by looking at his published tweets - his twitter handle is @rumeliobserver. You'll see that some of his English tweets are difficult to make sense of. [4]<br />
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So when our man persuaded those Oxford dons to accept him as a fresh-faced 18-year old, his English cannot have been the main reason. Equally baffling as to how it was possible to write twice-weekly essays about a complicated topic. Knaus mentions he was part of the OU debating society, again - I would have loved to hear his contributions as it is hard to imagine that with his halting, faulty, and weirdly pronounced English, he will have made much of an impression.[5]<br />
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But hey ho, he managed it all, and by his own testimony - he even got a First! <br />
After that impressive result, our hero dashed off to the Ukraine where he "taught macroeconomics and political economy at the State University of Chernivtsi" according to his own website.<br />
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Bafflingly, between the Vienna café cramming, the whirlwind Oxford tour and the Ukrainian lectureship, he also managed to fit in studies at Brussels University (Institut d'Etudes Européennes) and Bologna (John Hopkins University, Bologna Centre).[7]<br />
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Such a shame, that given the meticulousness with which he talks about his metereoric academic career, Mr. Knaus has never let anybody into the secret as to which Oxford College it was that he attended.<br />
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Footnotes<br />
[1] All of the rowing colleges, Christ Church, Oriel, St. Edmund Hall, Ballio, Magdalen would have a matriculated Olympic rower, especially bearing in mid there are also female rowers.<br />
[2] ORF : "Der Mann hinter dem Merkel-Plan". ORF Sendungsreihe "Doppelzimmer", Ausstrahlung v. 25.5.2016.<br />
[3] Metapedia, Eintrag: Knaus, Gerald<br />
[4] Twitter/@rumeliobserver<br />
[5] ORF interview, see above.<br />
[6] www.rumeliobserver.eu<br />
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Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-77350197524097233772017-01-17T08:53:00.000+00:002017-01-17T09:26:18.894+00:00People's Opinions: Leave Germany or Not<br />
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Personally, I've become convinced that Germany isn't a safe country anymore. The constant danger of falling victim to a crime increases by the day, and living in a huge town as I do, doesn't help. More recently, however<b>, a second danger has been manifesting itself:</b><br />
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Totalitarian methods of curbing free speech. Censorship, informing, reporting, denunciations, wrecking people's livelihood with the help of some misconstrued BDS- activity - all those things are alive and kicking. (Especially the latter).</div>
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And so I've been canvassing opinions of late. Asking anybody and everybody - friends,family, but also people I hardly know, people on social media what their thinking is: <b>Do they think it's still safe to stay in Germany if you want to speak your mind.</b><br />
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As it is, it seems almost everybody has a "secret plan". Everybody I spoke (or had written communication with) replied that they thought things were still "dormant" at the moment. They were critically observing the deteriorating scenery - newspapers publishing only obvious government-approved content, people becoming aggressively active when confronted with dissent to the current government. (When did it actually start that ordinary people make it their business to defend a hare-brained politician, i,e. Merkel just because they feel that they share a socialist agenda with her and you ought to be punished if you don't?)<br />
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Back to people's secret plan. Most people (with the usual provisos of family and property which make leaving the country difficult, or in some cases impossible) had given it a lot of thought and had already pinpointed a preferred destination they'd be heading for if things were to get worse in Germany. There was also a (mostly non-bourgeois) minority of people who said they would definitely not leave and were prepared to join some form of struggle or confrontation if necessary.<br />
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I mustn't forget to mention that nobody was actually considering moving before the autumn election results were known. Many of course hoping for a defeat or in any case weakening of the current administration.<br />
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Here are the destinations most frequently mentioned: <br />
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<li>USA</li>
<li>Australia/New Zealand (something comforting to being on the other side of the world)</li>
<li>Switzerland</li>
<li>Hungary (one of my own favourites)</li>
<li>some fair weather destinations like Tenerife or Madeira</li>
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Whether or not people will actually pack their bags and leave is of course their decision. I for one have made up my mind.<br />
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Thanks to all who were kind enough to share their views with me.<br />
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Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-36407101068269883422016-12-14T16:36:00.000+00:002016-12-14T16:36:24.563+00:00Die deutsche Werbeagentur<br />
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<i>Zur Abwechslung mal ein Post auf Deutsch... aus gegebenem Anlass, etwas über Werbeagenturen.</i><br />
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Ich hatte das (Un-)Glück einige Zeit in ener Werbeagentur als Texter zu arbeiten. Ja in ener sehr großen, internationalen, die für viele bekannte Marken arbeitet. Deren Spots man jeden Abend im TV sehen kann. Viel gelernt - wie entsteht ein Werbefilm zum Beispiel, von der Idee zum Storyboard zum Dreh, zur Post-Production. Viel über Marktforschung, Fokusgruppen, Strategie.<br />
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Aber vor allem viel über die Menschen, die in Werbeagenturen arbeiten. Und gerade darüber gibt es so viel Unwissen - vor allem in Deutschland, wo Menschen so wenig über die gesamte Kommunikationsbranche wissen. Was ist PR, was ist Werbung, was Marketing? Keine Ahnung, aber alles überdeckt von strinrunzelnder Mißbilligung. <i>Die wollen uns doch nur reinlegen </i>sagt, wie der Bauer 1920 auch noch 2016 der gebildeteFernsehzuschauer.<br />
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So herrscht natürlich auch ein völlig falsches Klischeebild von Leuten, die in der Werbung arbeiten: Glamourös und mit einer Aura- oh ja, aber auch eitel und oberflächlich. Und reich, sehr sehr reich. <i>Mad Men </i>hat Eindruck hinterlassen. Jeder Deutsche weiß jetzt Bescheid wie das läuft - und vergißt daß sich seit den 1950ern und vor allem seit den 80ern, sehr sehr viel verändert hat. Erst diese Woche hatte ich einen Twitter-Austausch mit jemandem, der mich belehrte, dass Werber alle auf Koks seien und Ferrari fahren: "Alle die ich in der Werbung kenne, sind permanent zugekokste Hipster". Ja, man kennt sie - die Reichen und Schönen - aber ist zugleich selbstverständlich empört über das unmoralische Treiben.<br />
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Oh ihr naiven, klischeebegeisterten Deutschen! Wenn ihr wüßtet! Die allermeisten in der Werbung Arbeitenden sind nämlich nicht straight outta Mad Men in schicken Anzügen, sondern oft verkrachte Existenzen. Lange lange geisteswissenschafltiche Studien führten zu eben so langer Arbeitslosigkeit zum Beispiel, bis man durch Beziehungem den Job in der Agentur bekam. Falsche Anläufe - jemand sollte mal die Anzahl ehemaliger Sportlehrer in Agenturen publizieren! - Jobs als "fester Freier", "Freier" oder ähnliches sind an der Tagesordnung. Schlabbrige Jeans, selber gekochtes mitgebrachtes Mittagessen, abends der Fernseher, so sieht das Mitarbeiterleben aus. Und natürlich die Kollegen, inzestuöse Beziehungen von Menschen aus kleinen Städten, die wegen des Jobs in die große weite Welt gezogen sind und dort niemand kennen, klucken zusammen. Das führt zu Streit, Mobbing, aber auch zu Cliquen und Ehen. Die Atmosphäre ist gespannt und die Gänge (allerdings strahlend weiß und mit interessanten Design-Objekten ausgestattet) riechen nach Tütensuppe. Man macht viel gemeinsam. Wer das nicht mag, hat schlechte Karten.<br />
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Steht ein Pitch an, wird tatsächlich hart gearbeitet, oft durch die Nacht. Steht keiner an (meistens) herrscht gähnende Langeweile, die jeder durch Computerspiele etc. zu besänftigen sucht. Und dem Satz "Also bei uns ist voll Stress" - man will ja nicht wieder arbeitslos sein.<br />
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Alles in allem sind es meist armselige, unkreative Menschen die dort arbeiten. Und es ist ja nicht alles Kreation - weit wichtiger ist die Kundenbetreuung. Das sind hochorgansierte aber recht langweilige Menschen, die früher Chefsekretärin gewesen wären, aber jetzt (weil sie ihr BWL-Studium nur mittelmäßig abgeschloosen haben) nicht in der Industrie, sondern auf Agenturseite landen. Wesentlich schlechter bezahlt.<br />
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Also nix mit Koks, nix mit Ferrari - sondern was mit Kleinbürgern, provinziellem Stolz auf sich selber (nicht mehr arbeitslos, sondern kreativ!) und viel klischeehafter Mythenbildung. Viel mit Ressentiment, viel mit trübseligem, trotzigem Linksdenken: Man will ja nicht sein wie der ewig betrunkene NPD-Vater, der auf dem Sofa in der Küche die Bildzeitung las.<br />
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Aber natürlich hat man Dünkel und Anspruch - gespeist dadurch, daß das Publikum denkt man fährt Ferrari. So internalisert dann auch der verkrachte Kleinbürger das klischeehafte Image, von dem er selbst weiß wie falsch es ist.<br />
