What I‘ve Learned Germans Are REALLY Like After 4 Years of Living In Germany 🇩🇪

[@PassportTwo]

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[@WhoAmI04490]

Lol yes I'm german, went to the US for a while, and got a shock because there was 'Bread' in a plastic bag at the grocery store that looks almost exactly like ours. I was at first relieved thinking 'oh yes, they DO have bread here' Then I picked it up... and it squished together like TOAST. I felt very disappointed 😂 It was toast pretending to be bread! So yes, I very much missed good bread while I was there, however, I also found a lot of other good food that I ended up not really getting back in germany ^^

[@GGysar]

10:50 It's also just about how German as a language works. I am not a linguist or anything like that, so bear with me here. In German, you can use the infinitive form of a verb minus "en" in combination with a noun to say what the noun is for, what its intended purpose is. What do I mean? Well, take "Trinkschokolade" as an example, it's "Trink" (trinken = to drink) + chocolate and means "drinking chocolate" (hot chocolate), a type of chocolate, that is meant to be drunk. The same is true for words like "Kochtopf", "Gießkanne" and many more, so for a German "Toastbrot" is "Bread that is meant to be toasted" (And yes, the Germanized version of the verb "to toast" is "toasten").

[@ksenss2513]

We went on a two week holiday to Turkey when I was about ten. On our flight back we got a meal, consisting of different kinds of bread and spreads. I was so delighted to get dark, german bread again, people several rows to the front and back noted and gave me their little packets of "Schwarzbrot".

[@fairgreen42]

Aw, that's lovely!

[@spieles21]

Fun fact for all the non german speaker. "Schwarzbrot" is translated to english "black bread"

[@michaausleipzig]

About our (supposed lack of) national pride: "Pride" is simply the wrong word here. I can be proud of my own accomplishments or of those of friends and family. Being born in Germany isn't an accomplishment. It'w just random. So how could I possibly be proud if that? Critics of that attitude often accuse people like me of hating (on) Germany and "If you don't like it here, you can move away". Why would I? I'm happy to be german. Happy. Not proud. I know that my life compared to the vast majority of people on this planet is incredibly privileged. And don't get me started on that "pledge of allegiance" Americans make their kids say in school. It really reminds me of the darkest parts of our history. I was genuinely shocked when I first learned about that...

[@RoonMian]

Yup, we here in Germany used to do a pledge of allegiance to the flag, a "Fahneneid," every morning in school, too. But we stopped doing that. In 1945.

[@DieBlutigeLynn]

Yes, I always thought pride is just the wrong word. I would use the word identification!

[@Freiya2011]

I agree 150%

Absolute true. ❤

[@robimac04]

German here - when I went to a Walmart in the US the first time, I was looking for "real" bread and was kind of upset to not find something similar. Haven't thought that this is such a German thing back then 😅 And I was blown away by the prices of american bread - but food prices in general...

[@ohauss]

The most mind-boggling thing for me was when they sold some kind of grey-ish regular loaf of bread as "Pumpernickel" in Dallas... I take that back - the most mind-boggling thing for me when they gave me a Paulaner at a "German Deli" that was so cold there was ice swimming in it... But the Pumpernickel was a close second...

[@peterhomann2140]

Fortunately there are LIDL stores and you find "German Sourdough" baked on site for 3.99 Dollars. As a German I would certainly not buy this product in Germany but go to a local bakery for my breads but one becomes humble when living in the US... not only with regards to bread.

[@tomsun3159]

Proud of having pedestrian walks, having bike lanes, having public transport, being able to walk more than 50m by foot, not eating 6000 calories of fastfood every day, having knowledge beyond the state borders, how to deal with the own history , having contributed some science to the world, ......

[@dominicfox4206]

The number one thing I miss on every vacation isn’t german bread but proper german Brötchen. No where in the world is something similar to a Roggenbrötchen, Mehrkornbrötchen or a Dinkelbrötchen

[@kaplaturme148]

A proper Britches is very important.

[@Mystikk666]

When we visited relatives* in Canada they profusely apologized for the "Brötchen" they served us. Which were OK though a bit bland and, yes, soft. (*Expats living there since the 70s.)

[@berndhoffmann7703]

Toast - Actually even if one toasts German bread (in order to defrost it) it is not going to be toast, it is still bread, whereas Toast is Toast if toasted or not, but Baguette is Baguette even when toasted.

[@chennebicken372]

My mother used to say: Don't eat the "toast-bread" untoasted, that's not healthy. Like, as if "toast-bread" alone was particularly healthy. That shows me, what a lack of trust there was in "toast-bread". With real bread of course its normal to eat it raw.

[@robertb8673]

Raw? You mean untoasted.

[@PassportTwo]

😂😂

[@Cornu341]

Raw raw bread = dough. Raw bread = baked dough aka bread. Toasted bread = non-raw bread 😆

[@fairgreen42]

Untoasted toast-bread has an air of being unbaked.

[@TainakaRicchan]

In my experience, the small "Toastbrots" are pretty disgsuting untoasted. "American" Sandwichtoast on the other hand is pretty nice untaosted, and really good for making, well, (proper) sandwiches.

[@alis49281]

The US American obsession with the flag will even be weird to the French or Brits, who are the most patriotic in Europe.

[@sarahmann4753]

Check Denmark around easter. 🇩🇰🇩🇰🇩🇰

[@cacklebarnacle15]

We call it Toast, cause it's only edible when toasted.

