Category: German Culture

In school, a teacher once told us about former Bundespräsident Heinrich Lübke, who was said to have been infamous for using the so-called Lübke-English, where German idioms and expressions are translated into English verbatim. Several of these expressions, such as “Equal goes it loose” (Gleich geht’s los = It will start any moment) have become well-known in Germany. It turns out though that all Lübke “quotes” were made up by the magazine Spiegel in a fake report and “letters to the editor” written by alleged readers, which were in fact Spiegel employees (why am I not surprised….).

Anyway, one of the most famous quotes (which has later also been attributed to chancellor Kohl) is “You can say you to me”. Does it make any sense in English? No. Because what else am I supposed to call someone in English? English only has “you”. Even if you were lucky enough to meet Her Majesty the Queen (as I was on June 25, 2015, yay!) – you’d address her with “you”. In German though, the sentence has a meaning, because we have two forms of address: the more formal “Sie” and the informal “Du” (just like the French have “vous” and “tu”). Continue reading “You can say you to me!” →

I love lazy Sundays. Yesterday it was stormy and rainy outside, so I spent most of the afternoon with nice hot tea, reading and taking care of the things I never have time to do during the week. The cat slept in her cozy chair and everything was quiet.

Many of my American friends or the expats in my trainings comment on Sundays in Germany – though it’s the lack of Sunday shopping they mention. “Everything is closed on Sunday!” they say, wondering whether they’ll be able to adjust to how they’ll organize their shopping. Now, shop opening hours in Germany have always been a big topic.

Germany has more than 8,000 laws, so you probably won’t be surprised to hear that there is a special law regulating shop opening hours, the Ladenschlußgesetz. Until a few years ago, shops were open until 6.30 pm in the evenings from Monday – Friday and until 2 pm on Saturdays (with a ‘long Saturday’ once a month when shops were open until 4 pm). In 1989 the ‘long Thursday’ was introduced – against strongest opposition from the unions, salesclerks and shopkeepers, who feared longer hours without an adequate rise of business. On the long Thursdays shops were open until 8.30 pm. I remember the first long Thursday, there was something of a party atmosphere, with everyone rushing into the city center to enjoy the feeling of shopping after 6.30 pm on a weekday. Gradually, the shops were also allowed to open longer on Saturdays and at some point certain cities even kept their shops open on selective Sundays.

Continue reading “The Quiet of Sundays” →