Hey everyone Dana here and today I am back in a video with Cari from Easy
German I'm so excited to be filming with her again today. Cari has traveled to
many different places around the world and met so many people who are learning
German and so in this video I would love to hear about a few of the things that
Cari has learned about Germany or the German culture the German language or
herself as a German from traveling to different places and meeting so many
German learners. Big question, I know. - It's a huge question, no but it's a really interesting
question because I started travelling when I was 19 like traveling abroad
Europe for the first time and then I couldn't stop ever again so I have like
yeah a lot of experience of traveling and I feel like my perception of like
Germany, Germans, and myself as a German has totally changed over these years.
That's so interesting! - Are you already surprised? - No, I guess I'm not surprised because I've also changed from
moving to Germany. - I always grew up thinking that I was not typical German,
that I didn't like typical Germans. I didn't even like Germany so much which
was both from like how Germans behaved, so in my understanding Germans were like
stiff and too organized and too punctual and everything has to be right, and I
hated this whole mentality. And I thought like I was so different I was so
alternative and so relaxed. Then I started traveling and realized that I am much
more German than I thought. I was just a little less German than the other
Germans that annoyed me. But still compared to you know when you go to some
countries where like it's not about whether the bus comes like five minutes
later or earlier, but about like three hours later or never,
then you feel like hmm I'm like more German then I thought. Actually I like
punctuality at least a little bit. I like when things are really organized.
And even worse nowadays I think like I am really like a typical terrible German
and I'm even proud of it because I like some things that are German. Like
I like giving direct feedback and being honest over politeness, and this is very
rare in other countries because in most countries you would be rather polite
than honest. - Like in America, yeah. - And in most countries that I've been to, and it's
that's always like a culture clash, but I don't feel guilty for that anymore.
I feel like yeah okay that's me, and I've learned to accept that. I'm still not
like my parents. I don't know like exactly like the German insurance system,
and I'm not prepared for every situation because this is like very German, that
you need to be prepared you know, you know what's happening, you know what
could be happening, and you're like over-prepared.
Can I say one thing about
the insurance? - Yes! - I mentioned in a video once with Stefan that...or was Stefan
in it? I don't know, but I mentioned that Stefan has sometimes at parties talked
with his German friends about insurances, and down in the comments a lot of
Germans were like I would not talk about insurance at parties, but I kind of think
sometimes Germans do talk about insurance at parties. - Of course. I mean not me, but Stefan.
But I wouldn't find it completely strange. I would still like, I would talk to friends
about insurances because it's something I have no idea about and I
would like to you know use my friends' knowledge to get better at it.
Now that I also like I'm working on an international team with like international people and
I can see the downsides of the German culture but also the upsides, so I like to
bring the German side to the table. Organizing things in an honest way.
Direct. Giving direct feedback. - Yeah, yes sometimes. Sometimes it's harsh but like through
you know also communicating about how Germans communicate. So it's not just
giving feedback and then leaving people with a completely... - Like leaving people
wounded. - Yes, exactly, exactly. I try to explain why I value this kind of communication and
that I would also like appreciate honest feedback from the other side.
Do you find that people often, that are from other cultures, give you that honest feedback?
Because I know it would be a struggle for me.
It feels so rude. Living here in Germany I have become more direct I
think. I really have but still if someone asks me to do something and I don't want
to, sometimes it can be hard to say no. Like I will say no, but I'll say it in a
very: well I mean there's this and there's that and there's this and there's that so...no
I mean I also find it hard to say no.
I talked about this direct thing
I think in several videos. It's always really interesting to me. I had a
situation again recently where somebody was giving me feedback here in Germany
and again it just was very direct which is okay, but only focused on the negative
aspects of the feedback. And at the end I was like, well did I do anything right?
You know? And so like direct feedback is I think helpful. That can be very helpful.
But I would also like to hear some feedback about what I did right.
And then also give me directly some feedback about what I could improve.
That's what Germans have to learn that they put something nice first. It's
actually they are like in some international companies Germans are you
know taught to do so. I think Germans always need to be very efficient so they
don't even think about doing something that is not leading to the point that
they want to get across. It's like just for them a waste of time.
If someone gives me feedback about what I... something that I did, and they mention a
few things I could have done better or they didn't like, am I to assume that
everything else was good? - Yeah. - Oh okay.