[@lanamack1558]

... and if you're intolerant to preservatives, is completely inedible.

[@blackboardmonitor3307]

I stayed in Omaha, NE for a year as an exchange student (to be fair, it was over 30 years ago, so things may have changed). At first I loved eating toast all the time, as my German parents never bought it, because "it has no nutrional value". But after a few weeks I was so desperate for "real" bread that I was overjoyed to find rye "Knäckebrot" in my host family's cupboard. My host mum was very surprised to find me happily eating her "diet crackers". A little later, I discovered a Lithuanian bakery downtown. They had rye bread with sourdough! Heaven! Still, when I was about to return home and my mum asked what I would like as a homecoming meal, I just asked her to buy "Schwarzbrot", really dark and dense sourdough bread, which I actually did not like very much before going abroad. So, German bread seems to be part of my DNA. 😂

[@hunnyl0va]

Exact same experience here 😀 I was in Texas 30 years ago, as an exchange student. Liked the bread at first, because Toastbrot was something my parents never bought (maybe only as a special treat for Sunday breakfasts sometimes). But after a while, it wasn't so special anymore, and I was craving real bread. Unfortunately, in rural Texas, no chance to find any. I still remember vividly, once I was back in Germany, my first breakfast was a Kürbiskernbrötchen, crispy and fresh and still warm from the bakery, with butter and ham...and I started crying, because it was sooo good 😀 Having said this...to this day, I still enjoy a good Peanutbutter and Jelly sandwich, and this only tastes "real" with the squishy American bread 🙂

[@trueamnisias]

Same here, I live abroad and everytime I visit family in Germany they ask what I'd like as my first meal. It's always 'Brotzeit' as I miss the bread so much. Sometimes I even get a Butterbrezn when somebody comes to pick me up at the airport, so I don't have to wait for bread fix. 😉

[@rosetoren3881]

"I spend so much time being human, I rarely get to be German." Ich verbringe soviel Zeit damit Mensch zu sein, zum Deutsch sein komme ich ganz selten. Volker Pispers But apart from that, first I am human, than Westphalian, than German. 😀The neighbour with Turkish roots is closer to me (culturally) in the Ruhrpott than a Bavarian.

[@diarmuidkuhle8181]

Hallo Mitwestfale! XD

[@antonywerner1893]

Ah Volker Pispers den vermisse ich richtig. Hilfe es sind westfalen das sind ja schon fast Ausländer.

[@yekaterinahawkins-vf7lf]

I bake all of my bread myself since American bread is just inedible to me. Also on the question of patriotism. I believe we Germans are self-assured enough to not have a need to be in everyone's face about it

[@m.n.7426]

I´ve recently moved to a bigger city in Germany and I wish I shared your experience about the well trained dogs. Closely evading about 6 dog attacks in just 3 months is way too much for my blood pressure and I´m now a supporter of a "dog licence" since I see too many people failing at teaching their dogs basic rules requiered to peacfully take part in daily life. But I see that your experience comes from the comparison between the USA and Germany. I guess I wouldn´t have a good time cycling around over there.

[@Heisenberg-Blue]

Since our dog is a race that tends to bark, I taught him to bark on command quite early on. This makes it to a game for which he is rewarded. As a result, he barks relatively little on his own, mostly only in stressful situations.

[@michaelmedlinger6399]

Nordic walking was developed in Finland (if I remember correctly, hence "Nordic"; not in Germany, anyway) for cross-country skiers to use as training when there was no snow. This explains its full-body benefits.

[@nadjar.-f.7606]

Oh yes, I miss bread so much when I am outside our country that I use to bake some for myself 😂. I remember in one holiday I thought about to Pick my own sourdough with me..but my hubby wanted to call the psychiatrist, so in the end I just baked bread with yeast😅😂

[@EyMannMachHin]

As a single I have gotten into the habit of toasting regular bread. It's just not really economic to buy a full loaf of bread or even a half one for me. It will go either stale or even mouldy before I have the chance to finish it. So I buy it sliced and put it into the freezer. The slices are still pretty easy to separate, so I can take the amount I want to eat. It took a bit of fiddling to find the right setting for my toaster, but I just put the frozen slices in and have some nice, scrummy, warm, and fresh slices to eat.

[@deliatedeschi]

On german bread- some bakerys went outside of Germany- always a story of success. I've heard of german bakeries in South Africa, Egypt and Australia. They are sold out quickly on a daily basis. I even read that the german consulates do order their bread there.

[@eveskiem.02345]

Actually there are even German bakeries that ship world wide - which I found out as well when living abroad and craving real bread 😅

[@m.m.6171]

I do not miss German bread when I am in a foreign country. Quite the opposite: I love to explore the local bread tradition there. There are so great and delicious sorts of bread e.g in Turkey: Pide and Simit, or in Italy Ciabatta and Focaccia. When I was once on a Greek island, I had a bread made of corn flour, that was really, really good.

[@berndhoffmann7703]

11:30 Trash Separation: Do not worry, there is the leftover bin (Restmüll) which is actually burnt, and there are few exemptions which cannot go in there, for example paint (lacquer) left overs. I have lived during unification and some years after in the UK, when I finally returned the country was bigger, more diverse and it just had introduced trash separation, I was simply lost, it took me some weeks to get used to it and find out where I put all the different bins in a small apartment :) - Anyway when foreign visitors come over, there is one (1!) bag and it all goes to the Restmüll, and I Do not feel bad at all, as for the whole year 2o23 I had the Restmüll emptied just twice ! - It is the size of 80 litres! So spare your relatives and visitors the fuss, it will neither save the planet nor the trash separation system if they throw their stuff in one bag for their time of visit! Proverb: Don't be päpstlicher als der Pabst - your job to figure that one out :)

[@antonywerner1893]

Soweit ich weiß ist das ja so eine Sache die von der DDR rüber gekommen ist. Hab dazu nämlich meine Eltern gefragt sind hier neue Bundesländer die haben mir erzählt das schon wo die Kinder waren alles recyled und sortiert wurde.