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All das nur ein bißchen als Hintergrund zum Fall Hensel und seiner Agentur.<br />
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Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-6245657281563181002016-10-06T10:47:00.005+01:002016-10-12T13:18:39.754+01:00Where Should I Emigrate To?<br />
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I will have to emigrate. Very very soon it will no longer be possible to lead anything resembling a normal life in Germany. Last week, an 80-year old woman was raped and robbed on a Sunday at 11am after a church visit. In the centre of Düsseldorf, a once pleasant and affluent town where I spent several years working in an advertising agency, riding my bike, going for walks, coming home late...normal things one does. None of those things would now be possible in Merkel's Germany. And that isn't acceptable. But as that evil woman vowed to stick to her guns (so to speak) and indeed will next week be visiting Africa to sniff out more possible Deals (as we've learned to call them) with African leaders, I have no choice but to leave this once pleasant, but now doomed country.<br />
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<b>So where should I go? Where can I go?</b><br />
<ul>
<li><b>Britain.</b> The obvious choice. My second home. Yet last time I lived there, I had to leave after 1 year: The combination of atrocious weather, Fridya night culture, ropey infrastructure and manky food proved too much. Enormous administrative, personal and financial efforts had to made to remedy a wrong move. Dare I give it another chance? Still, the prospect of a new promising Tory government is a positive sign, the North has to be avoided ( I lived in Edinburgh last time) and a general gritting of teeth might do the trick. Odds: 6/10</li>
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<li><b>Hungary</b>. The country I spent the most time in this year. Very sympathetic due to personal ties and the politics of PM Orbán which I wholeheartedly approve of. Affordable. Beautiful, historically interesting. But: Language problems, the near impossibility of finding a job there, low wages. And atmospherically, I often notice a certain ennui in people there, a tendency to be negative and find fault with everything, and a general lack of joie de vivre. Odds:4/10</li>
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<li><b>Holland</b>. Probably the country I feel closest to outside (the old, pre-Merkel) Germany . Although I have the vocabulary of a 10-year old, due to spending my youth there I can sound Dutch. I always get the frisson of coming home when I'm there. The smells, the weird food, the "Hoi" - it all feels comforting. Yet: Is it that much better than Germany when it comes to chaotic migration? And is the prospect of living in a politically divided, almost sectarian country any better than living with Merkel's constant "Nazi" slurs? Odds: 6/10</li>
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<li><b>Switzerland</b>. A country I have no ties with and know hardly at all. What I've heard about it hasn't exactly filled me with enthusiasm. Vigilante neighbours, high prices, strange forms of protestantism. Generally I'd say - too isolated, inward-looking, resentful and stuck in a decade we know little about. And yet: It's affluent, realatively safe, has good infrastructure and the prospects of finding a job there are better than in most other countries. Not a place I like, but as I say - it's grit your teeth time. Odds: 6.5/10 </li>
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Beggars can't be choosers. And it will be necessary to make a decision soon. The next German government will likely involve a loony left party AND the nauseating, destructive Merkel. I hope not to be in Germany when that doubly whammy hits.<br />
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So what do you think? If you're German, do you have similar thoughts? If you live outside Germany, can you recommend a country I maybe haven't thought of yet? Let me know!<br />
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Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-57185464006330743152016-09-23T14:14:00.003+01:002016-09-23T16:23:24.569+01:00Why Is Europe Deliberately Being Destroyed? My Take.<br />
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No other question has been bandied about as much during the last year as this: <b>WHY?</b> Why are European leaders (Mainly: Germany's Merkel) letting in a deluge of young unskilled Muslim males - unchecked, unregistered, uncontrolled?<br />
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The humanitarian argument didn't cut the mustard anymore when it became clear that most weren't actually from Syria (incidentally: Is shipping people out of the country the best way of dealing with a civil war?) but <b>from Pakistan, India, North Africa and Central Africa - none a warzone.</b> Then there was a spurious attempt to say those people were highly qualified workers and would boost the economy. (Laughable, no counter-argument necessary). Then we had the demographic ruse which is equally absurd: No more Germans? Hey let's take in 3 million Africans, I mean what's the difference! A "bums on seats" argument of the most primtive kind.<br />
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Okay, so the <b>official</b> explanations are clearly unsatisfactory. What does the other side have to say?<br />
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Having asked that question incessantly for a year, I'm probably familiar with every theory anybody ever had about this - from the banal ("Politicians are just incapable") to wacky ("It's a Zionist plot").<br />
During this year I learned a lot about the New World Order, about the Bilderbergers, the Trilateral Commission and various other arcane subjects.<br />
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I also came across some familiar figures from the past, e.g. R. Coudenhove-Kalergi who is high on the list of being responsible for the catastrophe we're now experiencing. Personally, I always found him a fascinating historical figure, well worth a proper biography. I also find his quest for a pan-European movement quite sympathetic. (Also proposed by Hubertus Prinz zu Löwenstein - surely not a suspicious figure). Bearing in mind that Coudenhove-Kalergi was writing in the 1920s where such ideas were common currency, I find it hard to imagine that this highly-cultured man of letters would have advocated an invasion of illiterate brutalised Third Word Muslims into Europe. In fact, I am one hunded percent certain, he would not. He is absolutely the wrong guy to blame for the various idiocies of the Merkel-"plan".<br />
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So... this leaves us where? I think when something is intensely puzzling and you just stand there open-mouthed wanting to shout "You What???" 20 times, you have to pause, let it all sink in and look for the most likely explanation. Which is why I would exclude the NWO theory. Creating all this mess, in order to provoke a civil war to then beat that down and start again is just too SciFi for me.<br />
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The answer (and of course this is only my theory) is much more simple.<br />
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A politician with immense power, and a massive chip on their shoulder. Somebody whose first term in office was blighted by set-backs, frustration and constant humiliation. Somebody with a dodgy past they have to conceal all the time. Somebody with a name that isn't real. Somebody with a massive amount of anger. Somebody who is black, has strong Muslim sympathies, and exhibits many gay tendencies. (Nothing wrong with any of those, unless you yourself think they mark you out as a lesser being.) <br />
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So - you guessed it, yes, the 44th President of the United States - Barack Obama II. A person whose hatred of all that he is<b> not</b>, is so overwhelming, he needs to destroy what he cannot be or have. Barack decided that after his disastrous first term (and the momentously catastrophic decision of the American people to grant him a second) he would not repeat his mistakes. He started to engage in the <b>Politics of Revenge.</b><br />
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By persuading gullible, slightly off the pace politicians like Angela Merkel who basked in the warm sunshine of his praise, to take in millions of young uneducated Muslims into their own countries, Barry achieved 2 things at once - improving the conditions for the Brothers after all, getting millions of no-hopers out into highly developed European countries where they will be alimented from arrival til death is no mean feat and probably guarantees him a place in the Muslim pantheon. Hail Barry.<br />
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Secondly, and more importantly, Barry made sure that he got his own back. Affluence? Destroyed. Peace? Destroyed by civil unrest. Safety? Destroyed by sky-rocketing criminality. Freedom of speech? Eradicated. Whites? Put in their place by fear and institutionalised black racism. The civil society? Replaced by sectarian hatred.<br />
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The humiliation of Mr. Obama, President, engendered the biggest hate crime ever: The unleashing of the Muslim invasion of the West.<br />
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Barry, together with your obliging, slightly backward handmaiden Merkel you've achieved so much more than any New World Order fantasy ever could!<br />
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Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-40382408069833509892016-08-16T15:22:00.001+01:002016-08-16T21:34:46.821+01:00The Year of Living Dangerously<div dir="ltr">
