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Moving to Germany as an Australian (2016)

blog.alexanderdickson.com

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Re: Moving to Germany as an Australian (2016)

#131

Post by ben_w »

cosmodisk wrote: post #48
looki wrote: post #9

Regarding the trains, >They are usually on time and cover basically everywhere worth visiting in Europe. He has a very ungerman definition of usually on time :) There's probably not a bigger laughing stock in Germany than our trains (Okay, there is BER). The long-distance ones only arrive within 5 minutes 75% of the time [1]. If you have tight transfers to make, that can get very annoying. I also thought the ICE and…

Well...The local operators,here in London,solved the stats issue this way: if a train is late, it skips many stations and still arrive to the end station on time. Guess what,all the stats are produced on first- last ststion basis...

Same idea but slightly different trick was being used when I was at university. Aberystwyth-Birmingham New Street was regularly terminated at Wolverhampton, so that it has gone far enough to count as “not cancelled” and because it didn’t get to BNS late it also “wasn’t late”.

Re: Moving to Germany as an Australian (2016)

#132

Post by fit2rule »

kfk wrote: post #128
lumberjack wrote: post #93

If you want to move to Germany don't underestimate how hard it is to have a social life around here, especially if moving alone. It is the one thing that seems a constant, whenever I talk with other foreigners. Even Germans seem to find it hard to have friends when they relocate away from their previous social lives.

I think the issue is that here in Germany there is a lot of unspoken peer pressure in regards to where you should be in life at your age. That pressure makes it hard to keep things in a flow and basically people (German and expats) tend to put a structure around everything. Social interactions? Needs to happen at the appropriate time and scheduled at least 2 weeks in advance. Fancy restaurant dinner with girlfriend?…

As an Aussie who's lived around the world with stints in California and Germany, I really miss my American friends' ability to just show up when they figured I'd be around, unannounced, and hang out for an afternoon - or not, no worries, nobody home - compared to my German friends who literally needed a weeks notice to come over and have a couple of beers, even in this mobile-phone era. Or, my Australian pals who would come over, let themselves in, do the dishes, have a beer, and wait until I got home.

Then again, there are the Austrians. Never, ever be even a minute late to an event involving Austrian friends.

Strange how things are more and more rigid, the further from the frontier one gets ..

Re: Moving to Germany as an Australian (2016)

#133

Post by currysausage »

realityking wrote: post #110
distances wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What happens in Germany if you lose your connection due to the train being late? In Finland the train company is responsible for ensuring you get to your destination (with taxi if needed) if the train rides were bought as a single trip.

Same here if the entire journey is booked on one ticket. I’ve taken a Taxi from Cologne to Aachen (~75km) on Deutsche Bahn’s dime. Unfortunately Deutsche Bahn is not very up-front about these option (e.g. with vouchers) and you have to expense that taxi ride or hotel after the fact. A lot of people are scared of that as they’re not sure if they’ll get the money back.

They will only refund you for the taxi if the scheduled arrival is after midnight and the expected delay at your destination is >60 minutes OR if it’s the last connection for the day and there is no other means of public transport that will allow you to reach the destination before midnight, and only up to EUR 80,00 [1] which wouldn’t even cover Cologne—Aachen (that is one intercity stop).

For regional tickets, some states or transport systems offer additional voluntary compensations. In NRW, you would be refunded up to EUR 25,00 before 8pm and up to EUR 50,00 after 8pm if your train or bus departs more than 20 minutes behind schedule. [2]

Obviously, there are edge cases like acts of God where voluntary compensations won’t apply (and legally binding compensations won’t apply either in a few years if a pending legislative initiative is successful). Since passenger information is less-than-ideal, it might be hard to tell if you will be compensated even if you know about the basic rules.

[1] https://www.bahn.com/en/view/booking-information/passenger-r...

[2] https://www.mobil.nrw/service/mobigarantie.html – I couldn’t find an official English version on my phone

Re: Moving to Germany as an Australian (2016)

#134

Post by tannhaeuser »

shakermakr wrote: post #107
FabHK wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My point was more that if German food was the worst among the seven, then they must have all been reasonably decent, at least.

The problem is often cultural food (ie non German) quickly changes to the German palate. There was an incredible Indian restaurant opening here recently. We visited a few months later and it was half as good. Asked the owner: “yeah well, Germans like it not hot, salty, and fatty”. Same with Italian: it’s quantity over quality. And the supermarkets are woeful. It’s hard even to get an “exotic” herb like cilantro often…

Food lovers in Germany don't buy at supermarkets, they go to proper bakeries, butchers, shops for vegetables (many of which are owned by Germans of Turkish descendant) and fish, or specialty shops (Asian, Oriental, bio, etc.), or to the "market" - a place where regional and quality food sellers come once or twice a week with trailers. Discounters are only visited for buying really cheap stuff (Aldi, Lidl, Netto), or for time-saving one-stop shopping (Rewe and others) or close-by shopping (Edeka). It's true, though, that German food doesn't quite live up to French and Italian food traditions - because nothing does.

