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Why skilled workers come to Germany and then leave again

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Re: Why skilled workers come to Germany and then leave again

#431

Post by aleph_minus_one »

aranelsurion wrote: post #389
dgs_sgd wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like, I imagine if I moved to a country and couldn’t do the B1 things in their language, I would have daily obstacles doing basic life things.

> I would have daily obstacles doing basic life things. That heavily depends on the city and country. I don't know where OP is, but for example in Berlin it's kinda rare to meet people not speaking any English, basically mostly old people/retirees don't. There are gyms where people speak English, cinemas with English subtitles, all kinds of doctors speak English, even a lot of bureaucracy like driving exams etc. can…

Berlin is a completely different world than the rest of Germany. Never make the mistake of generalizing anything that you observed in Berlin to Germany outside of Berlin.

Re: Why skilled workers come to Germany and then leave again

#432

Post by vachina »

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #231
dgs_sgd wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I appreciate your perspective, but I was curious what B1 proficiency actually entails and this is what I found [1]: - understand the main points of clear standard speech on familiar topics such as work, school, or leisure - manage most situations that occur while traveling in German-speaking areas - produce simple, connected text on familiar subjects - describe experiences, events, dreams, hopes, and ambitions, and b…

B1 is a completely fair minimum standard. It's normal for many countries to expect residents to have basic conversational adequacy. It's also the kind of requirement that's made explicit on government information about residency. So it shouldn't have been a surprise.

Exactly. Your life will be easier if you have B1. Your correspondence with everything is in German.

Re: Why skilled workers come to Germany and then leave again

#433

Post by torginus »

aleph_minus_one wrote: post #245
malshe wrote: post #130

Here is my anecdote. I was in Germany recently and met with a South American woman. We briefly talked about our immigrant experiences. She is now a German citizen married to a German man. However, she said she can't identify as a German because nobody made her feel like one. By contrast, when I became an American citizen, my American friends (white and hispanic) insisted that they attend the naturalization ceremony.

> she said she can't identify as a German because nobody made her feel like one As a native German, I actually have difficulties with concepts like "identifying as [nationality]", "feeling like [nationality]" or "naturalization". I really would say these are concepts that US-Americans (or people who were "shaped" by US mentality) seem to deeply care about, but Germans very typically don't. So, my opinion/advice is: s…

I think what she meant that even if you live in Germany/work with German colleagues, basically you will enternally made to be felt that you are not one of them by all but the most liberally minded Germans (and even those are rare even in the big international cities). So your friend group (if you decide to have one, rather than concentrate on family), will consist of other expats/immigrants.

Btw most Europeans are like this - but some are more polite about this than others.

Americans are the incredibly weird outlier (in a good way!). If you speak decent enough English, then basically if you get along, they forget about where you come from. At least it felt like it - Americans basically don't make headspace for this kind of stuff.

Re: Why skilled workers come to Germany and then leave again

#434

Post by NicuCalcea »

gib444 wrote: post #411
NicuCalcea wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with the breakdown of the social contract in London, but not with the unfriendliness. I've lived in the UK for eight years and have travelled to many parts of England and Wales. I've never felt as unwelcome in London as I do almost every time I leave it. Constant suspicious looks, questions about who I am and what the purpose of me being there is, the occasional downright xenophobia. To give you a recent exam…

I have experience in what you describe, as I live far from London in a place I'm not from. Yes it can be very insular and can take many years to even begin being treated like a local (it's not until you have a kid, so I'm told). I'm treated with suspicion too. A lot of it is 'not from here [the village/town/county]' (and not sounding like you're from here) rather than 'not white' or 'not from the UK' so I can't hard…

I don't have any identical comparisons of politeness in London and the rest of the UK, but subjectively I do feel people in London are more likely to hold doors, let me skip queues, etc. There's just more of a feeling that we're all trying to navigate life in the city together, rather than gatekeeping each other's presence in it.

It's even more noticeable with people who are paid to be polite: bar and waiting staff, the folks working at Tesco, pub security, the kebab man. I walk into a pub in the middle of nowhere in England, they treat me like I'm intruding or inconveniencing them. I do that in London, they just ask "What are you having love?".

There is definitely a lot of veiled and outright racism and xenophobia though. I've heard things like "your English is actually pretty good" (I was a BBC journalist, it's better than theirs), "at least you're not on benefits", "at least your people are not as bad as X". I've never been told these things in London.

Re: Why skilled workers come to Germany and then leave again

#435

Post by Dylan16807 »

aleph_minus_one wrote: post #337
BeetleB wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can only speculate, but usually when such phrases come up, it's about things like not being part of the in-group - people they know throwing parties and not inviting them, etc.

> I can only speculate, but usually when such phrases come up, it's about things like not being part of the in-group - people they know throwing parties and not inviting them, etc. Concerning "part of the in-group": It is very usual that in Germany, you don't become a "friend" fast (the German translation of "friend", [der] Freund, has a much deeper meaning than the US-American understanding of the English word). Fri…

> If you do shallow smalltalk (as it is very common in the USA), you signal that you only want a shallow relationship.