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It is now almost a year that German Chancellor Angela Merkel unilaterally decided to waive the Dublin and Schengen agreements and thereby triggered off the biggest migration flow in the history of modern Europe.</div>
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Much has changed since those fateful days in early September 2015. I will concentrate on the changes in ordinary people's lives rather than the big events (Brexit!!) this decision has brought about.<br>
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During the long gloomy autumn months that followed that disastrous September, everybody was feeling absolutely stunned. I remember travelling quite a lot and constantly meeting people who looked perplexed and confused asking each other the ever same question "What is happening here?" There was no help coming from politicians - the official reason of "our humanitarian obligation" was quickly transformed into absurdity as migrants from Pakistan, North Africa and India were flooding Germany in ever increasing numbers.</div>
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Evenings were getting darker, and as reports of soaring crime became daily news, going out by yourself after dark seemed a distant memory. Pepper spray became a handbag accessory. People were constantly looking over their shoulders rather than straight ahead. Whilst Merkel and her allies were calling peaceful demonstrators "scum" and actively encouraged people to sneer at "concerned citizens", Cologne NYE happened. You know the facts by now (against the explicit wish of the government who tried to hide, obfuscate and poo-pah those absolutely mind-blowing occurrences.).</div>
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The winter was spent raging against the forces that had made all this possible, trying to find answers, discussing it with friends til the early hours, going over possible scenarios,- and starting to think about leaving the country.<br>
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Suddenly it had become clear how vulnerable one really was. Things one had never heard ofbefore actually became frightening reality: Somebody can stand behind you on the escalator and burn your hair off with a lighter (happened in Berlin). Mothers carrying babies could be randomly stabbed (also in Berlin).Young women were admonished to dress decently so as not to "tempt migrants". Houses and flats that once seemed safe were broken into as if a window, a door, a fence were nothing - which is true, they offer very little actual protection. But in the "old Germany" they used to indicate barriers - this is MY territory do not enter without permission. In the new Merkel-created society such barriers are no longer meaningful. If there's something to get hold of, hey....go for it! And don't expect help or even sympathy from German politicians. Victim-blaming is common currency now</div>
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Then the really terrible terror attacks happened, not just in Germany but all over Europe. Train journeys became fraught with danger. Innocence, carelessness, normality, sponaneity have all gone. Instead there is a panoply of crude and rather primitive propaganda slogans urging everybody to do more and get with the programme which is inanely called "Wir schaffen das" (We can do this!). Indeed in her most recent interview Merkel, asked about the increase in sexual attacks on women said "I think we as a country can cope with that".<br>
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Life in Germany has become dangerous since Merkel's foolhardy decision last September. And of course this year has seen similarly staggering numbers of immigrants, especially from Central Africa. Thank you Merkel!You have managed to change Germany completely and utterly. Life has become difficult, unpleasant and dangerous, all in one year. Well done!</div>
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Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-45126473819690021572016-02-15T16:04:00.002+00:002016-04-10T12:28:12.311+01:00Xenophobia - a Clarification<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Today, I came across an article in the German Press which tells the story of a University Professor who<i> horribile dictu</i> is apparently publishing his thoughts on Twitter. His views, the article explains in a pained and worried tone, are not pro-refugees. They are therefore, the author points out "fremdenfeindlich" - hostile to foreigners, <b>xenophobic</b>. The article is <a href="http://www.focus.de/politik/deutschland/rechtspopulismus-an-der-universitaet-das-ist-nicht-mehr-mein-land-professor-schimpft-auf-twitter-ueber-fluechtlinge_id_5285411.html">here</a>.<br />
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This got me thinking: The professor is against Germany taking in more and more and more (every day, c.3,000) refugees, migrants, asylum seekers whatever you choose to call them. 80 percent of those people are male and 85 percent are Muslim. Whether indeed this is a good idea, is blatantly more than debatable, After the horrendous incidents at NYE in Cologne, people are surely allowed to raise the topic in a more than questioning manner. Crime, especially sexual crime against women has risen dramatically. Other violent crime is also up, especially in formerly pleasant towns like Düsseldorf, or the said Cologne. People, but especially women are rightly afraid to go out on their own. The sale of pepper spray, maze, and demand for legally availablel self-defense weapons has exploded.<br />
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So far, so bad. Back to our tweeting professor. Why, in God's name should somebody who is not in favour (and says so publicly) of taking in millions of misogynist, violent males, who balk at the thought of shaking a woman's hand - refugees in asylum seeker's hostels even refuse to take food when it is served to them by a woman - but don't appear to have a problem with raping women, why then should he not be allowed to say so? Or even more illogically, be smeared as<b> xenophobic</b>? For that is exactly the one aspect the professor hasn't got a problem with - that those people are foreigners.<b> He is not xenophobic - he is worried about the demise of tolerance in Germany.</b><br />
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Likewise, regular readers of this blog will know how much I detest xenophobia. They will also know how much I detest illiberalism and homophobic or misogynist attitudes.<b>Which is precisely why I am against importing millions of Muslim males who are explicitly unwilling to integrate and who demand that their anti-Western views and behaviour patterns aren't just respected but made the norm in their newly adopted countries.</b><br />
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So quite why the German press wants to stigmatize people who are worried about society becoming ever more illiberal, intolerant and proto-fascist as "<b>xenophobic</b>" must remain a mystery. Or shall we say not so much a mystery: Plummeting circulation figures are making German media vulnerable: Government funding is only for those who are happy to be "gleichgeschaltet" and will spout Merkel's message.Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-86528217806959917462016-01-07T14:55:00.002+00:002016-01-07T16:24:58.553+00:00Generation Emigration<br />
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How many times have we read about people from, say, Ireland leaving their country to start a new life in far-away places like Australia, the US or, like an acqaintance of mine who wasn't put off by the chill factor, and moved to the Canadian province of New Foundland because his academic career wasn't prospering at home!<br />
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Who would have thought that one day one would find oneself in exactly the same position. Whilst I've moved often in my life and am certainly no stranger to being an expat, I find this is now an entirely new situation:<br />
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Suddenly, ever since the beginning of last September, Germany (where I live) has changed. Within the space of 4 months, 1.1. million refugees have entered the country. Every single town in Germany has to accommodate vast numbers of mainly male Muslim immigrants.Container homes are being built. Twon centers are full of migrants who have nothing to do. And life has changed: You will all have heard about the terrible New Years Eve events at Cologne main station. Similarly horrifying reports have come up from other German cities, and are still emerging as I write. Today, it transpired that two teenage girls in a small town in the South Western corner of Germany were gang-raped by immigrants.<br />
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Life in Germany doesn't seem to be safe anymore - all of a sudden. And worse is to come: The forecast is for another 3 million migrants to enter the country in 2016. This would all be bad enough, as there simply isn't any room here anymore, and already newcomers have to be put up in shelters and gyms which are hardly fit for purposes.<br />
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Worse, or at least just as menacing, I find another terrible change which has occurred in Germany: The media, the police, officials etc. cannot be trusted anymore. Whilst this has been clear for a while (what for example with varying reasons for the chaotic mass immigration being given - Gemany needs young people, Germany needs qualified workers, oh no it's all a humanitarian imperative, and so on) the events of NYE have proven this suspicion to be fact-based without the shadow of a doubt. Police and media now admit to having neglected to report the real catastrophic extent of the events. Rapes, gropes, robbings, theft, assault, injuries were brushed under the carpet, and only came to light when the pressure of eyewitness and social media reports proved too strong.<br />