Re: Moving to Germany as an Australian (2016)

#135

Post by lucb1e »

WhiteAussie wrote: post #59
lucb1e wrote: post #3

> [My car is] impractical with only two doors and four seats I like four doors, but only two isn't too bad (drove one of those for five years). Seats though, is it normal to own a bus in Australia? The people I would expect to own a car with more than two rows of seats are families with 4+ kids, which is nobody here. I've recently been thinking about a 2-seater to save on gas/CO2 since I have no kids anyway and you c…

Maybe reconsider the no kids thing. Then you'll have the best reasons in the world for a larger car!

Mess up the planet two ways (introducing more humans + a car), great idea :-)

Of course, environmental reasons aren't my only reasons to not have kids but it is a nice way to stop doubting about it since I'm sure it's the right choice for the planet and everyone on it, even when I'm only leaning towards no personally.

Re: Moving to Germany as an Australian (2016)

#137

Post by geowwy »

fit2rule wrote: post #129
marcus_holmes wrote: post #124

I moved from Perth to Berlin. The biggest thing that hit me was the alcohol. I can buy a (good!) beer at anytime (even 3am) for about 2 euros from a spati ("late shop"- like a deli but mostly selling beer), and then walk around in the open air drinking it. All the supermarkets sell alcohol all day(and so cheap). People gather by the canals in summer, just drinking and talking. No-one seems to get drunk, there's no vi…

I'm also from Perth, lived around the world, including some years in Germany .. had the same set of observations. On this: >I always wonder why Australia seems such an angry place after travelling abroad. I think Australia has a lot of deep pain in its history, and in its culture, and this manifests in a hostility. Every time I go back, I wonder why its such an angry shithole. Australians just seem to be getting madd…

I've traveled around a bit but haven't noticed Australians are more angry than anyone else. Interested in this comment.

Re: Moving to Germany as an Australian (2016)

#138

Post by benibela »

snypox wrote: post #121
benibela wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, I can only work with the German layout after living in Germany too long I bought a refurbished, mechanical keyboard that was supposed to have the German layout, but it actually has the US layout, so I cannot use it. I have been planing to sell it. Anyone interested?

As a hungarian, I use a US keyboard with hungarian layout for months. It's not a problem, just don't look at the keyboard.

But the shift and enter keys have the wrong size

If I do not look at the keyboard, I get shift when I want <

Re: Moving to Germany as an Australian (2016)

#139

Post by ryder9 »

fit2rule wrote: post #129
marcus_holmes wrote: post #124

I moved from Perth to Berlin. The biggest thing that hit me was the alcohol. I can buy a (good!) beer at anytime (even 3am) for about 2 euros from a spati ("late shop"- like a deli but mostly selling beer), and then walk around in the open air drinking it. All the supermarkets sell alcohol all day(and so cheap). People gather by the canals in summer, just drinking and talking. No-one seems to get drunk, there's no vi…

I'm also from Perth, lived around the world, including some years in Germany .. had the same set of observations. On this: >I always wonder why Australia seems such an angry place after travelling abroad. I think Australia has a lot of deep pain in its history, and in its culture, and this manifests in a hostility. Every time I go back, I wonder why its such an angry shithole. Australians just seem to be getting madd…

>I think Australia has a lot of deep pain in its history, and in its culture, and this manifests in a hostility.

Yeah.. Germany doesn't have any of that..

Re: Moving to Germany as an Australian (2016)

#140

Post by ObsoleteNerd »

fit2rule wrote: post #129
marcus_holmes wrote: post #124

I moved from Perth to Berlin. The biggest thing that hit me was the alcohol. I can buy a (good!) beer at anytime (even 3am) for about 2 euros from a spati ("late shop"- like a deli but mostly selling beer), and then walk around in the open air drinking it. All the supermarkets sell alcohol all day(and so cheap). People gather by the canals in summer, just drinking and talking. No-one seems to get drunk, there's no vi…

I'm also from Perth, lived around the world, including some years in Germany .. had the same set of observations. On this: >I always wonder why Australia seems such an angry place after travelling abroad. I think Australia has a lot of deep pain in its history, and in its culture, and this manifests in a hostility. Every time I go back, I wonder why its such an angry shithole. Australians just seem to be getting madd…

I’m from Australia, lived a decent portion of my life overseas in various countries, and traveled extensively (never lived anywhere more than a year in my life).

I’ve always noticed Australians in general are very easy to get mad, take things the wrong way, etc. I’m constantly surprised by how many of my friends have so much loud hatred for things that seem so.. trivial? I’m constantly made fun of for being a “hippy” and “not caring about anything” because I prefer to always try stay positive and as stress-free as possible.

Of course this is a vast generalisation, but it’s purely my experience and something I’ve distinctly noticed too, and I agree it seems to be getting worse.

I don’t think the nations history has anything to do with it though. I don’t know where it started but I think it’s just a cultural thing that spreads like most cultural things.

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