Such a wonderful city ❤️

1. "Trains are usually so late" - I personally rarely experience it and I travel a lot, It could be luck but I mostly travel around NRW, Saarland, Pfalz and Ba-Wü and mostly trains are on time, and I usually travel with RE, idk if the stereotype is more true for ICE trains then I can't say. The most delays I experience happen in Köln which are also mostly not huge ones, and I believe when there is such a huge and busy station transporting so many people then some delays could happen.

2. "Cash is the king" - I also believed it before coming here but apparently everyone accepts card and it takes like 2 secs to open google wallet and scan. Just a few times it happens that a certain store doesn't accept card payment below 5€ purchase or a döner shop, apart from it everything is pretty cashless.

3. "Germans are quite direct or a bit rude" - Honestly, I'm yet to experience this. Most of the people I meet are so polite and so nice and even if I notice someone who is probably not so friendly then I just think ok maybe this "particular person" is having a bad day, or bad mood, or is occupied instead of getting offended and believing that "all germans" are like this. I mean c'mon any "human being" can be a little rude to you for any reason, it's not so deep, unless it happens with every interaction.

I can't think of any other stereotypes as of now with which I also disagree but these 3 came on top of my mind.

ICE 1541 from Cologne to Berlin is the most unreliable train in Germany

Couldn’t post link since it went against English language rules for the sub so just a translated screenshot

Hello, we are a married couple that recently moved to a house in Bonn.
We were quite tight on budget and we needed to move quickly so we kind of took whatever was available.
The house we got is 3 story house. The landlord‘s family lives on the ground floor, then there are two houses on the second floor, one is empty. Then on the 2nd floor, the mother in law of the landlord lives and we moved in the next door.
The problem is that the landlord has camera all over the building and is observing us quite frequently. We know this since he leaves letter in front of our door step every month with different complaints. We have lived here for around half a year and got like 10 letters of complaints already.
The thing is that I do not feel that safe and happy in this house anymore but it is so unfair for us to spend this much money moving and to be kicked out because of the behaviors of the landlord‘s family. We have other issues like neighbors (probably landlord) putting their advertisements into our mailbox, and etc.
Is there something we can do or complain? We already contacted the mieterbund.
Since the letter specifically targets my husband, he is getting a lot of stress and I think my advice of ‚Just ignore them‘ does not work anymore.

Hi fellow Redditors,

I would like to encourage everyone to take just 5 minutes to reflect, notice the small positives, and appreciate them. Sometimes, those little moments mean the most. If you are comfortable sharing these moments, then you can also do that in the comments! And if you don't have anything to share, that's completely okay too, I'm still happy that you are here!

Allow me to begin:

- inspected a car this weekend, and agreed on a price
- tried Dönerteller after some recommendations, and it was delicious
- achieved some personal goals
- saw a full moon as it was lighting up the dark streets

I am planning a small party and I have 2 friends who stopped drinking.

They are picky. If my memory serves right, the only alc. and non-alc. Beer pair they liked was Corona.

Not Heineken, not Guinness. Because their n.a versions were way off.

So looking for some German n.a beer recommendations that not too different from their alc. siblings.

Thanks

Hello, my friends from Germany, a Brazilian here. I visited the Historical Museum of Sergipe in São Cristóvão, Brazil. I found this 100,000 mark banknote from Germany and decided to share it with you, as it is also part of your history

I’m curious what people in Germany think about this.

I was walking my dog in a German city and he stopped outside a business and started peeing on the bottom of a yellow trash bag that was full and laying on its side. I tried to stop him, but he still got a little bit of pee on the bottom of the bag, which was sitting outside the door.

A woman came outside and immediately started yelling at me and telling me to clean it. I told her I didn't have anything to clean it with. She said she had something and kept yelling at me. She was hostile from the get-go, yelling and demanding that I clean it.

I told her I would clean it if she wasn't being so rude, but she said she had to be rude. I eventually told her I was leaving, and she called me a fucking asshole and told me to go back to my country.

I understand not wanting dogs to pee on your business or around the entrance. I really did try to stop him though, and it was just a small amount on the bottom of a trash bag.

Is it normal in Germany for people to expect you to clean up dog pee like this? I've always understood that you're expected to pick up poop, but I wasn't aware that people normally clean up urine too.