[@mel_ooo]

yes i 100% miss the bread like crazy when i go overseas. when i was in school we went on a class trip to portugal and everyone kept complaining about the bread, when my family moved to east asia they looked for the best bread possible for months and my mum even learned to bake some herself lmao and still every time they come to visit they keep eating and buying fresh bread (also straws have one long hole, a hole always has a beginning and an end otherwise it wouldn't be a hole so the ends of the straw are just that, not two different holes)

[@FriedelJrYT]

Ist was very Gummi seeing Thomas Gottschalk walking around with a dog kn your video. 7:48

[@KerstinVomVulkan]

Years ago I was in England for a training from my employer at that time. After three days I was desperate because of the 'bread', so that I walked throuth the little town to search for a health food shop. And I was so happy to find at least pre-packed wholemeal bread. The next time I brought crisp bread (Knäckebrot) from Germany. And of course straws ARE one hole with something around ;-) .

[@janwinderlich1996]

Alles hat ein Ende, nur die Wurst hat Zwei

[@numivis7807]

The bread thing is definitely true. I lived in nz and I was SHOCKED to see them eating toast untoasted. I honestly didn’t even know you could😂 in my mind untoasted toast was raw, like raw dough, that couldn’t be eaten without toasting. And also yes it really belongs to a different category, there is bread and there is toast. It’s like calling a cracker bread. So when my kiwi friends kept calling it bread it just felt wrong.

[@ErklaerMirDieWelt]

When I moved to France I bought a bread maker after a couple of weeks because I was so sick of baguette.

[@superdupergreen]

One big thing to the recycling is often missed in the discussion. The bin for plastic/aluminum aka yellow bin recycling is picked up free of charge at home. same goes for paper. In some areas the paper bins are localized at some stations and in some they have a pickup. For the other bins you will be charged, the bigger the bins are, the more it costs. Overfilling is not allowed, the lidl of these regular and compost bin needs to be fully closeed, otherwhise the trashcollector will give you a warning once, and then without asking bring you the next time a bigger waste bin, which will cost you more money. This incentivices the recycling. The compost waste (vegetables, fruits, etc.) is as well often separated and much cheaper to be picked up versus the general waste bin. So in order to not overpay, households wants to have the smallest possible general waste bin. Why is that so? They companies earn money with the correct recycled paper, plastic, compost waste where as general waste is just beeing costly burned.

[@anxietify]

The part on national pride and local pride is 100% true. I don't really care too much about the country, especially when it comes to pride. I wouldn't go around being proud of being a German citizen. However I have a deep love for my City, for my Landkreis, and for Niedersachsen.

[@RedbadvanRijn-ft3vv]

We Dutch compensate that for you. We are proud of Germany. ​

[@Kartoffelsuppe_m_Wursteinlage]

Pride?? The US concept of pride in being born by chance at one particular point in the world? Anyone who has no reason to be proud of something is proud being German. I have huge respect for people in germany, but why should I feel better, because of others efforrds? Last weekend, when 1.4 million people took to the streets and demonstrated, shows that any form of nationalism and ethnic concepts of Germany immediately cause massive protests. Since patriotism/pride leads too often to nationalism, so people in germany are very careful. Europe's too small for maga.

[@__christopher__]

Before the Euro, there was another thing many were proud of: The strong D-Mark. This is why especially in Germany there were many people against the Euro. This is, BTW, also the origin of the AfD, which was founded as a party to bring back the D-Mark.

[@mogon721]

​@@__christopher__ Interestingly, the Euro has been more stable than the D-Mark has ever been. That's something the demagogues from AfD v1.0 wouldn't have admitted, of course, and the fascist incarnation NSAfD will lie about whenever they can.

[@hypatian9093]

Exactly - more a regional, cultural identity. Might be because Germany is a young country and in a way we still live with the pre-1918 borders in our life. I'm living right between Hanover and Paderborn, 1 hour by train to both, but since I live in Niedersachsen I only rarely went to Paderborn.

[@Why-D]

I was for a semester in th UK and i missed the bread, as Spa had only Baguette and wheat-Brötchen, but the LIDL had a German section with Schwarzbrot. So I survived.

[@gretahaase5509]

A few years ago I visited London, which I love sooo much, but honestly... The breakfast the hotel provided was completely disgusting. Absolutely inedible. The breadrolls were dry and zäh. So, my father and I walked through London and ended up in front of a German bakery. I looked through the window and just sighed. Everything looked sooo delicious and just right. Suddenly a woman, who stood beside me, laughed and said in German (remember, I didn't say a word!): 'That's the first thing we miss, right?!'. :D And that's when I realized: I am a walking stereotype, thankyouverymuch. So, yeah, I am one of those...

[@RoonMian]

Ich würd "zäh" übersetzen als "chewy"

[@JulieT..]