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So, one suddenly finds oneself living in a country where the dangers of uncontrolled mass immigration are being denied, and victim's are supposed to just get one with it whilst being urged to shut up so as not to "slander" innocent migrants. Germany, once again seems to have transmogrified into a totalitarian state where unpleasantness is being denied, coverd up, and where people who want to speak their minds will be intimidated.<br />
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I don't feel I can live in such a country much longer. And whils it will certainly not be possible to move overnight - jobs, family connections etc. standing in the way of rash and emotional decisions - I feel a normal life, such as people were used to here in Germany is no longer guranteedor even possible. I know for a fact that many many well-educated Germans of all ages feel exactly the same.<br />
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If Mrs. Merkel and her government can afford to lose people like us, and is happy to import unskilled, largely uneducated migrants from Islamic countries in extraordinarily large numbers, I wish her good luck. Meanwhile I'm thinking of where I shall be moving to. Stay tuned.<br />
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<br />Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-7291395794367182942015-09-23T08:50:00.001+01:002015-09-23T11:39:38.453+01:00Are You A Nazi?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Ironically, in my last post I said I was looking forward to moving to a "delightful" town like Munich or Düsseldorf, or Hamburg. It turns out that in the space of only a few weeks, those towns have become a lot less delightful: Huge tent cities have appeared all over the place, container homes are being put up and municipal buildings are now the home of refugees from all over the world.<br />
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Only in August, the government was talking of 450,000 refugees Germany would be taking in. The figure quickly edged up to 800,000, then to a million, and now we hear that an additional 500,000 people want to complete the hazardous journey via Turkey before the winter sets in.<br />
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I will leave aside the question whether the best way of alleviating what is undoubtedly a global human catastrophe is bringing all those people here. I will also not discuss questions of demographical compatibility. Or the fact that the media continuously show pictures of refugee families and small children - whilst official Austrian Home Office figures established that 78.p.c. of refugees are young males.<br />
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I want to concentrate on the aspect I find truly amazing and not a little upsetting: The way this surely major societal occurrence is being discussed in Germany. Namely not at all. In canteens, round the coffee-machines, on commuter trains - the refugee crisis is always the elephant in the room.<br />
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That's because only one opinion is permissible: <i>It's great. Germany is an example to the world. There aren't any problems (well maybe some tiny minor technical ones which with the right organisational approach will soon be ironed out). Everything is gut. Shut up. Any questions, doubts, fears, problems? You cannot be serious! Are you a Nazi? You must be very right-wing!!</i><br />
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So everybody shuts up. If you're an ordinary middle-class person with a family, a job, holidays, friends, the daily grind, the weekend to look forward to, I'd say it's most unlikely you will have a Second Life as a rabid Hitler-admiring "Deutschland über alles" singing Nazi. Yet the public mood is so fanaticized - one doubtful look, one wrong question, and you'll be labelled a dangerous right-winger and a "rabble-rouser". No ifs, no buts. It's a fact. Go away, Nazi.<br />
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The leader of the Liberal party (FDP) today said : "It's the refugees who will have to adapt, not the indigenous population". Wait for the backlash, wait for the slander. Nobody, however liberal their credentials, how fair their point, intellectual their background is immune - it is open season in Germany. Any doubts about the wisdom of taking in 1 million refugees year on year? Shut up you Nazi!Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-65116208922327548602015-09-07T11:22:00.005+01:002018-04-24T14:55:11.567+01:00Berlin - Not For Me.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm6qU92cfFvKpKIJJiy_DfaSOPwBldxUG5VI6UAT0kDw7d8kJ5Msm4fT00Ks1hR7Sn5lzAMeYXjNaFcbhvztcBZOP_NZasByrvF4VwxlXE4S6vR3W0LqWFJvQ8bl_rV54o8-09Exzj-4k/s1600/potsi.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="234" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm6qU92cfFvKpKIJJiy_DfaSOPwBldxUG5VI6UAT0kDw7d8kJ5Msm4fT00Ks1hR7Sn5lzAMeYXjNaFcbhvztcBZOP_NZasByrvF4VwxlXE4S6vR3W0LqWFJvQ8bl_rV54o8-09Exzj-4k/s320/potsi.jpg" width="320" /></a>I have now been living in Berlin for almost a year, and its ugliness still hits me. Give or take the odd building like the Dom, and a few charming streets in Charlottenburg (one of which I'm fortunate enough to live in) the town with its vast stretches of indiscriminate housing, its brutal 4-lane quasi-Autobahns dissecting the city, its 1960s architecture (have you ever been to an area ironically called "Bellevue"?) is a masterclass in urban uninspiredness. Even the post-reunification architecture is horrible. I don't think I've ever seen quite such a visual imposition as the Potsdamer Platz. And that's is not to mention the creepy horror that was once East Berlin.<br />
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You will notice that I'm not a fan of Berlin. I live here because I have to. I've lived in many German towns and have never felt so "unwohl" as in Berlin. To all the thousands of people loving, coming here for their pilgrimage of cool, I have to say: Sorry, not for me.<br />
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So what is it I dislike apart from the ugliness? I do think towns (especially in highly regional Germany) have their own character and their own specifics not found anywhere else. So comparing it to other (West) German towns, I can, jus tas an example, say that I've never encountered such an unfriendly population, Hardly a day goes by where I'm not being told off for something (Being in the way, crossing the road when the traffic lights are on red etc etc) by a complete stranger. Berlin - a tolerant town? It is only tolerant of gypsy bands on the S-Bahn and people sleeping rough on the pavement. If you're an ordinary straight "normal" person, Berliners will hate you and resent you and will tell you all about it.<br />
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I also loathe the way the town is stuck in a (PR and real) permanent 1990s time warp. The"street art" for which read: Houses with brutal, ugly violent looking graffiti. The clubbing (does anybody still do that? As I have very few 16-year olds as friends there is no way of knowing.) Anyway who can afford to? Don't most people have a job? Not in Berlin evidently. And who would want to be told by some East German misfit with body-cover tattoos that No, you can't come in to our wonderful Berghain anyway? It's so non-Zeitgeist as not to be true and Zeitgeist issomething that Berlin is meant to be good at. 30 years out of date methinks. Or just a city PR agency unable to think of something new? More likely. And rather sad.<br />
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More recently, Berlin tried to bang the drum with street food, food trucks and restaurants. In my 11 months here I have never had a decent meal in any restaurant here. (I was recently in Stuttgart and amazed about the contrast). Berlin restaurants and Kneipen tend to offer low-quality cheap food, mainly catering for never to be seen again tourists. And don't get me started on the god-awful Currywurst. "Mit oder ohne Darm?" really says it all, especially where that disgusting concoction ought to be shoved. But that of course is a matter of taste...<br />
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Berlin is a mish-mash of horrible, grumpy and misanthropic indigenous people, trash tourists from European backwaters, and not much else. Charmless, ugly and permanently smelling of rubbish.<br />
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I will leave as soon as possible and move to one of the delightful towns of West Germany, Hamburg maybe, or Stuttgart, or München, or Düsseldorf....<br />
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<i>NB: This post is not written from the perspective of a British expat, but from a genuinly German one. And yes, that makes all the difference in the world.</i><br />
<br />Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-22318873598150530592015-07-16T18:48:00.001+01:002015-07-16T19:34:49.297+01:00Hatred of GermanyThis is a topic I find thoroughly distasteful. If you've been following my posts, you'll know that I loathe any form of xenophobia. When it's targeted at Germany where I live, and which (although I didn't grow up here) I consider my home, it's doubly irritating and painful. I also feel that I can't deal with it in an entirely fair manner anymore. Too much has happened; It has made me prickly and sickened, and I don't trust myself to deal fairly with a topic I find entirely disgusting.<br />
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Also, I haven't been living in the UK for a few years now. My last abode was Edinburgh, where I didn't encounter any anti-German feelings in particular, but was aware of a diffuse xenophobic atmosphere.<br />
