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by aforwardslash 21 days ago
One of the reasons is that Germany is not a friendly country for non-german speakers (and/or if you dont have the right profile); I've worked for a while in both Berlin and Munich. In berlin you get away with english, except anything official - from opening a bank account to any interaction with the city council or government services. They will go out of your way to make you feel unwelcome if you are not a fluent german speaker. In Munich is even worse - in many "non-immigrant neighbourhoods" they wont even acknowledge you if you speak english (eg. In the supermarket), though often they understand it perfectly.

Learning german is not easy, but it is absolutely essential if you want to call it home; Id suggest anyone planning a move to start learning beforehand - the idea that you will "wing it by talking to people" is not enough.

1 comments

Tja, Nie im Leben würde ich zu Bayern gehen.

I'm surprised that despite its claim to openness and tolerance, cities like Hamburg, Bremen or Hannover are not capitalising on this.

Lol. Honestly, I love Munich, but I totally understand why certain movements galvanized there :p its easy to be on a high horse on a rich land - if something is not right, must be someone else's fault.