As a fellow Okie, there are so many small towns and we don't have the resources to afford the recycling. In my particular city our city council consulted a recycling company and discovered that it was too expensive for the city to provide recycling bins for the residents because they would have to then haul those bins about an hour away for processing. This cost would make our water/trash costs too expensive. 😢 🗑️. Yes, it definitely varies depending on which state you live in and how much recycling capabilities are able to be provided. I can't wait to visit Germany very soon. Thanks for the awesome video. 👍❤ 🇩🇪

[@Ghost-Tower]

Diese Kommentarsektion gehört jetzt der Bundesrepublik Deutschland 🇩🇪 🇩🇪🇩🇪🇩🇪

[@castirac]

You really nailed it!

[@mrs.bluesky7398]

Actually nordic walking poles are quite different from hiking poles. Hiking poles are rather heavy and strong to carry part of your weigth. Nordic walking poles are very light and fall back into your hands after each step. If you put your full weight on them when hiking they can break, quite a dangerous situation in the mountains next to an abyss.

[@hermione3muller674]

PS regarding toast, it was called pappig, i.e. like cardboard. Growing up, i was taught to eat it only when no ral bred was available at all, and even then, eating cardboard would be the same, ie equally nutricious. White, fluffy, no substance, no vitamins, no bite, mainly air and harmful white wheat flour, even harmful sugar in the ingredients, so we would not touch it.

[@eXpG_Harlock]

Fact bread is a pillar of society ... bread is life ... bread is love ... Wurzelstangerl ♥ und jedes Sauerteigbrot.

[@hermione3muller674]

German here. Regarding bread, yes, toast is not considered bread. Growing up it was not even considered food in my family but trash. We were taught not to eat it because it was considered harmful to our health.

[@alexandermarkhart1582]

To answer the Question: Yeah, obviously i miss Bread the most when travelling. It's unfathomable for me that nearly every other country doesnt adopt our breadculture... I just can't understand how anyone can refer to "Toast" as bread, it tastes like litereally nothing. It's especially grueling when i watch a food-video and there is this beatiful sandwich and it gets stashed between two slices of this spongelike substance that apparently is considered bread. For the first point, I would argue that the younger Generation in Germany actually have "pride" in their country, in the sense that we do like it here. We believe it's a great place to live and so on, we just dont really show it off. It's like being in a longer relationship, everything (most) is perfect, we understand each other, but i dont go running around everyday telling everyone how great my relationship is 🤷‍♀

[@RainbowYak]

I'm from Switzerland but I definitely miss good bread when I'm abroad. In fact, I used to live in South Korea for some time and near my apartment, there was a bakery I regularly visited. After a while, all the employees knew me and if I didn't visit them one day, they'd ask me the next day what had happened and whether I was okay. Now, bread in Korea is pretty good but it's also very different from Switzerland or Germany. Obviously, Koreans don't eat bread traditionally and many people above the age of 50 don't eat it at all. Since there is no native bread culture, the knowledge of how to make bread was mainly imported from France (in the 1980s and 1990s, a lot of Koreans would move to France in order to become bakers and subsequently take their new skills back home). As a result of this, 98% of Korean bread is basically pastry. When Koreans hear bread, they think of what we'd call pastry. There are pastries of all types, even ones filled with macha or with chicken and curry sauce. Korean pastry is very good but it can be really hard to find "proper" bread. Luckily for me, the bakery near my apartment sold one type of "proper", German-style whole wheat bread. hence, I usually bought a small loaf when I went there. One day, my Korean girlfriend came along. The bakery employees quickly figured out that we were a couple and one of them asked my GF in Korean (so I wouldn't find out), why I always bought the "healthy bread" as they called it. Apparently, these women really liked me but they were also very confused by this white guy who came every day to buy (in their minds) the most boring, least tasty bread in their store when they had so many other delicious things to offer. Most of them thought I kept buying the bread because I wanted to lose weight or something... the idea that someone would actually prefer this over a pastry totally confused them lol. My GF and I both thought this was pretty funny and so from then on, we always called whole wheat bread 건강한 빵 ("healthy bread"), even after we moved to Switzerland together.

[@martinmuller183]

I definitely miss German bread. When I spent 6 months in NYC I even went to "Germantown" just to buy a loaf of German bread and spent a fortune on it. But it was worthwhile after all the Wonderbread in our local supermarket.

[@TripleDane]

When I went to the US, I knew the bread was likely substandard. Actually, I was pleasently surprised as our timy universty village featured a decent organic food shop that even had German Rye bread - unfortunately with caraway seeds. The unexpected issue turned out to be the lack of sour cream butter. Either you bought the salty stuff of the tasteless one. When shopping at the supermarket, we identified an Italien sour dough bread that was acceptable even tough of being of the "toast" type 🙂.

[@X33dbv]

Our pride is inside not outside. Our pride is in a strong bakery culture, a strong pride of our regions, in strong breweries culture etc.

[@HalfEye79]

A few years ago (more than 30 years), my family had a collie. So a quite big dog, but not very big. The dog always went a few meters ahead of us. But he was trained to always sit down before crossing a street up to a person of us said "Komm" ("Come"). He even scared a driver a little bit, when the dog walked to the street, but the driver was releaved, when the dog sat down.