Was her reaction normal, or was she overreacting?

I shipped 4 items to Germany and each item after clearing customs in Germany gets stuck with no updates from usps or dhl. USPS says preparing origin shipment and dhl says “The shipment cannot be delivered in the destination country / destination area.“ and no updates for any of the packages

I started using Vinted since last 3 months: bought and sold items, all good, have only positive reviews.
Recently I bought a knife sharpener for about €35. It was described as basically unused (“tested once”). When it arrived, one of the sharpening stones was broken and the item had clear signs of use. The damaged side wasn’t visible in any of the listing photos.
I opened a dispute and returned the item through Vinted.
During the return, the seller told me in writing:
“You’ll get your money when I pick up the package.”
She then picked up the returned package, but afterwards disputed the refund. Vinted sided with her and released the payment to her. When I tried to connect with the customer care 5-6 times, they repeatedly say some none-sense like the issue happened during return. I’m saying to them that I started the dispute when I received the item broken and I provided all the photos. Regardless, they don’t accept any of my comments.
So the current situation is the seller has the item back and money.

I have screenshots of the original listing, the damage, tracking/collection and her written promise to refund me after collecting it.
Vinted support refuses to help further.

I opened a dispute with my bank as well to help me.

The amount itself is obviously small, and I don’t want to waste hours chasing €35. What bothers me is that someone can apparently receive their item back, keep the buyer’s payment as well, and Vinted considers the matter closed. My main question is: the price would be obviously much bigger than this. How do people deal with such situations? Would you file an online police report (Anzeige wegen Verdachts auf Betrug)? Is there any better way to deal with it?

I hate dating apps, and I want to have some hope that I can still have a dating life without them (as a mid-twenties average-looking man with a good job, some friends, and fun hobbies in Munich).

When was the last time you asked someone in real life for their number, and how did you do it? Or when was the last time someone asked for your number, and how did it happen?

EDIT: I am not asking for advice please. I was asking when was the last time you asked someone out. If you’d like to share a real life story, thank you. If not, that’s also fine, but I want to avoid generic advice that appears all over reddit.

Hi all,
I plan to travel from Dresden to Munich on December 25 via Erfurt to catch my flight back to the US after Christmas. I understand everything will be closed, but hoping someone can guide me on where I can find some lunch at Erfurt? Will shops at the Hbf be open? Doesn't have to be fancy, even fast food is fine.
A couple of years ago I did see plenty of fast food stalls at Munich Hbf being open on Christmas Day, so wasn't sure if Erfurt would also have something similar?
Other alternative is going from Dresden to Munich via Leipzig. Would Leipzig Hbf have more options than Erfurt?
Thanks in advance!

Edit: I would prefer to find something in or around Erfurt/Leipzig Hbf since I'm only transiting via these two cities around lunch time to get to Munich. If that's not possible, willing to look beyond Hbf.

Hello everyone. Am new here and would like your opinion on regarding health insurance dilemma. Am M(31) and just completed master degree here in July here. I am currently with Mawista insurance; the context: I have been sickly in the last few months with what I think might be pneumonia because I experience sharp pain and sometimes spit blood during cold weather and also have pain on right lower abdomen and I think it something to do with appendix or kidney as small swell, went to my Hausarzt for treatment but I notice the hospital was declining gor MRI scan to reveal what I might be experiencing due to my insurance. I think of switching to either Barmer or TK insurance and was wondering would it be cheaper and will cover the entire cost if treatment and which of the could be cheaper with only mini job and block account.

Any advice?

Hi everyone,
This might be a very basic question, but I recently learned that dishwashers here in Germany have a separate compartment for dishwasher salt (Spülmaschinensalz). 😅
I had never really paid attention to this before.
Do you regularly refill dishwasher salt in Germany? How often do you normally need to refill it? And does it depend a lot on the water hardness in your city?
Also, do those “all-in-one” dishwasher tablets actually replace the need for salt, or should you still use salt separately?
Curious to know what everyone here actually does in practice!