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When talking to British expats here in Germany, I notice the same stereotypical cliches coming up: No queuing (nobody outside the UK queues), efficiency (not true anymore in Germany, alas) and over-emphasis on things like being on time, law and order, strictness in a family context. (All about 50 years out of date). They take the amenities Germany provides for granted but don't try to expand their knowledge of it. Empiricism doesn't stand a chance over stereotype in that quarter.<br />
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Thus we come to Social Media where the hatred of Germany and Germans is rampant. Only the other day somebody (an English female, allegedly a member of the Labour party) wrote on Twitter<br />
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"<i>All Germans are racists. They can't help it. It's in their/your DNA."</i> As far as racist comments go, this one would score highly. The same person maintained that "<i>All Germans are Nazis".</i><br />
All this was in relation/explanation of Germany's role in the Greek debt crisis.<br />
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Boris Johnson, the mayor of London, today said on twitter: "<i>Germany's </i>[role in the Greek debt crisis] <i>is a disaster. We have to stop this immulation.</i>" As it is clear that "We" can neither do anything, or that Boris Johnson has any intention of bailing out Greece in a different way from Germany, these comments have to be taken as an indication of an almost incandescent hatred of Germany.<br />
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I deliberately counterpointed a quote from a (clearly very poorly educated and ignorant) woman on Twitter and the Oxford man Boris Johnson who - however objectionable -prides himself on his worldliness and multi-cultural heritage. Sadly, both of them seem to agree on one thing: The horror that is Germany.<br />
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Speaking to a friend about it, he maintained that things had got an awful lot better over the decades. "Think of those dreadful British war films for example." I must admit I've never seen one. A loathing of all things military, war and xenophobic wouldn't make me the ideal audience. But I can assure you, even that sort of spirit is still alive and kicking: Recently, a British family man - otherwise a nice, decent person - enthusiastically raved about a new game app: "Dambusters" - hey, you can play at drowning Germans, how great is that! (War crimes as games, just think!) Incidentally, tens of thousands of Polish POW's would have died if that infernal plan had worked out.<br />
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It is all very sad. I suppose one has to see it as a corollary of Britain drawing into itself, becoming ever more anti-European, ever more parochial and cut off. Germany and Germans are just the lazy way of hitting out. Who could be bothered to open another can of worms by, say, hating Italians or Austrians? Still, it is a sad indictment on a nation, its people. its politicians, its intellectuals (are there any in Britain still?)<br />
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It's also a shame that the UK managed to (rightly) make racism and homophobia a hate crime. Xenophobia, however, remains acceptable, is indulged in by high and low (actually, the thoroughly awful Daniel Hannan (MEP!) is another example of somebody who recently compared Germany to an occupying force in Europe - but somehow he is too disgusting to even get into.<br />
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Xenophobia really is the last resort of the scroundrel.<br />
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<br />Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-29081047621142985632014-11-16T12:40:00.000+00:002014-11-16T21:28:30.184+00:00Twitter AbuseEverybody has stories like this to tell. It really isn't special, and as far as abuse on Social Media goes, it probably was of the more harmless variety. Well, definitely - because murder and rape threats didn't come into it by any stretch.<br />
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But just because you didn't get threatened with rape...does that already make it harmless? Did you therefore get away lightly? Why should it not be possible to contradict somebody about a reading of an article in The Guardian of all places? Why should it not be permissable to defend the author of an article against blatantly absurd readings? Why should one not be allowed to point out what the author "really" meant, especially when it's done in a polite and non-offensive way? Is that already showing too much female uppityness when dealing with a twitter-male? A twitter-male who has a lot of like-minded mates whom he is ready and willing to summon as back-up via copious RT's: "<i>Look at 'er - getting above 'erself, having an opinion when I expressly stated what's what!"</i><br />
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I'm no shrinking violet on twitter, I don't withdraw into my mousehole just because some fat, bald uneducated male tells me to do so. On twitter, you learn to deal with people who think just because they're invisble, they can dish it out. And in my experience, the best thing is to look those people squarely in the eye and hit back. As soon as they feel your fear all hell breaks lose. Because, make no mistake those people are without exception pathetic, deficient men (yes, men) with an inferiority complex. On Social Media they feel empowered, they feel nobody can beat them (unlike their daily experiences in real life where they probably have to kowtow, buckle and scrape).<br />
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So, it isn't as if I was dumbfounded by this particular reaction, not as if I didn't have my defences in place. I hit back, of course I did. With the sort of thin sneer which drives men like that into paroxysms of fury. They would kill you then if they were physically there. But they're not.<br />
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So far, so bad. But it made me think: Is it all really worth it? Is it worth my time defending freelance Guardian writers at the cost of getting abuse form a totally irrelevant person whom I don't know and will (fortunately) never meet? Why bother? Why tweet? I don't tend to get abuse in my daily life, I don't have encounters with pond life telling me off, telling me what's what. So...why go online to meet abusers, clueless, hapless human beings with a huge rage, a sense of entitlement and an axe to grind?<br />
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I don't know, but I don't think it's fundamentally a good idea. I will have to think about it. But it definitely can't carry on like that.<br />
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<br />Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-85344912712911017392014-09-07T14:24:00.000+01:002014-09-07T14:30:08.096+01:00Psycho-Metereology<br />
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Don't let the title put you off! It's just a little piece where I want to show how we are affected by preconceptions about the weather, with an intercultural twist. (Inspired, no doubt by the pretty ropey summer we've all been having.)<br />
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There are loads of myths and folksy believes attached to the weather any particular area has got (or is thought to be having.) Take Scotland, for example - most people will be associating one word here: RAIN. Yes, it rains a lot in Scotland but -after having spent a year there - I wouldn't say rain is the archetypal Scottish weather. In my books it is WIND. Whether it's sunny, or rainy, or just grey - one thing is empirically guaranteed: It will be windy. Yet RAIN will remain the salient first association when it comes to Scottish weather. Why? Because it goes with the complex image we all carry around with us: Cosy darkening afternoons with a cup of tea, a glowing fire, tartan blanket at the ready and a Victorian novel whilst the rain is lashing against the window pane. A nasty, bitingly cold wind when you walk up the Lothian Road? Not on anybody's favourite mental map of Sotland.<br />
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Or take Munich. At least within Germany, that's a town firmly associated with sunshine. Long hot summers, lasting well into the Oktoberfest season. Endless blue skies where you go rambling or rock-climbing in the neighbouring Alps. Or jump into one of the many lakes... tanned people frolicking in the Bavarian sunshine. The truth? There is more rain in Munich than in the allegedly perma-rained on northern town of Hamburg!<br />
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So what I'm trying to illustrate is that there is a real and actual weather - and then there's a weather of the mind: Psycho-Metereology. We have something in our mind, and stick a label on the object - regardless of the reality.<br />
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Another example is Paris - I noticed that it's an absolute trope amongst Americans to say how ever much they love "the city of light", it seems to get so much rain. I've been to Paris scores of times, but never noticed anything untoward about its weather. It seems to be standard central/Western European to me. So again, one's perceptions colour one's belief-structure. There are no absolutes - and people's preconceptions about the weather they associate with a particular place illustrate this beautifully.<br />
<br />Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-42297567949708733082014-04-01T17:31:00.002+01:002014-04-02T13:08:44.306+01:005 Things That Irritate Me About Germany<br />
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As some time ago I wrote about "10 Things I Like About Germany", <a href="http://interculturalmusings.blogspot.de/2012/03/10-things-i-like-about-gemany.html">(http://interculturalmusings.blogspot.de/2012/03/10-things-i-like-about-gemany.html</a>) I thought it would only be fair to talk about the reverse of the medal. A word of warning though - this post will probably only make sense if you know a bit about Germany and are familiar with its actual day-to-day customs and ways. If you're more of the "Ah, the Germans - beer, sowercrowt and layderhouzn" school of thought, I reckon you'll probably find other sources more palatable. For those of you who've spent some time in Germany and/or know it well, here's my take on what gets to me about this country, and I'd obviously be delighted to hear about your pet hates.<br />