[@utebellasteinweg3976]

I don't understand the national pride. Once we had it here, it cost many lives. We never need it again. If I am a good person and have raised my children to be good people, then I can be proud because it is a personal achievement

[@RoonMian]

"The cheapest sort of pride is national pride; for if a man is proud of his own nation, it argues that he has no qualities of his own of which he can be proud; otherwise he would not have recourse to those which he shares with so many millions of his fellowmen. The man who is endowed with important personal qualities will be only too ready to see clearly in what respects his own nation falls short, since their failings will be constantly before his eyes. But every miserable fool who has nothing at all of which he can be proud adopts, as a last resource, pride in the nation to which he belongs; he is ready and glad to defend all its faults and follies tooth and nail, thus reimbursing himself for his own inferiority." Arthur Schopenhauer

[@dorisschneider-coutandin9965]

Right. One can be proud of having been succesful in perhaps school, training, university, or business. But in which country one is born is just plain coincidence, and therefore not much to be proud of, because it's not a merit you earned on your own, by putting some effort into it, or so. It's just nothing you'd have any influence on. Hence, no pride applies.

[@robert48719]

​@@RoonMianthat and the sexual orientation

[@tomlg6]

When I read comments like that, I just feel sick! It is precisely because of such interpretations of national pride that it has been suppressed for many years. The connection between national pride and National Socialism is almost always made or implied. Our Minister of Economic Affairs is another one of those representatives who can't and won't do anything with national pride. I am always amazed at how proud other people are of their origins and their nation. If you look at reviews from abroad, many people admire the Germans as a nation, their creativity and wealth of ideas. The achievements of individual Germans are only possible because the national conditions made it possible or even necessary. The eternal reference to the 3rd Reich is completely inappropriate, because it would mean that all people who have a strong sense of national pride want a 4th Reich, and that is nonsense.

[@dansattah]

​@@robert48719It's less so about the orientation itself and more so about pride to stand your own ground against prejudice.

[@Thomas83KO]

4:33 I'm from the city of Koblenz... And whoever asked me, where I'm from, I answer it with a pride! And than show them pictures... I also always respond to say, the "Rhine from Wiesbaden close to Bonn is the most beautiful part of Germany and the most worthy part to visit, if You ever come to Germany!"

[@RoonMian]

"Ich weiß nicht, was soll es bedeuten, Dass ich so traurig bin. Ein Märchen aus uralten Zeiten, Da geht mir nicht aus dem Sinn."

[@Thomas83KO]

@@RoonMianDu wirst lachen, doch ich habe einem Freund zu seiner Hochzeit, ein Gedicht geschrieben, dass den Rhein und "seine" Loreley beinhaltet. Von der Loreley gibt es nämlich auch positive Geschichten. Die zu erst da waren, bis sie ins Gegenteil verkehrt worden sind. Manche haben sich auch noch so mäßig gehalten.

[@maja-kehn9130]

I lived in the UK for several years and YES one of the things I missed most about Germany was the bread....and strangely the German windows too. 😅

[@nachbarslumpi7093]

Honestly, in our family toast is called gummibrot.

[@tobih.8047]

Yes, I definetly missed Germany bread last year on my 170day long Appalachian trail thruhike. Thank good I found some propper homemade sourdough bread at a farm shop in Vermont. Ate the whole (small) loaf in one go.

[@NKA23]

Straws are basically tubes. If a tube has a hole, it won't work anymore, because whatever is supposed to go through that tube will leak out through that hole. So if a straw works, it doesn't have any holes.

[@Mafed_Graystone]

The Toast thing is a bit more complicated: There are two different sizes, the smaller one is sold as "Toast", the bigger one is literally called "American Sandwich". If it's a whole loaf, they sell it as "Weißbrot" (White Bread).

[@lhuras.]

Straws have one hole. There is no other break or point to leak between the two ends of the straw, therefor it's all one hole.

[@RoonMian]

From a topological standpoint a straw is a thorus. A donut. And so are you!

[@lhuras.]

@@RoonMian i always wanted to be a Donut... or a bagle. They are the best!

[@rebootlifeanddreams]

One of the reason there is much pride for your region instead of the nation is because not too long ago, we had all those small kingdoms and dukedoms etc. and we didn't actually live in one nation. Even during the Holy Roman Empire, the emperor was not a really important figure for every day life. Each region has distinctive dialects, different food, their own religion (protestant or catholic), different radio stations... People sometimes look slightly differently, think differently... Overall Germans are used to being spread around many countries. Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, South Tyrol, Luxembourg, Belgium.... all countries where Germans (in the sense of: German speaking and of course having more of an internal discourse) natively live.

[@Bramfly]

As a Dutchman when I leave my country the two things I miss most are Dutch old-cheese and Dutch black licorice

[@JaysMCworld]

as a german, it is fully accurate that the only thing I am proud of about being „german“ is not having such a strong national arrogance. very few germans would think they are better than anyone else simply for being „german“, which I think is beautiful. I also think the idea of patriotism is inherently more harmful than benefitial, as it can easily lead to in-group vs out-group thinking, nationalism and racism. overall I think the world would have much less problems if patriotism and national thinking were left in the past. what I am proud of is many things that this country simply does right and sometimes better than others, but it is a purely rational observation not tied to any national feelings, and I see its flaws as much as its accomplishments. if tomorrow we were taken over by another country, but the system stayed the same or got better, I could not care less. I have to add on though, that germany these days has not been such a great example of anti-patriotism as it used to be, the right wing is rising here too and it is… concerning, and honestly just makes me sad

[@HopeeInk]

I actually do miss the bread first. It’s weird I never noticed it until last year, because if I‘m leaving I more often leave to Belgium, Netherlands or France and they have great bread as well. At least good enough to not make me cry, but last year I took a bigger trip that was far away in comparison and I really really really missed a good loaf of bread.