I have another aspect for this whole like
how my understanding of Germany and Germans changed. And this really changed
within the last years of meeting, we've travelled to so many countries including
the U.S., Mexico, Japan, Taiwan, Vietnam and we always met Easy German viewers and
followers and people who learn German, and I was really surprised by yeah... My
first question is always like why do you learn German because I've always assumed
that Germany is not a great country. It has a very bad
history. It has like you know why would anyone come to Germany to live here
because it's cold, it's direct, it's like you know not the nicest place. And in my
childhood we always had you know other places that are like aspiring to go to,
but I would never assume that Germany is a place where people would love to live
one day or study or work you know. And that's something that completely changed
because I saw that people really have like an image or an idea of
Germany of being a nice country to live in because it's worth living in.
And that's something that was really a surprise for me. And now I see, I mean
it's also definitely came maybe through the politics within the last years of
Germany being like kind of more or less stable and a friendly country and the
country that is like involved in you know more like in diplomacy and yeah not
has not had any negative aspects in their foreign relations and stuff like
that. And also has a strong economy obviously. But yeah that was surprising
to me that people really like look up to Germany in a way. Whereby I always grew
up with like this feeling of yeah Germany is like has done so much wrong.
Why would ever someone feel like going to Germany and liking Germany?
That is so interesting. I cannot tell you. The whole time you were talking I was just, like
I didn't yeah, it didn't occur to me that that could be the development you know.
That and yeah wow. That's super super interesting. Through traveling around the
world and meeting all these different people you have, can I say, gotten a new
respect for your country your own country? - Yeah, if you look at it from outside,
if you I don't know if you look at an American perspective on Germany or
you know from other countries, I guess it's kind of if you see like the past 30-40
years, it's yeah, you can see this.
But I've never seen, taken this outside perspective,
so I don't see, like okay in the 80s, 90s we had
still all these troubles, we had also like a lot of right-wing people and we
still have obviously, but it's still, Germany has changed a lot within the
past 20-30 years. It got reunited. It got like, it managed to yeah become like more
economically successful and managed to integrate a lot of people who came to
Germany. And yeah it turned into an immigration country more or less.
Germany changed and I've never seen Germany from outside.
When I grew up in the 80s and
90s, I feel like we weren't raised in a proud way. Most kids are still not,
which is not a negative thing, but you would also not naturally assume that
Germany is like you know the best country in the world as some like.
Yeah, it's just so interesting to me yeah like, I'm just thinking like wow
that's so interesting. That you grew up...yeah you didn't think of it as a place
that people would be like that's where I want to move, that's what I
want to do. I want to grow up and move to Germany. Like... - Exactly. That's for us
when we grew up this country was America, like the U.S. We felt like yeah this is
like the American dream, this is like the best, the freest country in the world.
And yeah for me Germany was never like yeah it was never the place.
But now you're realizing that there are people all around the world that are like I really
want to move to Germany. - Yeah, surprisingly yes. - That's really...I like it here.
Americans would grow up differently at school you know. There's a lot of like
pride in America, there's a lot of belief that America is the leader of the free
world, the best country. And if you look at other countries then you see they
also have a lot of national pride and a lot of stuff, and Germany just doesn't
have this. I mean the only time when we feel proud of our country is when we
play soccer or football, and that's basically the only time. It's nothing
that we particularly miss. I think that's an assumption that
lots of people outside of Germany have, that they feel like yeah Germans you should
finally get rid of your you know your bad feeling. You should finally be proud.
That's what a lot of people write to us, that they kind of complain that Germans
are not proud enough of their country, but if you aren't proud of your country it's
nothing you have to miss. It's like not that you lose anything if you're not
super national, super proud, - Patriotic. - super patriotic, yeah.
Patriotism has like also a lot of negative aspects, and I feel like I have
a healthy relation to my country and I feel happy to live here. I'm certainly
happy and privileged to be born here and yeah that's it.
That doesn't mean I have to like feel like Germany is the best country.
Yeah, that's... - Super interesting. Thank you so much for bringing this very
interesting conversation.
So our question for you is: what do you think about the
things that Cari mentioned and what have been your experiences with this?
What have you learned about your own country or yourself from traveling to other places?
Please let us know in the comments below.
Thanks so much for watching. Be sure to go check out the Easy German channel. We will also be
filming a video for that in German, right? Yes, it's the Easy German channel so it'll be a video in German.
Genau. - Genau. If you enjoyed this video think about giving a like. You can
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