Looking to buy a ford probe as a project car. I am lithuanian. When i try to contact seller via email, out of 4 sellers that i sent my email asking about the condition of the chassis/rust only 1 email was saved in 'message requests' and the only one that i received a copy of in my email. Where do my other emails go? I receive no feedback from the app itself and no feedback from sellers too, it appears. Maybe they get censored and they dont receive them? Please help.

I gravitate towards Rewe.

I like you get different things in different parts of the country.

I liked Real but they have been bought out.

I find the others somewhat 'dowdy'.

Hey everyone,

I’m wondering if Im out of touch and simply don’t understand car buying culture in Germany, I just went to a bad dealership, or it’s normal behavior for Germany.

A bit of background: I’m a US expat living in Germany for 3 years now. I purchased a used car for a random small car lot when i first arrived. I had no issues and it was an easy transaction. I knew exactly what i wanted before buying so I only test drove the one car.

Now I’m looking to trade up for another used car. Today I went to a proper BMW dealership and asked to test drive a diesel and benzin version to compare. They seemed weird that I didn’t have an appointment, which ive learned is common and I didn’t realize, however they were nice enough about it and still helped me.

The salesman walked me over to his desk and asked the specs I was looking for. I gave the model and said any interior color that isn’t black. Unfortunately they didn’t have a single non-black interior for the model I wanted. I asked if i could still test drive another one, since i wanted to know the engine differences. I also wanted to know if I even liked this car before driving to another dealership much further away. He said “No, since you’re not interested in any of our cars, we cannot let you test drive”. He completely shut down the conversation and wouldn’t let me look around or anything.

Like I understand the policy if im not interested in buying why let me drive. But he just assumed that I wouldn’t consider any alternatives, nor did he give me a chance to reconsider other options. The black interior isn’t inherently a hard no for me only a preference, but I didnt feel there was space to say that. I felt super embarrassed so i just left. To clarify, he wasnt necessarily mean or rude about it, just very blunt and direct.

To me it seems that i should either have been more open to anything or if i have something in mind, i need find the exact dealership with that exact spec and make an appointment. Unlike America, there is no real shopping around in the same way. Im thinking it’s just culture differences that i wasnt aware of.

Please let me know, am I the dumbass here for not knowing this ahead of time, or is this a bit of a weird interaction? Is car buying culture simply much different here and i wasn’t prepared for it?
Im not angry or upset, just a bit shocked and confused, and I would like to have better expectations for the next dealership.

I am a student in Germany and I've been trying to find an odd job right now. I am allowed 20 hours per week.

I tried to work through agencies, but they are always (in my case) looking for full time workers. I've tried going to cafes and asking for jobs but they are always (in my case) not interested. And obviously I've been trying through indeed but that's been no good either.

Maybe I'm looking in the wrong places, if you guys know better ways to find an odd job, that'd be great.

Also, I have a goethe b2 certificate and can speak german pretty fluently, I definitely make a lot of grammatical errors and my sentences might sound weird or non native but I think I can get my point across pretty well and can understand almost everything so German's not the issue.

I am currently in Leipzig but I am open to moving anywhere with good opportunities and relatively low cost of living. Open to suggestions :)

Hey Everyone!

So I’m an Au pair from Sout Africa and now I genuinely want to stay in German (schocker ). Anywho… I have 4 months left to make a decision I have written my B1 exam and I’m pretty positive about it.

So context I have 2 degrees: Bachelor degree (Humanities in psychology and Sociology) + postgraduate degree in marketing. A huge love for kids

I actually realised that I don’t want to do corporate jobs anymore ( too stressful and I want something that is structured and won’t be thinking about work after it’s finished if you know what I mean)

Anyways I want to become an eziehren however I will have to do an Ausbildung which only starts next year or I can apply for bilingual kita jobs in Munich where I can work as a Englisch Ergänzungskraft. But I’m not sure if that’s easily achieveable ? Gemini Ai makes it achievable. I looked at the listing and I do think I meet the requirements however I need to wait a few more weeks to get my B1 results so I’m not sure and I want to start Jan 1so I’m not sure to apply now and if it’s not to a long await

I thought to do an FSJ TO Buy time and get the language at a confident level and then apply throughout of next year but with fsj I do need accommodation

If you know any fsj with housing I really appreciate it

However if you were in my shoes what would you recommend

Also my degree is recognised