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<b>1. Staring</b><br />
I've written about this (to me) highly annoying German habit before <a href="http://interculturalmusings.blogspot.de/2013/04/germany-nation-of-starers.html">here</a> but it still tops the list of my gripes. Being used to the English way of never ever gaping at people, I'm baffled how Germans can spend so much time unashamedly staring at each other. This is particularly annoying on trains where you tend to have a person sitting opposite you. From looking one up and down to bovine open-mouthed stares, there's every variety. Children are not told that staring is rude and therefore do it just as much. I've since learned that there's a North/South divide with Northern Germans leaning more towards the English manner, but as I currently live in Munich which seems to be <i>Starers Central,</i> this is not much comfort to me.<br />
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<b>2.Complaining</b><br />
I may sound like an Australian going on about Whingeing Pommies, but I have honestly never experienced anybody complain as much as the Germans. They complain as if their life depended on it. And as they have little comparison, they take the smallest ontowardness as a personal slight. The - really wonderful - train network (ever used an ICE linking major German cities? Well, I do this quite a bit, and it is just about the most agreeable form of travel imaginable. WiFi, quiet areas, sockets at every seat, snacks and coffee, often free newspapers, a nice dining car with seasonal food, air conditioning that actually works, and an amazing record of being on time - it's a travel dream come true.) But for Germans, it's a red rag. One minute late??? Unbelievable! Carriages in reverse order?? Typical! The <i>Bahn i</i>s not the only thing they moan about. They complain about high prices, the internet, e-books, the health service,modern life, capitalism, hotels..., anything and everything. They seem positively unhappy when there's nothing to complain about.<br />
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<b>3. Conversation</b><br />
For which read: "lack of". Have you ever been to a German office party? Or any party? Then you'll know the feeling of having to deal with complete and undisturbed silence. Germans don't ever feel the need to "make conversation" - something they dispise and find "artificial" (gekünstelt). They have no banter and no phrases come easily. They're almost always awkward when in a group. Uncomfortable and desperatly shy they sit around a table, saying nothing. I don't know whether they find it awkward themselves but they tend to do it for a very long time. It takes a better person than me to suffer this cringe-making atmosphere. I've learnt to avoid gatherings of Germans. They're exhausting and disturbing in an empty sort of way.<br />
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<b>4. Sense of Entitlement</b><br />
As Germany is still a fairly wealthy country, people enjoy generous perks and rich, early pensions. They get 13 (often 14 months) salaries and get paid extra for going on holiday. Of course employers pay an extra Christmas allowance (Weihnachtsgeld). Social benefits are generous, long leaves of absence for both sexes when a child is born, employer funded education (Weiterbildung), tax relief for almost everything including long commutes (which doesn't make a lot of environmental sense) and so on. Probably as a result of this, Germans tend to think their<i> Ansprüche </i>need to be redeemed at all cost, and feel short-changed (!) when they don't get what they feel they're entitled to just by dint of being there. In the East, where people lived under Communist rule for decades, this tendency is even stronger - maybe people there feel they have to make up for lost time. I find this whole approach to life and society very unattractive, and am still shocked by it. I often wish people here had more of a feeling for how other nations live and that affluence isn't a universal human right.<br />
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<b>5. Sexism</b><br />
Like the staring this is mostly an unconscious way of behaviour. If you asked Germans about sexism, they would tell you how much they abhor and condemn it. Yet in everyday life it is hard to find a more sexist society in a Northern European country .It isn't the lecherous wolf-whistle kind of sexism, but a deep-seated conviction (shared by both sexes) that men are simply the superior gender, and have to be listened to. A woman will by definition not be taken seriously in any position of authority. Vice versa, a man doing housework, say, will be a figure of ridicule (yes, this is 2014). Jokes about women drivers are perfectly acceptable, as is the conviction that men and women "think and feel differently". Shop assistants will be decidedly politer and more accommodating when dealing with a male customer. Handymen will be condescending towards women, and as a woman you'll be constantly asked what "nice things" you're planning to cook "for when your husband comes home". Women have totally internalised their inferior position in German society, and never complain. If they did, they'd be regarded as weird and called "Emanze", a strange out-dated expression from the 1970s.<br />
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I suppose there are things to dislike in every country, and in many ways Germany provides a more pleasant, easy and open society to live in than many others countries I know. If you find this this post too "complaining", please turn to<br />
<a href="http://interculturalmusings.blogspot.de/2012/03/10-things-i-like-about-gemany.html">http://interculturalmusings.blogspot.de/2012/03/10-things-i-like-about-gemany.html</a> Alternatively, there's a post called "5 Things I Like about Britain" to compare and contrast. <a href="http://interculturalmusings.blogspot.de/2012/04/5-things-i-like-about-britain.html">http://interculturalmusings.blogspot.de/2012/04/5-things-i-like-about-britain.html</a>Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-76210768064507916982014-01-15T16:27:00.003+00:002014-04-01T18:27:57.755+01:00On Queuing<br />
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If there is one thing Britons are proud of, and one thing that seems to encapsulate "the British way of life" it is the ability to form a queue. If I had a pound for each time someone (usually a recently arrived expat) told me "The Germans have never learned to queue", I'd be very rich indeed. It's also something every foreigner feels obliged to admire.<br />
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In fact, it isn't just the Germans who don't form an orderly queue. Europeans tend not to. Or have you ever seen a queue in Italy -or, say Finland? No. The now defunct Soviet Union would be the only other queuing contestant.<br />
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And that's what queuing smacks of to me - deprivation, wartime, rationing, dark times. Queuing says. "I know my place, I am a number and I know it." It says: "I'll do as I'm told. I'm obedient and subservient, I don't make a fuss even if I have to stand in the rain for hours."<br />
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Harsh words, I know, for such a beloved institution. But I've always found it quite off-putting. When I first lived in Oxford, I took photos of the endless snaking bus queues that would merge into the next bus queue... of people standing there - motionless, patient, obedient. I found it unnatural and a source of mirth.<br />
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Also - not forming a queue does not mean other nations just push and shove their way to the front, elbowing and if necessary head-butting others aside. Not so. When you look closely, queues are mostly a waste of space, and it is much more economical to form small gathering (say in a shop). People have a good eye for judging when they arrived and who came after them. There is no free-for-all. Quite the contrary, it often makes for polite exchanges "Were you before or after me?- No please, go ahead , I've got time." Or there are enquiries whether it's possible to go first - and so on. This is a very Continental type of small talk which contrary to British expectations isn't at all aggressive or anarchic.<br />
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It's how social life generally works in my books, by consensus and negotiation -not via a rigid, pre-ordained structure which is sacrosant. I was therefore pleased to see that in London - probably through lack of space - the endless snaky bus queues don't seem to exist anymore. People also negotiate access more freely. Progress indeed - at least that's how I see it <br />
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<br />Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-89450508510135749132013-12-12T11:13:00.000+00:002013-12-14T11:20:53.451+00:00Is Britain Becoming Less British?<br />
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Following the news during the last few weeks, you could certainly be forgiven to think so. Once we'd got used to the fact that sipping "Glu-wein" on one of the many many German Christmas markets now scattered all over the UK ( I believe there's even one in Belfast) is now the thing to do, the next hammer blow was falling. Apparently "Stollen" is now more popular in Britain than the once ubiquitous mince pie. Food for thought, indeed.<br />
