Christopher Hunt Kultur 10

I thought the Dinner for One situation in Germany to be pretty hilarious. That one short, black-and-white movie has gained such a cult following and cherished place in Silvester was very cool. I agree that the source its mass following must lie in the ridicule of the posh British aristocracy. Monty Python, while being a British show, has made similar inroads in the Vereinigte Staaten in regards to spoofing the British upper class (which probably no longer exists in the form they satire, but still). I'm not surprised that it's one of the second or third things an average Deutscher would ask a tourist. It's become a sort of national adopted treasure of sorts. To make certain that it really is a big deal in German-speaking nations I decided to look up the movie on YouTube. Sure enough, there were viele Deutsche kommentare (Link hier: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BN9edpdCH7c). It is a pretty funny movie, although I'm sure the free-flowing Champagner on New Year's make the laughs come a little bit easier.

I found German business hours to be quite strange, although understandable given the religious history of the country. We're quite spoiled by our 24-hour stores in the US, so next time I'm in Germany, I'll make sure to stock up on all the necessities (being Bier, Bratwurst und Spätzle) before the night sets in. I had heard that countries such as England had similar strange closing hours for shops, so I did a little research, and it turns out, most of Europe has similar laws pertaining to businesses closing on Sundays (Link hier: http://www.visiteurope.com/Plan/Practical-Information/Need-to-know/Opening-hours). Most Banken are closed at 1pm each weekday, and are closed for the remainder of the weekend. Most shops apparently have a period in the afternoon where they close, and then perhaps reopen for a couple hours in the evening. In England, shops weren't allowed to be open on Sunday until 1994! And even then, great restrictions still apply. Gott sei Dank I'm able to go to a 7-11 at 3am on a Sunday for ice cream!

I thought it was hilarious how Vatertag is so completely different than its manifestation in the U.S. Here, as the article says, we usually celebrate by giving dad a new tie or perhaps treating him to dinner or a round of golf. In Germany, groups of rambunctious Deutschen get as besoffen as possible and roam the streets in hilarious (yet politisch unkorrekt) T-shirts, and perhaps on nature adventures. That sounds a lot like the Anglo-American version of St. Patrick's Day to me!

Exploring the numerous travel-blogs of people traveling Switzerland was really fun. It was cool to see what they encountered in each part of Switzerland, and how each part of the country differed from one another. One blogger commented on how many Swiss people are trilingual, speaking French, German, and English. While I would be lost having a French conversation with anyone (Französisch ist sehr schlecht, aber ich lernte es in der Mittelschule), to have someone who would accommodate your Deutsch efforts with Englisch would be wunderbar. Perhaps I'll be able to go there someday and explore the Alps while immersing myself in the particular linguistic cultures of its regions. Also, apparently the McDonald's there has fried shrimp, so... yet another reason to go!