It's a curious see-saw, isn't it? Europe descends into dictatorship most foul in the 1930 and 1940s, depends on us to come save their sorry asses, and then, seventy years later, we descend into the same xenophobic culture-hating pit we helped them to crawl out of.

France hasn't really learned that tearing itself apart isn't a long-term solution, and has been at it, on and off, since 1789. But Germany seems really to have taken to this "peace isn't really all that bad after all" attitude after 1945, and has stuck to it. The looked at their country in 1945 and collectively (albeit with some dissent) said, OK, this is NOT good. They looked at it ten years later, and said, OK, THIS is better. It went though some serious growing pains, especially in the 1970s and 1980s, and even now, there is unrest in the fringes of the EU.

Poland, never a pleasant place in my experience, is turning back to its rightward tendencies, and Hungary is going right back to where it was before it joined the Axis Powers. But Germany, to me, at least, is epitomized by my wife and her generation, and they are the children of the people who experienced the worst of the war and the utter destruction of their country in retaliation for laying waste to their neighbors. The last thing they want is a repeat performance. We haven't really been subjected to destruction like that, and with today's weaponry, there will be no recovery from a destructive attack. That is why the Europeans know so much better than we do what a destructive danger Trump presents, and why he needs to be contained.

As for the Arabs, they were Europe's scholars of the Middle Ages. They still have scholars today, but except for religious scholars, and educating their elites in expensive Western schools, they have entered a sort of Dark Ages themselves. It's actually fascinating how some group or nation always finds themselves in the role of caretaker of civilized culture while the neighbors are busy trying to annihilate themselves.

I've always had an interest in German politics (well, since the late 80's anyway) since I once had a German wife who was living in West Berlin as it then was called when we met (but I think you may have known that)

I met my wife in what was West Berlin as well.

She is from the farm country of the far northwest, near Holland, was in her training year for social work in West Berlin in 1974 when we met. She had never met an American who spoke German before, thought the USA was the other end of the world, and sure as hell never imagined I'd be introducing her to the President of the U.S. some twenty years later (actually, neither did I, but who had heard of Bill Clinton in 1974?).

1. You wrote "Merz spent time in the private sector": He`s leading Black Rock's Germany section and thinks having an annual income of a million Euros makes him "middle class". Owns two airplanes.

2. I like Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer (though I would never vote for her party), but her name is… difficult. Even for German radio hosts, which gave me a chuckle today as the moderator could not for her live pronounce it correctly.



from Munich

Even most CDU members probably don't make a tenth of that. It's one thing for a rich guy to be prominent in a center-right party. It's quite another for him to pretend he's just "middle class." That is just mocking his constituents, something AKK would ever do.

As for Kramp-Karrenbauer's name--I suspect "AKK" will be heard a LOT in German media reports for the next few years! Maybe she is the CDU's revenge for "Leuthäuser-Schnarrenberger" of the FDP a few years back.

… AKK sounds like a nuclear reprocessing plant in German.

Maybe a hint of her subdued power as a party leader? The CDU spent a decade underestimating Merkel, and then suddenly she was Bundeskanzlerin, and they all said, wait, what just happened?

Mine were raised here as Germans and went to German schools. From your comment, I take it yours did as well.

The buildings WERE falling apart, and even today, many of them have only a handful of outdated computers for the whole student body. My wife tutors elementary school kids as a volunteer today. The multi-tier school system weeds out and intimidates "inferior" students according to rigid and often unfair standards. My younger daughter is an aggressive outspoken type, who had no problem, but my elder one is (or was) somewhat shy, and almost got herself eliminated from higher education for it. She went to college in the USA and was valedictorian of her class. In the States, her teachers and professors encouraged her. In Germany, she was just one of T.H. White's ants' "not done," and was considered discardable academic refuse.

If your children in Germany had a better experience, I'd like to hear about it, so as to lessen my short-sightedness. I was here for the whole time, and my German if fluent. My wife, a German, is a social worker, was heavily involved in our girls's school life. If that is short-sighted, I'd like to hear in what way your experiences here in Germany were more enlightening, and to what degree they were different.

