As I
mentioned in my last blog, we were gone for three weeks. It was enjoyable most
of the time. We ate plenty of good German food and drank a liter of beer every
day. You can buy beer in every grocery store and from every vendor that sells
sausage and other fast food.
I paid one
Euro for half a liter beer in a small store at the train station. I also bought
a Salami sandwich for one and a half Euros.
I wish
liqueur laws were not so restrictive in Canada and beer not so expensive.
Our government is just too damn greedy. They could make just as much money if
the prices came down. People would buy more; I know I would. Instead I make my
own beer which is time spent I could use to do other stuff. Even though beer
and wine is so much cheaper in Germany
and so readily available, we never saw any drunks.
I was
quite happy to get away from the Tim Hortons, the A # W’s, the McDonalds, the
Burger Kings, and other similar junk food places. However, our last breakfast
in Berlin at
the airport was at a Burger King, because I didn’t want to pay nine Euros for a
Croissant and a cup of tea at those other places.
Why are
these places at the airports so greedy?
I have to
inject here that I don’t care much for our new Winnipeg Airport.
In the old airport I used to take a sandwich and a soft drink to the airport to
have for breakfast. They had tables and chairs before you had to go through
Security. Not so in the new airport! You can’t take any liquids through
Security to the other side, which means you are forced to pay exuberant prices
for food and drinks. We paid $3.00 for a bottle of water—in Canada! That
bugs me.
Speaking
of water, in Germany
you don’t get water in restaurants—not for free, anyway. A bottle of water
costs nearly as much as a bottle of beer, which made the choice what to drink quite
clear.
One
peculiar thing we found in Germany is the fact that employees behind counters,
be it in a store, a restaurant, a train station, or even at a government
outlet, can be quite sarcastic, bored and even rude. I had my first experience
with that in the Hamburg
airport.
I asked a
female attendant how to get to the ‘Hauptbahnhof’. She just laughed and said,
“That is twenty minutes away.” I said, “I’m aware of that, but where do I board
the train?”
Attendant: “Downstairs.”
Me: “How do I get there?”
Attendant: “Down the stairs.” Gives me a strange
look.
Me: “Where are the stairs?”
Attendant: “Outside.”
Me: “Where outside? Which exit do I use?”
Finally, with obvious boredom, she points me in
the right direction.
Another incident happened in a store when I
asked the saleswoman how much a certain item cost. She said, “If you would
raise your eyes you could see the sign with the price at the top of the shelf.”
At a fast-food place I changed my mind about a
fish-sandwich I bought. I saw one that looked better. The guy behind the counter was totally annoyed about
that. When I told him I was going to eat it there, he got all flustered because
now he had to take the sandwich out of the paper bag he had shoved it and put
it onto a paper plate. No smiles from him.
It may possibly have something to do with the fact that in Germany nobody leaves a tip; not in restaurants or anywhere else. You just round it up to the next Euro. By the way, before we left on our trip, I checked out the internet about tipping in Germany and I got completely wrong information. This guy suggested to leave 5 to 7 Dollars a night with the maids in the hotel and 10 to 15 percent at restaurants. False information. Nobody tips.
About traveling in Germany. In Winnipeg we don’t have streetcars, not
anymore; we don’t have a subway, and nobody uses the train. I don’t remember
when I used a bus for the last time. My mode of transportation is a car. So
getting around in Germany
presented some problems at first. Our first trial began in Hamburg. We had to buy a ticket for the
train on a ticket dispenser. You have to punch in where you want to go and it
tells you how much it cost and then you put in your money and it prints out
your ticket. Sounds easy enough but it isn’t. They have zones with different
tariffs and we found it confusing.
We speak fluent German, which is a good thing
but can also be negative at times. Asking for help with certain things Germans
do on a daily basis might earn you strange looks. A young man finally helped us
with buying our ticket.
Actually, you can buy tickets at counter where
you talk to a live person and that made future purchases easy.
In Hamburg
we went on a city tour and also on a tour around the harbor. We learned how to
use the ‘U-Bahn’ (Subway), and the train. Once we knew how it wasn’t all that
difficult. By the way, all the trains, the street cars, and the U-Bahn run on
electric power. No pollution there and they are silent.
In Schwerin,
our next stop, we got a Tourist card from our hotel, which allowed us the use
of any public transportation system. We used the street car a lot.
On the island Rügen we received a Tourist card
from our hotel, also. There we used the local ‘Beach train’ to get around in
the city and the bus to travel to nearby small communities.
In Berlin,
again with a free Tourist card, we used the train to get around, but we also
did a lot of walking. Walking was good exercise and kept us from gaining weight
from all the Schnitzel, the Pork hocks, and the delicious fish we consumed and
those gallons of beer we drank.
People in Germany walk a lot and they use
their bikes. There were hundreds of bikes chained to bike stands by the
‘Hauptbahnhof’ and also at one of the outdoor markets we visited. People on
bicycles where everywhere. They have special bike paths in many places.
Evidence that people are physically more active was the fact that we saw no
obese and very few severely overweight people. Some a little heavier maybe, but
many were slim and trim-looking.
On the whole, people were dressed nice and clean
and not sloppy. We only saw one guy with his crotch down to his knees and his
pants on the verge of slipping down; he was probably a foreign traveler. Some
old men were dressed a little too flamboyant for my taste. My wife thought it
was refreshing and interesting, but she won’t get me to dress like that.
Tattoos were also evident but not common and we saw the odd girl wearing torn
jeans; fewer yet with blue or purple hair or crazy haircuts. I don’t remember
seeing any guys wearing rings or diamond studs in their ears. I’m sure they
exist; there are odd and strange people everywhere. You can’t get away from
them, no matter where you go.
One thing I found annoying and that was all the
dogs. Germans seem to have a love-affair with dogs, and not only small dogs;
some are quite large. They take their dogs into the bus, into restaurants, and
to the beach. Some people have more than one dog.
The other day on TV they showed some kind of
convention where people showed off their dogs, doing tricks and stuff like
that. I don’t know where this happened. It doesn’t matter, anyway, and I wasn’t
that interested. Okay, I admit, dogs are pretty smart, loyal to their owners,
and good company for a lonely person, but let’s remember that they are still
only animals and not people. Dressing up a dog like a person or a baby is going
too far. Come on, if you want a baby than have one—a human one.
I’m not a dog-person.
To be continued…