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Apologies to my Atheist readers but have never heard "stollen" referred to other than "Christ-Stollen". (Stollen on its own meaning a mineshaft.) But is the abbreviated version also an indication of culinary shortcomings? Christstollen is a yeasty sort of cake with plenty of dried fruit and (regionally )a dollop of marzipan in it. At its best it tastes like wonderful Italian panettone, at its worst, it could double up as a self-defense tool.<br />
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Plus, I saw a picture of a British Christmas tree. Had the description not included its origin, I would have assumed it was the real continental thing. Tastefully decked out with traditional wooden ornaments (rocking horse, trumpet, drum) and real candles, I was thoroughly perplexed. What about the plastic tree that would open up like an umbrella? What about the multi-coloured fairy lights that blink omnichromatically in 3-second intervals so that your eyesight becomes disturbed? What about the pink fluffy tinsel?<br />
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And apparently it's not just the Christmas spirit that makes Britons borrow heavily from their Continental neighbours. An article in The Guardian suggested that on top of those Christmas Markets, The UK could also benefit from a less centralised, more federal governmental structure. You can read the article <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/local-government-network/2013/dec/10/christmas-markets-lessons-uk-germany-economy?CMP=twt_gu">here</a><br />
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Whatever next I wonder. No more bare legs on January evenings out? Winter coats instead of fleeces? Mixer taps in a bathroom which is no longer carpeted? It's all beginning to sound very scary.....Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-804182107725084622013-12-03T10:35:00.001+00:002013-12-06T20:47:01.368+00:00A Great British Interculturalist Has Died in Germany<br />
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A radio presenter has died. No, I didn't know him. But in the deepest recesses of my brain his name produced a faint echo: Chris Howland.<br />
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The interesting thing is he was a British radio journalist whose career happened exclusively (apart from one unsuccessful stint at home which only lasted a year) in Germany. He was born in London in 1928, became a professional beekeeper, and in 1946 started as a radio presenter for the British army in occupied Hamburg, working for BFBS.<br />
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Soon his radio show became the preferred listening for German youths fed up with the staid and pompous way German radio was then presented. And apparently Chris Howland's show was just what they were looking for - all the great new music (rather than some outdated operetta tunes that German radio would have served up) presented in a laid-back and funny way. Apparently once he told his audience: "Don't worry about the lyrics [of an English song] I don't understand them myself". Just the sort of witty, uplifting remark people needed in those days.<br />
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In the 60s Chris Howland got his first show with a German radio station and again managed to turn it into a great success, thereby even saving the almost defunct broadcasting station from ruin by being so popular. Later on, when TV became the more important mass medium, Chris Howland got a show called "Hidden Camera" which must have been hilarious, especially given the uptight, head-down German post-war era. It involved putting people in awkward or absurd social situations and filming their reactions.<i> Ethnographers of today, take note</i>! So for example, traffic lights were set up in a forest (absolutely no traffic!) and the good Germans were filmed standing there obeying the red lights 'til the cows came home (or until they were being told it had been a joke.)<br />
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Without making a big song and dance about it, Chris Howland who made his strong British accent his trade mark, managed to alert Germans to their post-war weaknesses - a strong allegiance to aurhority, humourlessness, and an unquerying mind.<br />
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Chris Howland died last Saturday near Cologne. He'd made Germany his home, and did radio shows right to the end. I think he deserves to be remembered as one of the first post-war interculturalist who was not afraid of going against the grain. I wonder for example what his BFBS colleaagues made of his decision to stay on in "enemy territory"? He also calmly sailed through the storm when a German politician complained that his "Hidden Camera" was irreverent and impolite. <br />
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I think we need more Chris Howlands - unafraid, humorous and bridging cultures!Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-13727086138838627732013-11-16T16:23:00.001+00:002013-11-16T16:23:38.050+00:00My Languages<br />
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Even the most casual reader of this blog will know that languages are my passion. Learning languages, fiding out abot diffrent gradated shades of meaning in different languages, picking up some hilarious (and inappropriate) slang in a language you already know quite well (wouldn't recommend it in an unfamiliar language as things can easily go pear-shaped), punning in all sorts of languages - and of course being able to read literature in the original - is that not a joy? I certainly love it.<br />
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And it isn't even (sadly!) as if I was an absolute language genius, one of those people who can converse fluently in almost every European language, plus of course Mandarin...<br />
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I have three languages where I'd say I feel comfortable in. But not to the same degree, and not in the same way. My languages are English, German, and Dutch. All not so dissimilar, but still totally different in the registers they offer - and sometimes of course their very similarity can be confusing. The thousands of "false friends" in Dutch and German are known to all speakers and very real pitfalls, even for near-native speakers.<br />
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Those three are my languages because I've lived in the respective countries and picked them up there. I didn't "learn" them. Saying this reminds me that I could do with adding a massive load of Dutch vocabulary - that would certainly do me a world of good! For being able to speak a foreign language is an ongoing and never-ending process. It's much like a sporting skill where you can get ever better, refine your technique, try different approaches, and experiment. Which again is something I love doing in a foreign language.<br />
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My love of languages is definitely not limited to those three - at the moment I feel I'd like to learn Norwegian and Italian, the latter I'm alread quite familiar with but nowhere near fluent. I also suspect that Germanic languages just suit me better. Much as I like French, I've never been very good at it. There's something about the pitch and speed which I can't quite seem to master... I think everybody develops a feeling as to which languages suit them and which don't. But of course there are all sorts of fascinating languages - Hungarian being the one that always tempts me. I really really wish I was better at it - my grandmother was Hungarian, and I feel a special obligation to master it. And wouldn't it be fantastic to be able to read and speak Russian properly, rather than just treat every Cyrillic letter like a personal challenge? I wouldn't stop anywhere actually... Navajo? Icelandic? They certainly sound intriguing! And one doesn't absolutely have to master them all, sometimes you just sort of dip in - I gave up on Japanese and Irish for example, both brilliantly challenging but somehow I got completely flummoxed by them.<br />
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I think you get the idea... I will never stop being fascinated by languages. Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-91038915016398164512013-10-18T17:59:00.000+01:002013-10-18T18:32:19.337+01:00Good-Bye to All That (Social Media)?<br />
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I've been on twitter now for four years, and when I joined it didn't feel all that new. I was aware of it long before I decided to sign up. So as an old hand it's perhaps not surprising that I have a slightly different perspective from people who only started out on it recently.<br />
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You go through phases, and with Social Media there are always phases, and fads, and moods... just as, I suppose there are in real life. Only you can act on them faster. The wordless "Unfollow" button is something that is (fortunately? sadly?) lacking in real life relationships. But even accepting the fact that things change and have their own dynamics, I often feel that I've come to the end of the line with Social Media. I can safely say there won't be any more surprises left (other than the radical monetization of a site). It could go its merry way for another 4 or 40 years, Twitter settling into an ever more boring routine of links posted, RTs received, hashtags followed, people followed and unfollowed and so on and so on. Facebook? I left that a year ago: Cat photos, baby photos, interspersed with un-targeted ads. Old school friends, now unrecognisable, inviting you to play farm games...<br />
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So what have I learned, and why am I now less than enthusiastic about Social Media in general? I've learned that Social Media is a great enhancer of things. Suddenly you're in touch with all those people! Having conversations about...well whatever floats your boat, really. SEO? Translation? Sex in dungeons? It's all there (The last item I can't be sure about, actually). Only a month ago I remember having a conversation about Hugo von Hofmannsthal's poetry just before midnight on a Wednesday.These things don't happen all that often in real life. But "enhancement" is the operative word. There is no essence to it. No substance, no core.There is confirmation, entertainment (sometimes), there is a lot of redundancy and routine. And never anything solid, anything you can hang onto.<br />
