Now whenever I order a Hefeweizen back home, I sound like a pretentious turd.
Getting a driver’s license in Germany is an expensive hassle. In addition, you’ll quickly learn that biking is the best way to get around. Most cities have bike lanes and fairly respectful drivers, and you can bring a radler along for the ride without earning the wrath of the Polizei. Radler means cyclist in German — it’s a half-beer, half-soda drink meant to refresh cyclists without causing them to drive off the road.
Particularly if you’re moving to a smaller city, you may be initially disappointed with the nightlife. As you make German friends, however, you’ll start hearing about unofficially advertised parties happening after-hours at bars, warehouses, and abandoned train stations.
Germany is located smack in the middle of Europe. Even the smaller cities in Germany have busy train stations, and there are several RyanAir and EasyJet hubs that can get you all over the continent for cheap. You’ll wind up spending a weekend in Morocco like it’s nothing.
When your new co-worker orders a beer at lunch, don’t panic. Having a beer while the sun is still up is a totally acceptable and awesome custom in Germany. You often won’t even need to leave the office — work cafeterias usually have a beer fridge. If there’s a big football game on during the day, everyone takes off for a few hours to watch at a local pub, or if you’re lucky, someone will rig up a projector in a spare office.
Cigarettes are anathema in the US, particularly in the Northeast. Not so in Germany — people light up at work, restaurants, everywhere. Your clothes will reek of smoke every time you come home from a bar or restaurant, and you’ll become totally immune to it…until your mom comes to visit you and is horrified by how terribly you stink after what you claimed was a “low-key night out.”
Germans don’t waste. They go a step beyond recycling and trash — glass is sorted into clear, green, and brown bottles, plastic is separated out, compost is collected, and everything that doesn’t fit into these categories goes into a final bin to be hand-sorted.
German apartments are streamlined, efficient, and meticulously clean. They also typically lack some American staples, like dryers, dishwashers, garbage disposals, and window screens. Many apartments also have a large bathtub and handheld showerhead in place of a typical shower. The first time you use it, you’ll inevitably flood your bathroom, but you’ll gradually get the knack of it.
“Ich möchte etwas essen / trinken” will be one of the first phrases you learn.
Your first encounter with the German stare will be unsettling. You’ll be walking along, minding your own business, goofily grinning at strangers in an attempt to showcase your cultural humility, when an unassuming old lady will laser-beam you with a deadpan, overtly hostile glare. Germans are all about maintaining order, and the stare is one way that aberrant behavior is kept to a minimum. Anything vaguely abnormal or suspicious will earn this norm-enforcing gesture from whoever’s around. Pretty soon, you’ll be shooting the side-eye at young whippersnappers skateboarding on the sidewalk or putting their feet on subway seats. 