Kultur 4

Like all of the readings on German culture, these were interesting and showed great contrast between our American society and a German society. In Ann Arbor we could absolutely care less about whether or not we are allowed to cross the street or not by the little lights on the sidewalk. We cross the street as if it were any other part of the sidewalk, and cars should stop for us no matter what. I couldn't imagine that with the street crossing habits we have from living in Ann Arbor would transfer well to a German society in which we would get hit by a bike or nearly ran over by a car. Someone from Germany coming here for the first time would probably not know what is happening when 20 people cross the street before they are technically allowed to, and cars stop mid-intersection just to let it happen.

I wish our culture would use bikes as much as the germans do. They have a fully integrated and socially acceptable bike system, whereas for us it is only for kids, and adults usually don't ride bikes, and when they do it is usually for exercise and not for running errands. We may see a great reduction in obesity if we did more like the germans and rode our bikes everywhere instead of driving.

I like how in Germany public transport relies on the honor system. However, I think if they tried to install that into our society, many people would take advantage and not buy tickets, because we don't have nearly as much of an organization obsessed society as they do. We also don't appear to have the high moral code to follow honor systems as they do in Germany.