mjm wired ;)  

What a trip!

I went to Germany last week on a business trip and it turned out to be quite an interesting experience filled with fun, stress, food, booze, late nights and women. Okay, maybe not the last one, but I had a great time (ignoring work). The Germans are a funny bunch. I can't recall all the differences I saw between them and American culture, but I want to mention some of the things that I observed.

Food. The main components of German diet are pork and beer. The menu's consist of 75% 'swine' meals and the remaining is beef (with a little fish and fowl). But the fowl was scarce due to fears of the avian flu. They love the juicy bacon, not the crisp stuff. Even the veggies are sprinkled with bacon!! ... And the portions are huge! Well if you run a meal at 15 euro, that's almost $20 US (ie. everything was just a tad bit expensive -- tip and tax are automatic). The odd part of the meat is that it's seldom seasoned. Just huge slabs of meat. Just huge.

Drink About 5 yrs ago, someone told me that once you get used to German beers you won't like anything else. Hmmm, some truth in that maybe. ... They prefer hefeweizen which to me was a 'misty' beer that seemed a lot thicker. Odd at first, you develop a taste for it rather quickly. Although the dark beer ('dunkel') did have a nicer taste. Curious though, the bars did not have much variety with the harder drinks. Maybe it was their lack of understanding my english?

Toilets The men's standing toilets seemed like little bowls mounted on the wall. No privacy. Just everybody standing friendly next to eachother. Of course, the Germans aren't as uptight as Americans (which explains a lot). ... Toilet tissue leaved a lot to be desired. Interestingly most of the restrooms I saw always had lots of open TP laying around. In the US you have to lock it up so people won't steal it. And the final kicker: the TP is like sand paper!!! Go home and hug your Charmin and tell it how much you appreciate it.

Sex Again, the Germans are open and free. Driving to the hotel, there are posters and billboards all over with ads for "erotic materials". Absolutely no big deal. You can find a 'Sex Shop' in the middle of other stores. Buy some groceries, try on some clothes, pick up some XXX magazines. Curious. And the television isn't much different. After 10 (or maybe 11) the commercials on several channels are littered with all sorts of ads for 'erotic' things. See I couldn't quite figure it out. I thought it was possibly phone sex or something. But it was also SMS messaging, and other weird stuff. But, you see the girls are totally naked. And that's only the commercials. Very odd. --- Don't worry, I was almost never in my room except to sleep.

Lots of other interesting things. ... The autobahn was a bit wild. I saw our cabby pull 165km/hr more than once. ... Lots of absolutely tiny tiny cars. ... No such things as 'non-smoking areas'. People smoke everywhere. And there are cigarette vending machines, with not a few varieties - but 40. Clothes smell. I even saw ashtrays in the stairwells at work. ... Impressive how the restaurants and bars have many english speaking waiters (and attractive waitresses). ... Airport security is about 3x times more intense than in the US. ...

It was a very fascinating trip. I'll bet most of the above isn't too specific to Germany and maybe Europe as a whole, but still hard for me to guess either way. Anyways, I'm glad I got the opportunity.