[cagataygurturk]

I am surprised that noone mentioned about the bottle collectors phenomenon in Germany. [1] Basicly you pay a deposit (.25 eur for plastic ones, 0.08 for glass.) for each beverage you buy and then sell those bottles back in supermarkets. This is maybe the easiest and most efficient way to force people to recycle. Are you lazy to do that or you don‘t have a place when you finish your beer walking in the street?[2] Then you simply leave the bottle next to a trash bin and in couple of minutes someone takes it to cash it back and call for a day. It‘s a serious revenue stream for a large group of low income people.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/02/german-cities-...

[2] In a country famous with rules and strictness, it is also surprising to see stuff which are not forbidden or no one simply cares, such as drinking on street or public transport, quite openly shopping and using drugs, smoking in bars etc. However some of these might be true only for Berlin, which became a island of freedom in the middle of Europe.

[ahartmetz]

The drugs thing is only Berlin, at least in Germany. Drinking everywhere (though not at all times) is normal in all of Germany AFAICT. It's legal and nobody cares if you still behave.

[tannhaeuser]

Drug selling and smoking pot in the public (or even schools) is also not uncommon in other major cities in Germany eg. Hamburg, Frankfurt, Köln, etc. Hamburg has areas near the habour feeling quite extraterritorial in this respect. Munich I don't know; it's a much cleaner place than those other cities. Though drinking beer there and going to the Biergarten is kind of their way of living, and it's certainly a relaxed place with respect to nudity, love affairs, and sex.

[ahartmetz]

Definitely not Munich. But Hamburg, Cologne and maybe other places, yes, you're right.

[dminor]

This is common in several US States.