German Of The Day: Späti

May 18, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, High Art, Home Cooking, Humor Tags: Beer, Berlin, Corner Stores, German, Germans, Germany, Kiosks, Language, Späti, Spätkauf 2 Comments

Speaking of Berlin… Finally there’s something this town can do really well: The Spätkauf or “open late” corner shop.

These late night places are everywhere in Berlin and, as the article linked to here rightly points out, “The Spätkauf in Berlin is not just an opportunity to go shopping, it’s also a social center for entire neighborhoods.” Or it’s an asocial center at the very least. There are guys at my Späti who seem to spend the whole summer hanging out around there, supporting the local beer industry in the process. Hey, somebody’s got to do it.

Mensch ist man dort, wo sie zu meinem Hund „meine Sonne“ sagen: Der Spätkauf ist in Berlin nicht nur Einkaufsgelegenheit, sondern auch soziales Zentrum ganzer Nachbarschaften.

Latest Cultural Exchange Takes Place

May 16, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Hard Facts, Helplessness, Higher Education, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy Tags: Asylum Seekers, Berlin, Cologne, Crime, German, Germans, Germany, Immigrants, Karneval der Kulturen, Migrants, Rape, Refugees, Sex Manual, Sexual Harassment 5 Comments

This time at Berlin’s Carneval of Cultures. Like, duh. Where else?

Police have detained three suspects after two teens were groped and robbed by a group of young men during Berlin’s “Karneval der Kulturen” festival. The assault was reminiscent of the New Year’s Eve attacks in Cologne.

Germans everywhere immediately began apologizing for not having first properly explained to these young men how sexual harassment, rape and robbery are not generally viewed as being socially acceptable in their country and then immediately sought to make amends for their shameful oversight by referring them to the German government’s latest $136,000 porn site specially designed for sex-starved refugees like themselves who are desperately trying to integrate with German women or anything else out there that moves.

Hmmm. They could have at least explained to that guy (I’m assuming here he’s the asylum-seeker) that the two of them are going to have to take the rest of their clothes off first.

The site is adorned with cartoon illustrations of various sex acts that are equally graphic and clinical. (Imagine the stick-figure man and woman on a public restroom sign pictured in virtually every conceivable sexual position.)

States Getting Safer All The Time

May 13, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Habeas Corpus, Hard Facts, Helplessness, Higher Education, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy Tags: Asylum, German, Germans, Germany, Immigration, Migrants, Refugees, Safe States Leave a comment

At least as far as Germany is concerned. Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia just got a whole lot safer than they were yesterday, for example.

How did this happen, you ask? It’s kind of like magic, I guess, but “safe countries of origin,” you see, are countries where asylum-seekers seeking asylum in Germany can be sent back to safely, in a safe manner. And this safes, I mean saves, Germany the trouble of having to deal with them.

The problem here being (and don’t tell anybody I told you this – it’s top secret or something) that most of the asylum seekers coming to Germany from these countries aren’t in need of asylum at all.

“A large number of people from the Maghreb states come to Germany for reasons that are not connected to asylum. The stay of such people must be ended quickly.”

We Are Also The Two-Thirds Percent

May 11, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helections, Helplessness, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings Tags: German, Germans, Germany, Immigration, Merkel, Migrants, Polls, Refugees, Surveys Leave a comment

OK, two-thirds isn’t a percent per se, but still.

Germans don’t want Angela Merkel to run for a fourth term, it seems. They just want her to run.

A poll published on Tuesday shows that just under two-thirds of Germans do not want Chancellor Angela Merkel to run for office again in elections next year.

The poll conducted by INSA for Cicero magazine asked people if they thought Merkel should run for a fourth term and 64 percent responded that she should not.

Other polling figures show that if an election were held now, Germany’s two main political parties would barely scrape together 50 percent of the vote between them.

“Wenn die Flüchtlingsthematik in die aus Merkels Sicht richtigen Bahnen gelenkt und aus der öffentlichen Aufmerksamkeit verschwunden ist, wäre ihre letzte große Aufgabe erfüllt.”

We Are The One Percent

May 10, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Helplessness, Home Cooking, Hypocrisy Tags: Armies, Bundeswehr, German, Germans, Germany, Military Spending, NATO 1 Comment

Whereas in 1990 there were 585,000 soldiers in the German army, this number has now dropped to 177,000. The military budget, meanwhile, currently stands at a little over 1 percent of GDP.

That’s GDP for Got no Dinero, Partner.

