People say that travel
broadens your horizons. I think they mean that observing different cultures
expands our sense of what is possible and possibly good, that we had not known
about before.
Some things that people do in
other countries don’t seem desirable. Driving on the left side of the street,
as they do in England and many
former English colonies, is crazy. Driving like crazy, as they do in Italy,
is also crazy. Other things can be
confusing: “football” is mainly played with a round ball which can’t be touched
by the hand, except in a few countries like the US. But we can learn many
valuable things from foreign travel, as I have discovered again by observing
what is different on a trip to Germany.
Coffee is different. Coffee
in Germany, and in most of Europe, is a drink to be savored, not gulped. A cup
of coffee in a restaurant is prepared individually and actually served in a
cup, not a mug or a giant container. The coffee is strong, more like espresso.
A refill? Pay for another cup.
Eating in Germany more
generally is different from eating in the US. Germans spend
about as much as Americans on eating out, but what they eat is not
comparable. Americans eat more fast food than anyone else, mainly from giant
chains which serve simple familiar foods. The low significance of food quality
in American eating is clear from a burger taste test, which put McDonald’s dead
last among 21 fast food chains. Germans favor individually owned local
restaurants, whether for fast food or sit-down meals. In my neighborhood in
Berlin, there are dozens of restaurants serving every variety of international
cuisine, but no chain except Einstein
Kaffee, which has 12 coffee shops in the city.
A visit to Einstein, or to
any other restaurant, is slower than in the US. Servers do not appear right
away and they don’t expect you to eat, drink, and leave. Tables are expected to
turn over only once every couple of hours. Americans are likely to get
impatient for service in a German restaurant, while Germans would feel hurried
in America.
Driving is different here.
Economics is crucial: gas costs over $5.50
per gallon in Germany, while prices are below $2.50 in the US. Americans
use more than 5 times
as much gasoline per person as Germans. That difference is partly explained
by smaller vehicles, but more by different daily driving habits. Public
transportation networks are much thicker in Europe, covering not just big
cities but connecting every community. The commuting traffic jams which plague
every American city during rush hours are rare in Germany.
Eating habits also affect
driving habits. I can’t remember the last time I did food shopping in America
on foot. We all drive to the grocery story, as we drive to do nearly all of our
shopping. Food shopping is done in giant chain stores surrounded by expanses of
parking.
In Germany, much more food is
purchased at specialty shops, like bakeries, which dot the landscape. Food
shopping is a daily chore, so the packages can more easily be carried the
shorter distance home. Much
more fresh food is purchased, which requires more frequent trips to the
store.
Those are just a few examples
of cultural differences that affect daily life. In our globalized world, these
national variations are being erased. Tiny European autos now appear on
American streets. People in Berlin carry containers of coffee on the street,
while Americans have shifted away from instant coffee to more expensive and
better tasting individually brewed cups. German stores are open longer than
they used to be, some even on Sundays, but the 24/7 buying culture of America
is still far away.
These differences have
developed over many years and are particularly suited to each country’s
economy, landscape, traditions, and social structures. Some are habits for
which there is no better explanation than “That’s the way we do things here.”
None of them prove that any country is greater than another.
There is no reason to abandon
the bottomless cup of Joe at uniquely American diners or to make fun of Germans
for obsessively obeying pedestrian crossing signals. Experiencing a different
culture can broaden the horizon of the possible without necessarily altering
familiar behavior. You learn that what you take for granted as one of life’s
rules may just be local peculiarity.
And you can still enjoy those
social traits which span the globe. People everywhere seem to share an
excitement about sports. Although we were certainly among a minority who
watched the Super Bowl here in Berlin after midnight, the German TV announcers
shouted just as loud as any American commentator when the Patriots completed
their amazing comeback.
So let’s celebrate both our
similarities and our differences.
Steve Hochstadt
Berlin
Published in the Jacksonville
Journal-Courier, February 7, 2017
No comments:
Post a Comment