Thursday, September 27, 2007

American German Relations

Here is some food for thought for all the American Expats out there.

RENT AN AMERICAN!
Exchange Students Find a New Way to Deal With Germans

How does an American fit into the German society these days? Was it different 5, 10, 15, or 20 years ago? Obviously there are challenges a plenty when you live in a foriegn country, and simply speaking the language does not cover all of the bases. University professors have written volumes on the subject, so I won't digress.

Der Spiegel has been looking at this topic for some time now (article is in English and you have to read all the way to the end to see the "real" point of the article).

On a personal note, I believe that even my young children have experienced this negativity and so I believe it is something that will not repair itself overnight.

2 comments:

C N Heidelberg said...

Interesting articles!
We haven't suffered this too much since being here. Now and again people will ask us some question like, "Why don't people like Hillary Clinton?" or "Don't Americans know what's going on Guantanamo?" but it's not bad. They seem to get the concept that not all Americans are in favor of what the government is doing.

Jo Anne said...

I believe that many foreigners care much more about what is going on in this country than we do! Thanks for the article...who even knew that goes on in Germany? I am sure it goes on everywhere outside of the US but not quite so agressively. The article did mention that we would consider many of their questions rude, I agree. We don't ask each other those questions here at home! Maybe we should?

March 2007