[@reimlinge5988]

Totally true. Visiting my mother in France f.e for six weeks means automatically that I take bread with me for six weeks. Only beginning at a temperature of over 30 degrees I accept a baguette as bread.

[@dorisschneider-coutandin9965]

In our family we call it "Toastbrot" (full German name) when speaking of the packaged, sliced product, and will change to "Toast" as soon as it has been in a Toaster. Generally, we dont use it for anything else than - yeah, you guessed it - toast. Very, very occasionally, I also use it to make sandwiches in the traditional British style (like egg, cucumber, and the likes) for a brunch or a special afternoon tea.

[@Wamboland]

I am not particularly picky with bread, but toast is no bread. I do eat it toasted (toast Hawaii or others) and occasionally I eat it with jam or honey. But in general I tend to Graubrot, Vollkornbrot or Krustenbrot. 1-2 weeks it's fine without it, but not much longer. After a 2 week holiday to Britain it was the first we bought. 🙃 So I guess that is a very typical German thing. 🤔

[@agn855]

…where _"Toast Hawaii"_ is the most German thing ever

[@Thomasg1404]

Klar lol Das muss ja Deutsch sein Erstens weil von einem deutschen "Fernsehkoch" erfunden . Zweitens weil kein anderes Volk auf so eine Idee kommen würde.

[@drei-zwei-eins]

@9:12 as a german i feel it, ohhhh yeah😂

[@fairphoneuser9009]

In Vienna the dog poo was also a big problem...until they introduced fines. Now you rarely see dog poo in the streets.

[@TrangleC]

I'm very un-German when it comes to bread. I prefer the white, squishy American style bread over dark, sour tasting German bread. As a young student, I spent a year in China for an internship, working on a international aid project. The boss of the company that organized that project and 2 engineers from another German company went there too and stayed for a week or so before flying back and leaving me behind to run stuff in China. In that week we had adjacent hotel rooms in a big 4 star hotel and in the lobby of that hotel there was a German bakery selling original German bread. My boss said to me: "You are so lucky. Now you have a place where you can get proper bread every day." I nodded and smiled but during that year I spent there, I not once went to that bakery to buy bread and I didn't miss it at all. The only somewhat bread-like stuff I ate in China, outside of steamed rice buns was "Jo Tiao" (no idea how to spell that) which are deep fried dough sticks Chinese people eat for breakfast. They pretty much taste like unsweetened doughnuts. And the other thing was something called "Honey Cake" which was a honey infused soft biscuit cake that was sold in large cubes at Walmart. I don't even know whether that was a Chinese thing or something American originally. It was the same with other stuff. The place where I come from in Germany is famous for food called "Maultaschen", which are basically a kind of large, roughly hamburger-sized ravioli, you could say, filled with a mixture of minced meat and herbs. When we were invited to a large dinner at a fancy restaurant in Beijing, we learned that there is a very similar specialty in Northern China called "Bao Ze" (again, not sure how to spell that) and the two engineers from a Hessian company joked about how I as a "Schwabe" (someone from the South-West of Germany) should feel right at home and how I could eat Chinese Maultaschen every day and wouldn't even have to get used to exotic food. Again, I don't like Maultaschen and I avoided eating Bao Ze whenever I could during my time in China. It isn't just the food. It is outright comical how little I fit into the place where I was born. I don't like the food, I don't like the culture, I don't like the environment/landscape. If there were such a thing as being "Trans-National" in the sense of being born into the wrong country, I would be that. Even stuff other Germans consider negative about the USA, like people supposedly being "superficially friendly but distant and phony" sounds great to me. That's just how I like it. I want to smile and nod at my neighbors and never have to learn their names. I wish so much I could emigrate to the USA. Unfortunately I'm tied down here where I can't even look at the surroundings without disgust. People say this is a beautiful place, but I hate it. Everything happens at the bottom of a series of small valleys here, where you never see a horizon, just brown and green walls everywhere you look and you rarely get up on those hills because they are all privately owned vineyards. Yeah, I legally have the right to walk around among them, but I don't want to because it is all just disgusting mud and dirt for 10 months out of the year. Even the trees here seem to try hard to be ugly shrubbery. I know that sounds dumb and crazy but I think you would get what I'm saying if you would see them. I feel like a shrew living inside a giant hedge or something like that. I would give my right arm if I could live in a desert, where you can see further than half a mile and where you have horizons and big, blue skies and where you can leave a paved road without sinking ankle deep into thick mud. I guess I'm one of the very few Germans who don't subscribe to channels like that because I get a kick out of having Americans tell me how great Germany is, but because I don't understand why anyone who doesn't have to would want to live here and because I am waiting for the moment when the expats realize that and had enough of this depressing shithole.

[@caramelvictim193]

With peace and love, you sound like an absolutely miserable human being. And I'm not talking about how you are "stuck" in a country you seem to hate, but seemingly how you want everyone to be as miserable as you are. Genuinely, I hope you get the opportunity to follow your heart and move somewhere else asap 🙏 p.s it's you tiao and bao zi (never tried you tiao before but would love to!! Don't see the point in travelling overseas just to eat the same food as back home, considering it's probably not even going to be as good. Other countries have delicious food too! 🙆)

[@exn207]

To explain local pride visit the Betzenberg for a Match against Karlsruhe. Karlsruhe is just around 40 miles away and the capital city of Baden. Until 1871 Baden was one of the 38 German states and the Prince of Baden fought in different wars in the 17th and 18th with the french against other German reigns. And a lot of battles we're fought in Palatinate against Palatinate. So, we (1. FC Kaiserslautern) hate them and they (Karlsruher SC) hate us.