But now Germany is going to change all of that or something and like totally increase its military spending by, I dunno, way lots. Or at least that is how we are supposed to see it. Flinten-Uschi (Ursula von der Leyen) has taken control and isn’t going to take it anymore – and is also shooting for a raise and a new job at the Chancellery one day, by the way.

Nonetheless, the new commitment still keeps Germany way below its NATO commitment to invest two percent of GDP in its military. For that it would have needed to raise the budget to €60 billion instead of €39.2 billion

Ständig kommen neue Auslandseinsätze auf die Bundeswehr zu, aber ihre Ausrüstung ist veraltet oder technisch anfällig. Die Aufstockung der Truppe löst die Probleme nicht.

“I can sing the Ode to Joy in German!”

May 9, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Helections, Helplessness, High Art, Home Cooking, Humor Tags: Boris Johnson, Brexit, EU, German, Language, Singing 2 Comments

Boris Johnson then added that “the French and German failure to get our jokes was a reason to vote Leave” the European Union (Brexit).

“There is simply no common political culture in Europe; no common media, no common sense of humour or satire and – this is important – no awareness of each other’s politics,” he said.

Dammit, that makes sense! Or at least I think it does.

“No, I don’t believe that leaving the EU would cause World War Three to break out on the European continent.”

German Of The Day: Mittelschicht

May 8, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Higher Education, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings Tags: Economy, German, Germans, Germany, Language, Middle Class Leave a comment

That means middle class.

And here you thought that your middle class was shrinking. And it is, of course. But the German middle class is shrinking, too. And “it’s shrinking as quickly as the middle class in the U.S.” It’s down to 54 percent of the population, from 60 percent 20 years ago.

Der Anteil der Mittelschicht an der Bevölkerung ist in Deutschland in den vergangenen Jahrzehnten auf zuletzt 54 Prozent geschrumpft. Rund 20 Jahre zuvor lag er noch bei 60 Prozent. Vergleicht man die Entwicklung von 1991 bis 2013, schrumpfte die Mittelschicht in Deutschland genauso stark wie in den USA.

Germans Outraged Again Sort Of

May 6, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Habeas Corpus, Hard Facts, Helplessness, Higher Education, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy Tags: Austria, Germany, Immigration, Italy, Merkel, Migrants, Refugees, Renzi Leave a comment

In a way. Stunned at Austria’s latest plan to put up another yucky border (the Italian one this time) to keep refugees from entering Austria (and thus Germany), German Chancellor Angela Merkel has decried the awful plan, calling it “mistaken” and “anachronistic.”

And you can hardly even tell that she is secretly thrilled to death about the Austrians saving her political behind once again, thus allowing her preach from the moral high ground way up north in Berlin another day.

The narrow Brenner Pass has become a point of contention between Italy and Austria, as Rome has long complained that parts of northern Europe were allowing southern European nations to bear the brunt of sheltering and taking care of asylum-seekers.

German Of The Day: Bollerwagen

May 5, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Helplessness, High Art, Higher Education, History, Home Cooking, Humor Tags: Ascension Day, Beer, Booze, Father's Day, German, Germans, Germany, Holidays, Humor, Language, Tradition 2 Comments

That means handcarts. Handcarts filled with beer.

And if a handcart isn’t available on German Father’s Day (Ascension Day) then you can always use a baby buggy or a shopping cart to put your booze in.

Es ist kompliziert. Warum aus Christi Himmelfahrt auch der Vater- und Herrentag geworden ist, lässt sich nicht mehr so recht nachvollziehen. Es wird spekuliert, dass die Prozession der Jünger Jesu zu einem Berg als Vorbild für die Männer mit Bollerwagen dienten.

Many Germans Feeling Ill Already

May 4, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Health, Hideology, Higher Education, Home Cooking, Humor Tags: Dope, German, Germans, Germany, Grass, Law, Legalization, Legislation, Marijuana, Medicine, Pot, Puns 1 Comment

Germany will legalise medical cannabis in early 2017.

Now the government just has to figure out how to grow the stuff – The ultimate goal of German health authorities is to grow medical marijuana on German soil at specially approved sites.

It is a high art, after all. And knowing how our half-baked buds in government regularly blow things sky high, the whole thing might just end up going to pot. I bet you it’s going to toke them forever to sucseed, in other words.

Um die Versorgung mit Cannabis in kontrollierter Qualität sicherzustellen, will die Regierung den Anbau der Droge zu medizinischen Zwecken unter staatlicher Kontrolle ermöglichen. Über den Anbau wacht das Bundesinstitut für Arzneimittel und Medizinprodukte.

Observing Hermann

“Was interessiert mich mein Geschwätz von gestern?”

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