Germans and their garbage

I'm just going to start off by saying that every time I go to Europe, I'm almost embarrassed to be an American. Not just Germany, but countries such as Austria and the Netherlands have absolutely astounding garbage and recycling systems. In America we have the standard recycling and garbage cans. We may sometimes even have a paper can just for kicks. But if you ever sit in the terminal of a Dutch airport you will see a video playing that is constantly telling you how to use the waste baskets that surround the airport, showing you to separate plastic recyclables from metal ones. In Germany it is very similar. The waste baskets there are mostly divided so that not only do you separate garbage from recyclables, but so that you are also separating paper, plastics, and metals. Maybe some people in America ( cough ) the President maybe, should start looking at why Europe is so clean rather than raising taxes to create bigger landfills.

Garrett

Kultur 6

I found these articles to be a bit disappointing in comparison to previous Kultur articles. The first one was pretty uninteresting, as I find tabloids to be a massive waste of time, paper, and money. I found the second article to be an improvement over the first. I was actually surprised to read this, because I generally do the exact same thing at home. The recycling article was also interesting. It was pretty funny to read the reader's confusion over what category her paper plate fell under. At the same time I sort of expected something simple like garbage to be turned into something overly complicated in Germany.

Kultur 6 Tony

When I learned about the statistics about the tension of the student housing in Germany, I came to sympathize my girlfriend more, for she couldn't find a on-campus dorm when she was in the exchange program in Germany. The almost only decent choice left to her was somewhere far away that would take 30 minutes' of bus. But I guess she wasn't that unlucky because only 19% of the student body can get the housing.


The article about Auslaender in Deutschland also interests me, because I once was briefly checking if I can ever become a doctor in Germany. But later, I learned that besides the academic and linguistic challenge, I would have to deal with the potential discrimination. I guess even there are a lot of foreign immigrants in Germany, the German people wouldn't identify their country as an immigrant country as much as the Americans. This might be true for most European countries, for which the case of Norway shooting might be a good evidence.

Kultur 6

As I big fan of celebrity gossip, the article about tabloids was fun to read. But I have to say, I'm more of a fact-based person, and it annoys me when magazines take semi-factual information and completely distort it. I'm all about the latest paparazzi photos of Ke$ha on the beach, but must we really create an entire dramatic story line about it? Also the whole, "Page One Girl" is a little disturbing. I don't think I would be okay with that being on the cover of my newspaper.

The one about knocking on the door was also interesting, because that really is one of the most awkward moments when you're not sure if the person inside actually responded to your knock or not. Makes me nervous just thinking about it. Luckily, people here are almost always nice about it. I would be terrified if I knew that the person on the other side might start yelling at me!

And finally, as for the garbage article - it seems slightly crazy to break down glass into different colors. But on the whole, I think it's great that they're so diligent about separating different types of waste. Much better than throwing food/paper into the garbage. In my hometown, there are some pretty fancy and complicated garbage cans because we're a very environmentally-conscious community. So for me, I think I could get used to it. It seems a bit overboard, but clearly Germany does a great job in terms of environmentalism, so things could be a lot worse!

Kultur 6 - Joe Schafer

The article on door etiquette is very interesting. It would be very odd to just knock and barge into a room, especially if the person you were trying to meet was busy or didn't want to be interrupted. And I find it interesting that you sort all of your recycling and trash at the bins. Whereas here it is separated later at a recycling facility. I wonder which method is more efficient?

I didn't like the articles as much though, they were no where near as insightful into German life as the past ones have been.

Kapitel 6 Kultur - Adam Zientarski

I find it extremely awesome that Germany has a racier version of our National Enquirer or The Onion. But I do find it a bit surprising since past articles have painted the uptight and orderly stereotype on the German people. But they really do it the way it should be done. They are very serious about things that should be serious and know how to have fun about things that don't really matter. If something like the Bild was published in the United States, you would probably have every minority and religion sending letters being offended about something or other.

I also find it very odd that they have literally no student housing in college. Especially since the German people are more open to change and progress. It sounds like there has been a lot of protesting to get more housing in some way. However, the German people are more conscious than us Americans of the environment and don't bulldoze green land when our needs are not being met.

Willkommen!!

Welcome to our class blog!

Throughout the semester, you will be posting here roughly every other week for your Abenteuer mit Deutsch (AMD) assignment. First you do a fun activity that involves German, then you post about it. You should spend an hour total on this (maybe 45-55 minutes doing something, 5-15 minutes posting about it). And make sure to add your name as one of the "Labels." See the links on AMD Ideen and Beispiele for ideas! This should get you excited about the kinds of things you can do!