[@nicolebrunzel6608]

The answer is: yes, yes, yes.

[@hermione3muller674]

Regional pride instead of national pride is correct with me as a nothern german. It is, however, sadly fuelled by discrimination and cruelty rather than any kind of friendly rivalry. The south is richer, largely due to weapons industries and the like. We in the north are poorer and are being looked down upon, being called cruel names like fish heads and stupid and even being spit at. Happened to me recently. Bavaria has held the ministry of transportation for ages and pumped all the federal money into their own infrastructure depriving us from any progress. My wheelchair lost a screw on its first day because of potholes all over. I cannot go a single meter without a disturbance of this kind.

[@elcockroach7328]

Buddy, you know that it is in fact a punishable offense to even order an "Alt" beer (which translates as alt = old) in Cologne and the wider region surrounding Cologne? Punishment includes being ignored by the "Köbes" (waiter in Cologne) if he is feeling generous, being kicked out of the bar or just getting what you should habe ordered, and that is Kölsch. (Yeah I noticed it was an intended pun, but could't help myself... ;-) )

[@TheDude50447]

Bavarian here - Beer mug in hand is more of a village thing. Its not as pronounced in cities.

[@anner.413]

You have the ZAK waste management guide! Awesome, I know where you live. Hi neighbor! 😊

[@florianschaefer78]

How much you recycle also depends on where you live in Germany. For example, I live in Munich and we only recycle glass and paper. For the rest there is only one trashcan. Unlike other German cities we don't have a yellow bin for plastic or a blue bin for bio waste.

[@christinehorsley]

Picking up dog poop: it’s a fine if you don’t pick up after your dog I in public places, walkways, streets etc. In Baden-Württemberg the fine is between 25 and 150 Euros. Even bigger if your dog leaves a poopy present on someone else’s private property. Dog owners here carry baggies with them (and maybe a scoop) and many communities have special trash “dog poop stations” at strategic places around town or village. It’s been quite a few years since I had to sidestep dog poop on the sidewalk …

[@herbertgonswa3503]

We take some packeges of Pumpernickel (cause it last longer ) on every journey outside Germany, especially in the US and Canada. Our first way in Whitehorse and Kitchener was to the german bakery. I can live with the bread in Europ countries, but the US and Canada ? No ! Sorry

[@WhoAmI04490]

Btw about Garbage seperation, it gets even funnier when you realize that it is different in different parts of germany, even in different cities, because they have their own separation systems. For example, while in most places there is an extra garbage for organic wastes, in some parts that just enters the leftover trash. Or some parts don't allow egg cartons to be thrown in the paper waste, because it cannot be recycled anymore. It's complicated, I get it, a lot of germans are also 'trash' at it.

[@101kurtj]

Straws are technically a donut. Just like humans are. ;) From a biologist's perspective, me I'm that biologist, we are one giant straw or donut because we have a tube that goes from the oral cavity to the, ehem, other end. Not including the urinary tract as that includes filtration and some other types of processing.

[@Mowraq]

As I couldn't find comments about 4:10 lemme just explain that he intentionally mixed up the beers and there are running jokes outside of the cities that ordering an Alt (Düsseldorf's staple beer) in Cologne or a Kölsch (Cologne's staple beer) in Düsseldorf will get you tarred and feathered or something similar to that as those cities have some kind of rivalry going. Don't know how much the locals really buy into that though. About 7:30, one reason for that is that many owners, especially of larger breeds, tend to go to "Dog School" with ther pups and/or train them to behave well. I also believe there are some requirements for larger breeds by law. Unfortunately doesn't apply to smaller hand bag breeds like chihuahuas, so they'll bark at anything everywhere. Also, in my definition a hole is something that shouldn't be there (except in cheese and some other foods maybe) so I'd say straws have no holes but are a tunnel with two entrances.

[@RoonMian]

As a local, if you order an Alt in Cologne (provided the pub doesn't have the logo of an Alt brand hanging outside) people are just gonna roll their eyes and think you're a try-hard eedjit who wishes they were funny... But aren't.

[@Thomas_Schwarzenbacher]

I was born in Bremen. My parents ate both Austrian, so I was an Austrian, too. That only changed in 2009 when I became a German citizen. So for most of my life I wasn't German but also not Austrian, so what was I? Simple, the same I still am: a Bremer ;=)

[@TainakaRicchan]

How much I miss german bread depends on the coutnry I travel to. France has amazing white bread, Austria and most nordic coutnries know also Rye bread And I heared even in the states Aldi carries german lye bread, whcih seems to be always in stock, since americans doesn not seem to "get" it. ^^ About the straws: Mathematically speaking they are equivalent to a doughnut, therefore have one whole.

[@christianharst7339]

Nice move the thing with alt and kölsch 🙂

[@thomaskara2395]

I am German and lived in Mexico for a few months. It is actual true, I missed the German bread a lot. It never crossed my mind before that the bread in other countries could be so much worse. Btw not talking about the Mexican kitchen in general, the food was delicious, ofc! But after a while I started to miss the time saving yet in Germany still healthy "Brotzeit" :D

[@nevermore5792]

I'm German and I actually like American style bread (aka "Toast") (even though I also like German bread). I like to use it for things like sandwiches for example, even if I'm not planning on toasting it. So I don't miss it too much when I leave the country. What I do miss however are Pretzels.

