Matthew Brancaccio, Business, Technology, and Engineering: The German Way Summer 2024
‘The Germans are cold people’. I’ve heard this too many times. Germans are not any meaner than other kinds of people. In fact, I found that they are quite nice! Through my interactions with local students, service workers, and other locals I realized that they are perceived as mean by Americans because we have stark cultural differences.
Americans tend to be very outward people. And sometimes, we act out of sync with our feelings. For example, it is common for Americans to toss a ‘How are you’? to an acquaintance in a grocery store when we don’t really care. Comparatively, a German will walk straight by you without smiling or in front of you onto the U-Bahn subway without noticing that you were waiting for someone else to get in first. They are very practical people who do not hide their intentions. They care about their itinerary more than they care about you, a stranger.
Germans are quite nice. They will take a picture of you and your mom if you ask them, and then tell you to stand farther back to catch the light. They will stop and translate to the cashier that you want ‘eins crepe’ and ‘eins kaffee crema’ when your attempt to order in German has failed. Then afterwards, they will laugh when you bluntly tell the cashier that they need to tell you to pay after the crepe comes out and not the coffee.
However, Germans are pragmatic and are steadfast in their identity. They are pragmatic to the extent that I witnessed multiple individuals scoff at that the phrase ‘German Engineering’. This is because they are aware (and honest) that they currently bask in the glory of the mechanical achievements of earlier generations. The best example of their admitted shame was given to me by my professor, and he told me that it came when he and an international colleague were on the train. It was time for them to get off of the train, and the door malfunctioned. He told me he was extremely embarrassed by this.
As you can see by this anecdote the Germans have a high standard for what they deem to be successful. This may be why they don’t care to ask a passer-bye how their day was. Days are long and days are hard—and this question is not worthwhile when there are other things to be doing.
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