A rather large percentage of DU members have built Europe in their minds as a socialist paradise where no one has to compete, healthcare is free as oxygen, college is free to all students who want to attend and everyone retires upper middle class at 52.

Challenging their perceptions on a Friday is just cruel. At least wait to a Monday!

Full disclosure: I think we could learn a lot from some forward European policies. But having been there I know they have some problems as intractable as ours.

Many Europeans are convinced that the USA, despite its many and intractable flaws, is the paradise on earth they are waiting for.

The grass is always greener on the other side of the mountain, doncha know? We could all have one big idea symposium and try to learn and implement the best of everybody, but then what would the "Besserwisser" of the world do? "Besserwisser" is one of those perfect German words to describe in one word what to us is a concept. Literally, it means "one who knows better," and implies "than you do."

And I think only a small percentage of people on DU REALLY believe Europe is some utopian socialist paradise like you described. Some wish it were so, in order to point out what a hovel of a country we live in, and for some, the system has truly crapped on them, and a northern European nation might have offered them a better life, depending on their specific situation. But for many, each nation has its ups and downs. I know plenty of Europeans that would give their eye teeth to live in parts of the USA (California, New England, PNW, Hawaii, whatever suits their specific fancy). It's easy to be an expert if all you know is from Facebook friends and biased websites.

My daughters both were born and grew up here in the German Rheinland. My elder daughter makes a modest five figure salary, lives in New York City, gets 3 weeks vacation, so-so health care, and envies her sister's huge salary, and six weeks vacation. My younger daughter makes big bucks, has the six weeks vacation and envies her sister's chance to live in New York City. For that matter, I hate the cold and the rain here, envy the heat back in Dallas, but my colleagues in Dallas envy my living next to a 1000 year old castle, having an open-air farmers market in the town square 3 times a week, being an hour's flight from London, Paris, Zürich, Copenhagen, Berlin, Munich, etc. a 3 hour train ride from Brussels or Amsterdam, etc etc. Few, if any of us live in a real paradise, and we all have to accept trade-offs. Even here in "Paradise."

And your grass is always greener is spot on.

I truly wish more Americans could afford to travel to other countries and visit other cultures. It would be money well spent to provide ever high school senior with a trip to a forgien country.

My visits to Europe and China have changed me more than anything else I have done short of getting married.

Have a nice evening.

In Germany, they encourage upper level high school students to take a year abroad. ANYWHERE, just get out and see the world. It's no accident that the neo-Nazi skinheads here in Germany often come from schools that weren't upper tier "Gynmasium," and have little idea what the world is like out there, or how culturally vast it is.

People like that see a few dubbed episodes of "Law and Order," and think they know what New York is like, and they see a few episodes of "Sons of Anarchy (again, dubbed into German)," and think they know what California is like. That is about as realistic as listening to one Bernie Sanders speech and thinking you know what life in Germany is like.

it's much easier to visit another country in Europe. It is just not so far away, just sit in your car or a train and in 2 to 4 hours you are abroad.

I learned to drive in the USA, not a Roman gladiator arena!

Last edited Sat Dec 8, 2018, 04:06 AM - Edit history (2)

I fear for my life every time I drive on the Autobahn. I think it resembles a Roman gladiator arena where only the last man standing is allowed to live.

… bis dahin, dass die Leiterin des Kindergartens sie erst nach einem Jahr zum ersten Mal sprechen hörte. Dies hat sich durch die ganze Schulzeit nicht geändert, immer haben wir gehört: sie ist sehr zurückhaltend - aber kann alles. Die Grundschullehrerin hat ihr Potential in der ersten Klasse erkannt und uns gedrängt, dass sie eine Klasse überspringen sollte. Sie hat das mit großem Erfolg getan, und sie wurde darin von der Schule, den Kindern in der aufnehmenden Klasse (mit denen sie heute noch eng befreundet ist!) und dem Tagesheim, das sie nachmittags besuchte, unterstützt - wir Eltern haben dazu nichts beigetragen, weil ganztags berufstätig. Diese Schule liegt in einem Stadtviertel mit dem höchsten Ausländeranteil, der als sozialer Brennpunkt gilt. Eine bessere Förderung hätten wir uns nicht wünschen können.
Es kommt also auch bei unserem öffentlichen Schulsystem sehr auf den Einzelfall an. Wie schade, dass Eure Tochter so schlechte Erfahrungen machen musste!