[@khan7459]

As a German I've lived in Netherlands and northern Italy, and the recycling was very similar in all of these countries, so I guess at least the basics of it are maybe defined by EU law.

[@thomasp.5057]

Yes, I am a crazy german. Crazy for german bread! 😂

[@Alpha-Cephei]

Interesting observations about local pride - and very true. Especially obvious in the Rhineland at carnival. Probably stems from the country having been split into a multitude of duchies for most of its history. That even fought each other sometimes. But Donnie, the Cologne style beer ist not called "Koolsh", it's "Kölsch" with an ö-sound similar to the "i" in "girl". 😉

[@schnaeutz4546]

Nach meinem Verständnis ist das brotähnliche Gebilde in der Tüte ein "Toastbrot", bzw. "eine Scheibe Toastbrot". Zum "Toast" wird es erst durch das Toasten. Es kann entweder Natur sein oder zubereitet, z. B. als "Champignontoast" oder was auch immer, gerne auch mit einem Phantasienamen. Der Name verändert sich nicht, er wird nur ggf. entsprechend der Zubereitungsart ergänzt.

[@michaelebeling5158]

I wouldn't miss German bread so much but i couldn't survive without my mett

[@Lisa-sr9xn]

Yes, I'm one of those Germans missing our bread when not in Germany. I lived in the UK (in a boarding house) for two years and missed our bread a lot! I also live and studied in France for two years and also missed our bread. 😅 To answer your question from the end, I've never thought about that! 🤣 But from a logical perspective, I would say that it is on hole as it goes all the way trough ... 🤔

[@bernice6867]

I was on a trip to GB once. I just ate their bread and didn't mind. After one or two weeks something inside me said "If I don't get decent bread right now i will scream." So I had to search the supermarkets and found some sliced wholegrain bread from Germany, something I don't really like that much but I ate it and it saved my life. And an english guy complained about the spanish bread being terrible.😋

[@herbie1975]

Eventhough I'm not german, when I went to Canada in the mid 90s after like 2 month there I really started to miss good bread (and some other stuff from Switzerland like Mayo in a tube and not a jar, sausages etc.) but you get used to it.😅

[@jangelbrich7056]

I remember that the only foreign country I linked to Toast(bread) was the UK (no thought about the US), as something typically British (Bwiddish?). What still puzzles me is that British giving-a-toast does NOT relate to any bread whatsoever ... but to a drink (cheers). I also remember that we would have Toast (yes, toasted) only at breakfast, if at all, with butter (melting on the hot toast) with jam.

[@agn855]

Asking for a Kölsch in Düsseldorf - that’s how wars are started…

[@proxyblue4815]

10:50 Yes, i do miss the bread

[@isabelcarrasco4528]

Straws have one hole. If there were two holes, each of those would have to have a beginning and an end.

[@tonchrysoprase8654]

Trash separation isn't necessarily a German thing. Only in the US have I been scolded for not hand-washing my plastic recyclables before throwing them in the recycling bin. Also, I'm not sure what was the content of the 30-page brochure, but the double-sided page I got in the US from my city clearly isn't enough to explain which kid of plastics are OK to throw into the recycling bin and which aren't. In Germany the gruener Punkt seems to take care of most things rather neatly and separating clean/dry paper seems to make sense since that can be easily recycled if separate but must be a nightmare if mixed with plastics and used food packaging that may leak and wasn't washed and dried by hand - which may shed light on my earlier point.

[@schnetzelschwester]

In many US cities they have issues with cockroaches. If dirty food packages are kept in the bin for a while, the roaches can feed on it and multiply at an appallng rate. Plastic packages with shampoo is no problem, but mac and cheese is. In Japan it is common to wash the plastic recyclables, and I myself do it as well in Germany since I watched the mice nibble into the yellow bag and eat the food residents. My cats had the fun of their lives.

[@conniebruckner8190]

silly RQotW ( please find a better one for next time) : who cares, really, as long as you can suck from it...🤪, so maybe two : stuff goes in one, goes ot the other... I really did miss the bread when I was in USA, but also when I was in Italy, although the latter do have some bakeries that do make what we are used to. In NYC one can also find bakeries that have "european bread", but with a hefty price. I was urged to use the walking sticks after doing away with crutches after a knee op, and it certainly does/did help. I got some stronger rubber tips/ends to put on the spikes when walking in the city. Is Jr. at nursery/ kindergarten now?

[@uschil228]

I wanted to write something about the beer thing, but then I was like, " no wait continue. I'm sure you know this was wrong and wanted to troll us."

[@PassportTwo]

😉😂

[@pitri_hub]

Topology has already solved your bonus question. Straws have one through-hole, and are thus equivalent to a donut. :)

[@RoonMian]

And so is a human being, provided they have no piercings.

[@yakiimox]

4:10 Ich spüre eine Erschütterung der Karnevalsmacht

[@Quasithere]

The Swiss make the best bread 😁🤣🤣🤣

[@alexriedel3067]

Tipologicaly speaking a straw has only one true hole. Because the definidion of a hole is something like "has one entrence and one exit". For example a bottle would have no true hole becaus a liquid has to enter and exit threw thesame opening. The funny thing is with that criteria a bottle is thesame as a ball and a mug is thesame as a doughnut 😂

[@robert48719]

Actually the favourite pet of the German is the cat, not the dog