Kultur 3

Food and drinking culture in all countries is sooooo interesting, so I really enjoyed this week's series of articles.

The public drinking article was very interesting to me, because I had no idea that Germany had any problems with drinking. In my mind's eye, I assumed that because of the lower drinking age that Germany had less problems than the US with binge drinking, but apparently that has caused different problems, rather than getting rid of the problems. I've been to Europe a few times, and in most countries I've gone to public drinking has been allowed, so it was always kind of fun to be able to walk down the street with a bottle or wine or champagne with friends, but somehow I never thought that it could potentially be a problem as far as public drunkenness goes. I love the solution that the article gives about "The Sofa" and how it not only gives a place for drinking, but help for alcoholics. It displaces and controls the problem, rather than eliminating it, but has a process for eliminating it as well in the future.

KEBABS! It's really cool to read an article about "Döner," because while I was in France the same thing basically applied. There were kebab places on every corner, and a lot of them were really good. It definitely makes sense that there are a lot of "Imbiss" places in Germany, since there is a high Turkish population, but seeing so many in France makes me wonder how many Turkish people are spread throughout Europe in general. I love how the article basically took you through how to order a kebab, and oddly enough because I ordered kebabs in France it was easy to understand how it might be complicated or strange for someone who hasn't ordered before, since the words used in that kind of interaction aren't something you would normally used, like "zum mitnehmen" and "zum hier essen," although it should seem common sense.

Continuing with the food theme I read the German fast food article, which is really helpful for food cart culture. Cart culture in foreign countries is probably one of the more interesting things, and even in the US the food can be really good, and of course really cheap. It's cool to read about German fast food, because all fast food is kind of a product of whatever the culture is, and it's also true with this article. All of the fast food mentioned is sort of a simplified (but tasty!) version of traditional German cuisine...and actually, a lot of it really was just traditional cuisine! Spätzle is something I would consider traditional, and Schnitzel as well. Tangent: there are so many different kinds of Schnitzel! So good to know.