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Social Media is inconsequential. It goes on for ever - if you let it -but nothing will ever change on account of it. Whatever you thought you might get out of it (and I'm talking about the long run, not your giddy first year) - you won't. It won't enliven your life, it won't sell you more copies of your oft-rejected and now self-published e-book, it won't put you in touch with Justin Bieber, it won't launch your model career, and if you're a company it won't sell you more products, despite what all those studies may say - they are there for a reason, after all: To get more companies in on the social media act<span style="font-size: x-small;">. <span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-size: small;">Of course there are good things happening there - speaking for myself, I backed a very
worthy cause for years, and brought it to a satisfactory end, I unmasked
a spy, I won books and competitions, got to know (and unknow) fabulous people and resurrected old contacts. Sure.</span></span><br />
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But Social Media (whatever your favourite site is) will carry on and on and on, like the next Sudoku puzzle, and the next crossword. And that's fine, as long as you're aware of it, and don't expect anything else. <br />
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<br />Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-72381146587765418892013-09-12T09:40:00.002+01:002013-09-29T18:33:34.999+01:00That's Funny!<br />
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It came to me when Allison Pearson posted a tweet about how funny she thought the American pronunciation of "Putin" is: Poohtin, rather than the British "Pyootin" It obviously didn't occur to her that there is a Russian pronunciation to a Russian name.<br />
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Never mind the ins and outs of the correct pronunciation ("Murkl", anyone?) - but why is everything that doesn't mirror the British way automatically classified as "funny"? I've endured countless anecdotes of British people's adventures abroad: It always involves a point of "funny foreigners". Funny as in odd, and as in laughable of course.<br />
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No baked beans and wodges of fatty bacon first thing in the morning? That funny German breakfast. No leggings and voluminous t-shirts? Funny way of dressing the French have. No fleece jackets in winter? That's so funny.<br />
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And of course no British habits are ever funny. They are just, well normal, the way you do it. No funny business. Given that fewer and fewer British people can afford to go abroad., that hardly anybody speaks a foreign language ("That sounds funny!") and therefore information about other countries and cultures is heavily curtailed, I envisage a veritable barrage of baffled reactions in the future. Except it isn't funny, it's sad.<br />
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Finding others funny rather than interesting smacks of provincialism to me. It is also incredibly short sighted. Just imagine what you could learn when you start thinking about doing things differently, and why cultures aren't all the same. And that your own perspective isn't necessarily the best one, and that there are many different ways of doing things without the one necessarily being better. Start thinking, and stop finding everything new "funny", and see what a multitude of perspectives you gain!<br />
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<br />Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-4881248583637905422013-09-02T13:39:00.002+01:002013-09-03T09:36:39.706+01:00Translator-Speak. How Odd Language Affects Sales<br />
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There is currently a boom in translation - despite all the moaning you hear from translators. (They're moaning because there's too many of them and most of them haven't got access to people commissioning.) In fact, there are hundreds of websites being opened up for translation every day. Especially Germany and Eastern Europe are targeted by British and American companies eager to penetrate more affluent markets.<br />
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But when you look at those websites, (and I will be concentrating on German translations, not being fluent in any Eastern European language) it is hard to know whether to laugh or despair. Actual grammatical errors aren't they main problem, but they are there. Do these companies really have nobody who can proofread a website?<br />
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Boden.de for example advertises "Kleider unter Knie", and God know what they mean - unter, über? Whatevs. But grammar it's not. And if the customer doesn't know what they mean - will they buy?<br />
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More importantly though, these translated websites seem to create a language of their own. It's somehow just about comprehensible - especially of course if you know the original language from which it is translated word by word. But it certainly isn't proper German either. It's not how people speak, or how people write. It's a hybrid, a non-existant language. Something that only exists in the mind of an overworked translator, slaving away long past midnight over words (s)he's never heard of, has to look up in "Linguee" or one of those handy but treacherous online sites, and then has to link up in a catchy sentence somehow. And mostly it just doesn't work. Look at Next.de, Accessorize.de, Asos.de , Joules.de (particularly awful!) etc. etc, - and that's just sticking with the fashion brands. A true horror of never heard-of German which pretends to be right up there as marketing and fashion speak.<br />
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I would like to be able to quantify how much money gets lost every day by those retailers who are trying so hard to unlock new markets. People have to be persuaded, they need to be reassured that the brand they're buying speaks their language, is there for them. These oddball translator-speak websites will fail badly - and the retailer won't even know what it is due to!<br />
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A very sad state of affairs, but as long as companies place their trust in incompetent translators without effecting checks and double-checks, it won't change.<br />
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<a href="http://outfit.bodendirect.de/default.aspx?styleid=WH596&colourcode=#Page%3DPageCache%26Div%3DPagePlaceholder%26Type%3DProducts%26PageNumber%3D1%26Sort%3D%26MarketId%3D3%26BrandId%3D9%26LanguageId%3D1%26DepartmentId%3D6%26CategoryId%3D3%26SubCategoryId%3D88%26i%3D0">http://outfit.bodendirect.de/default.aspx?styleid=WH596&colourcode=#Page%3DPageCache%26Div%3DPagePlaceholder%26Type%3DProducts%26PageNumber%3D1%26Sort%3D%26MarketId%3D3%26BrandId%3D9%26LanguageId%3D1%26DepartmentId%3D6%26CategoryId%3D3%26SubCategoryId%3D88%26i%3D0</a>Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6712793603818833281.post-38975696953750398712013-08-11T17:26:00.001+01:002013-08-17T20:12:47.450+01:00So Different - Women in the UK and on the Continent<br />
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First you notice the hair. British women's hair tends to be cut into geometrical shapes. Even when it's long, there is a blunt, hard line at the end of it. And it will always have been through the straightening iron. Continental women's hair is much softer, it's "Just-so" hair". You never ever see a French women with "salon" hair. It's freshly washed, but definitely not styled. As with the colour - British women love blocky colour, even their highlights (which they love) are mostly blocky beaver stripes. Teased, straightened, dyed. Anything natural is anathema - it doesn't merely look "made up" - it has to look "up for it". Natural is a look absolutely confined to the elderly in Britain.<br />
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Teased hair, teeth bleached white with a blueish tinge, spray tanned, nails with "nail art" - you do occasionally see that look on women in continental towns - but they tend to be sex workers.<br />
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So what style do continental women go for? For a start, spray tans and artificial tans aren't necessary. The summers are long, and most people tan easily. Hair is, as I mentioned, natural, straightening irons aren't very popular at all. Teeth are left as they are. Of course most women wear make-up and fake eye lashes are as popular as in the UK (if not quite as long and black) - but they tend not to be combined with glitter eye shadow and fuchsia lip gloss.<br />
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Generally there is, I think, on the Continent a horror of looking as if you tried too hard. (Which is invariably the look British women go for - they want to be seen to make an effort, thereby sending a signal to men: I'm up for it.) Clothes emphasize this - it would be totally unacceptable to wear British-style clothes in a (relatively style-conscious) town like say, Munich, Barcelona, or any French city.The cleavage, the "heels", the skirt length, the style, the "body-con"... all wrong. People would stare, and not necessarily in admiration<br />
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I'm not saying the one is better than the other. But there is definitely no overlap.<br />
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Next: Men.Margit http://www.blogger.com/profile/17830126186468062827noreply@blogger.com2