Cultural Oddities

My time abroad is almost over, so I wanted to share a list of little things that I've found to be different here than at home.

1. The stores close at odd times.  They are always closed on Sundays and often on one of the weekdays too, and they close for two hours every day for lunch.  Banks here are only open for six hours a day: 8:30 - 12:30 and then 2:30 to 4:30.  I wish the States had these sorts of hours for employees!

2. Sandwich condiments come in toothpaste-like tubes.

3. Recycling is big.  We have a bin for plastics, a bin for paper and cardboard, a bin for biodegradable food scraps, and a bin for any non-recyclable garbage.  Each type of recycling or garbage has a specific day that it gets picked up on and these days are not regular.  At least, not that I can see.  We have a calendar taped up in the kitchen that is specifically for trash pickup.  It is marked with which day which kind of trash is picked up.  And there are even more types of recycling options on the calendar than we do here!  There is recycling for gardening waste and even recycling for Christmas trees!

4. Keys on German computer keyboards are labeled differently.  I hadn't thought about this much before coming, but we use a German keyboard for computer work, and it was quite confusing at first.  The Z and Y are switched, so I often found myself writing "Thank zou" and "Jany B&B" instead of "Thank you" and "Janz B&B."  The keyboard also has the German letters that the English alphabet doesn't have, such as umlauts.

5. There are no screens on the windows and no screen doors.

6. The windows and doors can open at unexpected angles.  If you turn the handle so it's pointed down, the window/door is locked.  If you turn it so it's parallel to the floor, the window/door can swing open like a door.  If you turn the handle so that it's pointed up, then it can tilt and open at the top.

7. One euro is a coin, not a dollar.  I know this is obvious, but at one point when I first arrived and was trying to buy something, I kept flipping through the paper money in my wallet looking for one euro bill.  Finally the cashier politely reminded me that it was a coin. 

8. The dishwasher has an extra rack just for silverware.

9. Customers have to pay for bottled water at restaurants instead of being served tap water for free.

10. Customers have to pay for plastic bags at the store, so everybody brings their own bags from home.  I actually like this because it's a great way to reduce plastic use.

11. Shopping carts are chained up, and to use one, customers have to push a one-euro coin - or something of the equivalent size and shape - into a slot in the cart's handle.  This causes the chain to unlock and the cart is then free to use.  To get the euro back, the customer has to make sure to put the cart away and lock the chain back in place, making the euro pop out of the slot.  This gives customers incentive not to leave carts rolling around in the parking lots.

12. Getting into neighboring countries is a quick and easy affair.

13. Beds have only a fitted sheet, no upper sheet.

14. German pillows are shaped like couch cushions - so square, not rectangular - and not quite as flat as a pancake.  Maybe a waffle though.

15. The bathrooms are marked WC for "water closet."

16. There are no garbage disposals.

17. Measuring cups have no labels.  (But the B&B cups in the photo do hvae labels because some past host got so desperate that he/she scratched labels into the handles.)

18. A church wedding is not considered valid in Germany, so to get a wedding certificate, couples have to make sure to have a legal wedding as well as a church wedding.

19. Watering cans are called "geese cans" because their shape supposedly bears a resemblance to geese.

20. The light switches are more like light teetertotter buttons.

21.  There are outlets by almost every light teetertotter.

22. The streets are crazily narrow.  There are streets here that look like one-way streets, but then I see cars driving both ways down them.  If they meet one another, one of them often has to slow down and/or pull over. 

23. The roles of decimal points and commas when doing math are switched.  Two thousand eighteen is written 2.018 instead of 2,018.  Three point one four is written 3,14 instead of 3.14.

24. Germans don't call a dachshund "dachshund" even though "dachshund" is a German word.  They call a dachshund a "dackel."

25. There are no bars of soap in the stores here, only plastic bottles of body wash.

26. I have not found any bottles of lotion.  Luckily I had a big jar of lotion that's lasted me the entire summer.

27. People use the 24-hour clock instead of the 12-hour clock, so 5:37 PM is 17:37.

28. There are no German flags displayed outside houses or public buildings.  In the States, I see American flags everywhere, but here, I was told people are wary about returning to Nazi-like nationalism.  However, people didn't worry so much when the World Cup was happening earlier this summer.  Then I did see flags hanging out windows and on sides of houses and on car mirrors.  People are very supportive of their football.

29. There is a lot of firewood stacked up in places around town, and the wood is stacked very precisely.

30. Tipping at restaurants is not common because either it's included in the bill or the waiters are paid a sufficient wage that they don't need the tips. 

31. Hand towels have little loops sewn onto their corners to hang them up on metal hooks drilled into the wall next to the sink.

32. I see tour books for the USA when I go into bookstores.

33. I've seen advertisements for English classes and German as a Second Language classes. 

34. There are sinks in the bedrooms.  No toilet, just a sink with hot and cold handles and a mirror. 

35. At one of the two grocery stores in town, there's an International Foods aisle, and on that wall are things like marshmallows, Pop Tarts, and Swiss Miss hot chocolate mix.

36. I can't find any chocolate chips!  I wanted chocolate chips to put in a zucchini muffin recipe, but I couldn't find them, so I asked one of the store employees where they were.  Or at least, I showed her my Google Translate app with the words "chocolate chips" translated on it.  She led me to a shelf and handed me a box.  I bought it, went home, and opened it to find . . . these.

I tasted one though, and it tasted fine.  I used it in the muffins, and the muffins tasted pretty good too, so it turned out okay.  Still, it was quite a surprise to open the box and find these instead of chocolate chips.