Since September 1, I’ve been studying in Berlin. I was always on the fence about studying abroad, but after more than three months, I can confidently say my decision was well worth it. I spent my entire high school career and a few semesters at Hamilton studying German language and culture, but never had the opportunity to experience the country. While many of my encounters here have reinforced things I learned in class, there were also a few unexpected lessons.

Much of what I’d learned about German people turned out to be spot-on. For example, Germans are known to be very efficient. Just look at the luxury cars they produce. But it goes beyond the automotive industry. The checkout lines in grocery stores move incredibly fast. Considering the fact that you are responsible for bagging your own groceries at the same pace they’re scanning the goods, the whole interaction becomes a lot more stressful. Especially when they start glaring at you to make you go faster.

Interactions like this also reinforce the stereotype that Germans take things very seriously. I’ve noticed this on public transit especially. I’d have trouble counting the number of glares my friends and I received while talking and laughing on the bus. There’s also less of that typical American kindness in Germany. Greetings when entering a small store are very rare. If they do occur, we Americans are usually the ones to initiate it. Furthermore, small talk during brief interactions is very rare. One particularly outgoing guy in my program always found a way to make small talk with German people, but they seemed rather annoyed. In speaking to other Europeans I’ve met this semester, the common conclusion is that Europeans think Americans come off as shallow and fake.

Aside from confirming things I’d learned in class, being here has taught me interesting additional things about German culture. For example, Germans memorialize the Holocaust and its victims incredibly well. One impressive method of memorialization, called “Stumbling Stones,” spans all of Germany. These small pieces of brass-like metal are on the sidewalks in front of buildings where Holocaust victims lived or worked. The Stumbling Stones have their names, the date on which they were taken away, and where they were taken. I have also been fortunate to visit a few of the museums commemorating the Holocaust. I found the Jewish museum the most moving, because various exhibits were designed to make visitors feel very uncomfortable, in an effort to show how Jews and other targeted groups could never feel safe.

The Jewish museum was also very informative. One of my favorite informational exhibits was “Catastrophe,” a hall with dozens of long banners suspended from the ceiling. On them were the hundreds of decrees against Jews from 1933 to 1945. This was particularly shocking because it demonstrated how bureaucratically the Nazis enforced their anti-Semitic obsession. There is a lot to learn just from this exhibit. History shows that when you yield small but continuous victories to would-be tyrants, you eventually end up with a tyrannical regime that is too big to stop. How this might be applicable today is a separate question, but the point is absolutely worth noting.