When I first told my one of my American friends that I was moving to Amsterdam, in 2003, she clapped her hands and exclaimed, “How delightful!  Good for you!  I’ve always wanted to live in Germany!”  It’s a good story that illustrates the American (mis)perceptions of Europe and the national Napoleonic complex that can plague people from the Netherlands, living next to gigantic Germany.  My loyalties should be obvious by now.  I’ve been living in the Netherlands -- a.k.a. “that little country next to Germany” -- for almost seven years now; yet prior to this week, the sum total of my time in die große Deutschland has been limited to less than a week (seriously:  a three-day conference close to Köln in 2008, a couple of days in Dusseldörf to help some friends remodel their home in 2007, and several hours of driving through Germany to get to Italy on a family vacation back in 2005; that’s it).  And I had never spent any time at all in Germany's capital city.  Thus my current three days in Berlin is indeed an interesting experience for me.

 

Some random observations…

The German language is a mystery to me.  Even though I’m fluent in Dutch and English (two languages which are very closely related to German), and even though I can decipher written German pretty well (thanks to the Dutch and English), I can hardly understand a single word of spoken German.  While riding on the train, the conductor makes his announcement in German and I have to wonder if he’s seriously communicating actual information or just mimicking “move-German” like me and my friends used to do when we played together as kids:  “Einschtein gutenberg wienerschnitzel freundeschtagenblitzemfrieger.”  To me, it sounds hilarious.  Ludicrous.  I know that’s just the way it works with languages:  one person’s communication is another person’s gibberish.  But I’m surprised with the way that this joke still does not seem to get old -- and I have to actively resist the temptation to speak my pretend “movie-German” with strangers and with my German friends here in Berlin.

Berlin is a beautiful, magnificent, monumental city.  Amsterdam's most extravagant, eye-catching sites (like the old churches or the Royal Palace or the museums on the Museumplein) would hardly be noticed in Berlin.  They might even be scoffable.  Even the big, old (admittedly uglier) Communist monuments in the Eastern half of the city stand out.  And Berlin is a huge city, too.  Absolutely massive -- and I've only seen a fraction of it.  It all actually makes me appreciate Amsterdam so much more:  many of the advantages of the "big city" without many of the hassles.  Still, it's cool to be in a really big city like Berlin, too.

 

I tried a Berliner Weiße -- "official beverage of the city of Berlin."  It was nasty.  White beer mixed with heavy fruit-flavored syrup, sipped through a straw.  Yeah, I should have known better... I would not recommend it.

 

I would heartily recommend taking a walking tour of the city of Berlin.  Three separate individuals recommended this very highly to me -- and they were absolutely right.  I went with Insider Tours, and I would highly recommend the experience.  Our tour guide was a tall, theatrical Welshman who studied political science and history and was obviously crazy about his adopted hometown (Berlin).  We had a lot of fun as we walked through the city, and we learned a lot, too.  This may sound ridiculous, but I honestly feel like those four hours of walking around Berlin helped me to understand the history of the 20th Century (particularly WW1, WW2, and the Cold War) better than all the history courses I've ever taken, all the books I've ever read, and all the personal life experiences I've ever had combined.  Suffice to say:  if you ever make it to Berlin, take the walking tour.

 

I’m surprised by the seeming mono-culturalism of the Germans.  Being here in Berlin has reminded me that the Dutch are totally awesome when it comes to inter-cultural communication.  But where I might have presumed that this was something of a European trait, a couple of days in Berlin (arguably the most “international” of Germany’s cities) have shown me that, no, it’s actually not "European" -- it's Dutch.  Germans seem to be much more similar to Americans (or other people from “big” countries) -- regarding their linguistic adaptability, their points of cultural friction, and their latent sense of nationalism -- as opposed to the Dutch people (or other people from “little” countries).  The language barrier is much more real here.  But so is the cultural barrier.  I just feelmore like a foreigner here in Berlin; even more foreign than my first time in Amsterdam (when I was much less cross-culturally experienced).  A simple visit to a neighborhood cafe reveals a surprising amount of cultural misunderstanding:  how to speak the language, how to order food and drinks, how to pay the bill, even how to conduct ourselves in our own company at the cafe.  We're immediately pegged as Americans and treated as a point of curiosity by the locals (which would almost never happen in Amsterdam).  "I like your American accent," they tell me, "Just like in the movies."  Funny, huh?  It’s not entirely disagreeable -- and certainly not unmanageable.  But it is remarkable.

 

All the stereotypes about Germans being über-analytical, über-ordered, über-organized, and über-methodical seem to be astonishingly accurate.  It's comical to realize that Berliners have counted and numerically-identified each and every one of the precisely 412,000 trees in the city -- many of which even have their number tag physically-affixed to the corresponding tree trunk!  But I've now seen how the Germans' administrative aptitude has its definite upsides:  namely, timely public transportation and sparklingly-clean public toilets.

 

Last observation:  I like Berlin.