That sounds like an extremely obnoxious judgement.

> If you want a deep friendship, better bring something deep to the table.

At some point sure. Are you suggesting launching into deep conversation when you meet someone?

Re: Why skilled workers come to Germany and then leave again

#436

Post by OrangeDelonge »

eldaisfish wrote: post #223
ikut3hva wrote: post #165

Hi everyone I don’t usually comment on topics like this because there are so many biases and different perspectives involved. In the end, I believe only the person who has actually gone through the experience can truly understand it; otherwise, it often becomes just another judgment. We are an ASEAN family earning more than €200k gross annually (sorry for mentioning the TC, but there is a reason for it—please keep re…

There is yet another angle that people don't like to discuss because it is uncomfortable. Every European nation state is built around ethnicity as the bedrock of society. This makes it nigh on impossible to integrate fully in these countries. The way this manifests is different in each country, but the fundamental reason is the same. In the german case, take the words of Messut Ozil, the former footballer - when the…

You’re right but I think the US/Canada are just exceptions. Essentially every other nation on earth (not just Europe) is what you describe Europe to be.

Re: Why skilled workers come to Germany and then leave again

#437

Post by m_dupont »

ikut3hva wrote: post #165

Hi everyone I don’t usually comment on topics like this because there are so many biases and different perspectives involved. In the end, I believe only the person who has actually gone through the experience can truly understand it; otherwise, it often becomes just another judgment. We are an ASEAN family earning more than €200k gross annually (sorry for mentioning the TC, but there is a reason for it—please keep re…

I lived in Germany for seven years and by the end I was fluent. B1 is a very low bar to pass, I know because I've done it.

Sorry to say, but the rule is fair. If you want to be a permanent resident, put in a little bit of effort to integrate into the country that you would like to call home.

Re: Why skilled workers come to Germany and then leave again

#438

Post by Dylan16807 »

baranul wrote: post #353
stickfigure wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The black population of the US is unquestionably descended from immigrants. 1.4% of the U.S. population is "American Indian and Alaska Native alone". 2.9% is "alone or in combination with another race" per the 2020 census. I have no idea what you're going on about.

Slavery and indigenous are not considered immigration. You might want to study again about this. Being multiracial, and of indigenous ancestry, does not necessarily mean or always count as immigrant. It is nebulous. No definitive conclusions, in regards to immigration, is made about those of mixed and indigenous ancestry. Speaking of mixed ancestry, the US has a very significant percentage in that category, from both…

I don't know what pedantic definition you're using, but the context was clearly about indigenous or not. Insisting on a definition from a completely different context doesn't make you right, it makes you annoying.

Re: Why skilled workers come to Germany and then leave again

#439

Post by pantalaimon »

arianvanp wrote: post #406
ManuelKiessling wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you cannot be bothered with learning our language, and think that being rich somehow makes our country owe you its citizenship — then yeah, maybe Germany isn’t for you.

Permanent Residency -- not citizenship. Residency is purely about taxes, health insurance and right to work. You e.g. don't get voting rights in national elections. EU citizens automatically get permanent residency in any EU country regardless of language. E.g. I'm a permanent resident in Germany as a Dutchie. (However I did end up picking up German and speak it now. But never had to do a language test)

> EU citizens automatically get permanent residency in any EU country regardless of language.

Yea free movement and choice of residency is one of the main points of the EU

Re: Why skilled workers come to Germany and then leave again

#440

Post by aleph_minus_one »

delis-thumbs-7e wrote: post #413
littlecranky67 wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a german living in spain, i feel your pain. While I do speak spanish around B1/B2 level, it took a lot of time and effort - probably the biggest effort in learning something after uni. People are often "you should speak the language if you life there" - yes, agreed. BUT: Hell, if you are a professional entrepreneur, you are already not working 40h week but way more. If in your day job you speak english anyway beca…

None of this people opining “just learn the language” have learned a second language while working as adults, let alone learned German. You can get to A2 level pretty easy (in most indoeuropean languages at least), but jumping to B1 can seriously be a year or more of studying. You have to be able to handle basic daily situations in the given language and understand what is said in a TV or Radio show. With practice yo…

> None of this people opining “just learn the language” have learned a second language while working as adults, let alone learned German.

I am very certain this is not true. The "just learn the language" people are typically rather people who are very talented in learning new languages (and often indeed to this as adults as a personal hobby - often even with languages from very different families), and thus are often not easy to convince that not everybody is as talented in language learning as they are.

Believe me, I know this kind of people:

I just want to quote some polyglot person who very casually said: "Being fluent in five languages is not something to be proud of - this is rather minimum standard." (she had the opinion that rather keeping fluent in 10 [!] languages is something that takes steady learning efforts to retain the obtained level in all of the 10 languages).

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