Objective Truth/Nothing to Say

I find myself – not necessarily on purpose – often thinking of and/or picking out the major differences between Europeans and Americans or between Germany and the cluster of states back home. This is a relatively broad topic as ‘‘differences“ can encompass anything from food and drink to ideals and morals. However, I find myself doing it just the same and have, as a consequence, come up with a few primary differences. As with anything I ever say or attempt to clarify in writing, read the following with a bowl of salt and a tablespoon.
The first major difference that comes to mind is the European stance on Obama’s attempt at universal healthcare. This is not my opinion – just what I have experienced. Although an objective truth may be impossible, I still wish to try. Simply put, every European whom I’ve met thus far – the Swiss, the French, the Finns, the Germans – seem to lack the ability to wrap their heads around the thought of rejecting such change in the USA.
‘‘But I just don’t get it; why is it met with such resistance?“ I recall one girl saying.
‘‘Well, you have to understand that it is a big change“, I say, as I try to begin giving clarification.
‘‘Yes, but…“ – the confusion begins to set in - ‘‘but why wouldn’t everyone want this? Don’t they know that, that…‘‘ And then the confusion starts to take hold of her; I can tell at this point that so many thoughts and arguments are entering her brain at once that her thought process has become clogged and she is now attempting to decide if continuing this conversation is worth the energy that it will no doubt require. This is usually where I end the conversation before they speak at me as an American instead of with me as a person sitting at the same table. They just don’t understand, for better or for worse, how Americans could object universal care. It seems that, to them, universal healthcare is a right and not a privilege.
Another aspect that comes to mind is – as far as I know - in particular reference to Germany and the German language. This aspect is their reservation of deep, emotional verbs. I have yet to hear a German say ‘‘I’m sorry‘‘,‘‘I love that‘‘ or ‘‘I hate that‘‘. Die Deutscher seem to store their deep emotions in a personal, internal reservoir; stockpiling them for when they’re necessary instead of when they’re merely convenient. This is accomplished through the simple, regular use of verb substitution: ‘‘That doesn’t please me“ instead of ‘‘I hate that‘‘,‘‘Excuse me‘‘ instead of ‘‘Sorry‘‘ and ‘‘That pleases me‘‘ instead of the infamous American ‘‘I love that!‘‘. This has posed a paradox, though, as brainless, pointless and manufactured American reality shows - in which the characters can’t even spell ‘‘vocabulary‘‘, much less utilize one - seem to be fairly popular here.
Another huge difference which I have noticed is the Freie Universität Berlin itself and its students. How prestigious FUB is, I don’t know. In my opinion, rank is only relevant to those whom will benefit from theirs being one of the best. Is FUB a ‘‘German Oxford‘‘? Perhaps, but it is a bit too ealry to tell for sure. However, at a first glance, I must say that the main building of FUB – Silberlaube – doesn’t have the stereotypical appearance of a professional institution. For example, every door is a different color, as is the carpet in each hallway and many of the walls and curtains. And not merely a darker or lighter stain of wood or shade of white; they’re green, orange, red, yellow, etc. I don’t mean this in a negative way, but I feel that it resembles more of an elementary school than a university in a developed country.
Classroom etiquette is also something else. The stereotypical ‘‘puntcual‘‘ German clearly never went to college. If the course information states that the class runs from 16.00 – 18.00 Uhr, that means ‘‘show up – if you feel like it – with food and your fifth coffee of the day – sometime around 16.30 – but never before then and certainly never at 16.00! And feel free to continue your conversation – either in person with the three students whom you drifted in with or on your cell phone with others interrupting their class – while the professor attempts to speak over you.‘‘ In one class of roughly 35 students in a classroom intended for maybe 20 (many sat on the floor) I became a little fed up. Three medical students – I know they were medical students among many other details about their life which they felt compelled to share with everyone – seemed to be holding an open-floor debate behind me on which class they were going to interrupt after this.
Lacking the confidence to turn around and lash out at them grammatically correct and auf Deutsch in addition to my unwillingness to be labeled as a loud American, I opted to take a Thoreauean approach. I piled my books together and set them on an empty table in the middle of the room where no one was sitting. I stood up, took my jacket off of my chair, threw it over my shoulder and then tipped my chair over. I felt the eyes bearing down on me, felt pupils fixed on my movements. I then sat on the table and spun myself around to the other side, slid the chair out from under my old table and set it up at the empty one in the middle of the room.
‘‘Brilliant move; well-planned and very effective‘‘, said a student from Israel whom I now sat near. He seemed glad they the three in the corner would now be quiet. I assumed after he said this that he must not be an Erasmus student. Thoreau would have been proud; the professor stared at the [insert negative plural adjectivial noun here] in the corner and asked, ‘‘Perhaps you would like to add something?‘‘ They had nothing to say; perhaps my actions weren’t ‘‘pleasing to them‘‘. I never did ask them where they stood on universal healthcare.

Bis später,
ZG