Sie wurde niedergeschmettert auf übelster Weise von der Schule (also, Gymnasium) und den Lehrern. Sie sollte einmal eine Arbeit über die Sprache der Schwarzen in den Ghettos schreiben. Ich habe ihr Bücher darüber aus den USA besorgt. Sie bekam eine 4 minus und musste Korrekturen dulden, wo die Englischlehrerin echte englische Wörter durchstrich, und nicht existierende Englische Wörte als Korrektur dareingesetzt hatte. Sie war in Tränen. Nach einem Semester in Dallas ist sie zwar zurückgekerht, um ihre Abi zu machen (mit Not hat sie eine 2,9 geschafft), wollte aber nachher nie wieder was mit dem deutschen Schulsystem zu tun haben.

Vier Jahre später bekam ich einen Anruf von ihr aus New York mit der Frage, "was ist ein 'Valedictorian (Klassenbeste)', und warum bedeutet es, dass ich eine Rede vor der ganzen Welt halten muss?" Endlich hatte sie es begriffen, dass sie vielleicht besser war, als man ihr manchmal sagt, und gewann dadurch ein Selbstbewusstsein, dass sie nie verlor. Sie war durch ihre Erfahrung in den USA vollkommen umgewandelt, wie der Schmetterling, der aus einer Raupe wurde.

Bei uns handelte es um den Raum Düsseldorf-Nord. Es ist durchaus verständlich, dass es anderswo besser ist/war.

My feeble, but improving German language skills couldn’t quite make out the news articles I read.

When I first got here, my wife thought I didn't like her friends, since I didn't say much when they were around. My problem was that I wasn't used to people speaking in local accents and dialects with local slang I had never learned in college. The reason I didn't talk much to her friends, was that I didn't understand 75% of what they were saying, even if my German was quite adequate. There is a huge difference between what you learn in school and what is really spoken out there. It takes years before you master both. Be patient! And what you read in the newspapers will ALWAYS contain language and expressions you won't be used to. My wife has been coming to the USA on vacation with me for over 40 years, and STILL has to ask me for help when trying to understand what is in American newspapers.

The spoken part of all my languages has always come last and slowly. So I understand a lot, but struggle to put my thought into words. It’s the same with Spanish.
My friend lives out in Fulda and swears that if I moved out to the country for about a year, I’d be fluent. We’ll see.

Whereas in her native German, she is the university-educated worldly person, in English, she came across like a struggling high school student for years. In time, she got better, but it was a struggle for her. I always tried for oral fluency first, but it sometimes gets me into trouble. With languages like Turkish and Japanese, of which I know only a few words, my accent is close to perfect, and so natives of those countries assume I'm fluent in their languages when they hear my few words, and lose me instantly.

The real key to conversational ease in any language is spending a lot of time around people who don't speak anything else. Live it, hear it, breathe it, and soon you will find yourself far more comfortable in it than you ever suspected possible. After a year living with a Catalan family in Barcelona, natives assumed I must be from Mallorca, or some nearby Catalan-speaking area, but certainly not a "foreigner."

Please don't hesitate to contact me when you need assistance for your studies of German!

from Germany

I am slowly getting more confidence.

Really hate to see Angela leaving. But I guess she deserves retirement and picking speaking offers, hopefully she keeps some public profile after she retires.

BTW, is "bauer" pronounced the same way in German as it is in French?

Let me try the woman's name

"Cromp Car ren bower"

"High" German uses the French "r." And their Kramp is more like a British short "a," sort of like how proper British might pronounce the word "ask." Bauer is indeed pronounced more or less the same way everywhere. The word by itself means "farmer" or "peasant." The Dutch variation is "Boer, "pronounced like our word "boor." The Boer War, thus, was considered a fight against rural Afrikaans-speaking farmers by the urban English-speaking elite.