![]() Children jumping in muddy farts lacks a certain romance.ĭefaulting to informal when communicating with Germans The words for cheat and mould are rather similar, I still struggle with the remarkably similar words for church, cherry, kitchen and cake, and am too afraid to say the word ‘puddle’ in case I say fart. The result was repeatedly wishing everyone Frohe Wehrmacht! Except he had stumbled somewhere along the way, and perhaps mixed his high school history with his high school German. Dad, keen to grease the cogs of his high school German, and yet crippled by nerves, polished one key phrase – Merry Christmas, Frohe Weihnachten – and wheeled it out at every opportunity. My very first Christmas in Germany, my parents visited. Its articles and umlauts and unyielding grammar make it a difficult tongue to master and, as with any language, learning it means making three hundred mistakes every time you open your mouth. German is a language that needs no introduction. Here’s a collection of some key cultural faux pas I, and many of my fellow immigrants, have made so you don’t have to. I even wrote what became a book, about all the rather specific things I noticed Germans did, which were namely exactly all the German cultural norms which I wasn’t doing. ![]() I could not have stuck out more if I had tried (and I really wasn’t trying, one already feels so out of place as a foreigner). I drank cold Glühwein from a wine glass, got on a bus via the middle doors and got speaker-phoned to the front for a bit of a talking-to, had a conniption at the Aldi checkout as groceries flew past my head (I had no idea supermarket cashiers could scan so quickly), didn’t ever dress warmly enough, had ‘naked feet’ more often than not, kept my window open all the time… I lost count of how many things I got wrong in my first few months (okay, years) of living in Germany: Many German Cultural Norms aren’t obvious, even to not-so-Newbies! Exiting that culture and springing into another one means learning how things work all over again and invariably getting a lot of things wrong as you go about it. Sure, there are some things that are universal, like, I don’t know, breathing, but a very large reason for the way we do things is the culture we grew up in. We’ll be collating the best faux pas and offering some advice for avoiding them soon.Settling into a new country means opportunities to make a fool of oneself abound. You can share your faux pas in the comments below and on Twitter or Facebook using the hashtag #FLintercultural. Then tell us if you’ve ever been guilty of these or other social blunders. Take our just-for-fun quiz to find out just how easy it is – how you eat, drink or even smile could get you into trouble in certain parts of the world. ![]() When you’re visiting another country – or simply talking to someone from a different culture – it can be easy to commit a faux pas.Ī slip or blunder in etiquette, manners, or conduct an embarrassing social blunder or indiscretion. Eating dinner can be a tricky business if you’re not aware of certain cultural habits. ![]() To mark the occasion, we’re asking you to tell us about any embarrassing moments you’ve had while working, studying or travelling abroad. The free online course “ Intercultural Communication” begins on FutureLearn soon, to help you appreciate and adjust to different cultures.
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