20 German rules you shouldn't break

I just found an article online about a list of things you should not do when you visit Germany as someone who liveed here for years and also make content about living in Germany for some Germans to see I think I kind of qualify to talk about it so that's exactly what I'm going to do in this video I'm going to go over this list and give you guys some of my perspective about it let's go first of all I did not see this thing on the list but for my personal experience I just want to

tell you no matter what you do do not put ice on beer in Germany and you might say when what kind of monster even put eyes on beer anyway well a lot of Southeast Asian country do that including my country Vietnam when a German sees me putting eyes on beer they act as if I was insulting the ancestor or something there reason is that when you water down the beer with ice the beer loses all of the flavor so you should just put the whole bottle of beer into the fridge to keep it cool like

that and the thing is there is a very good explanation to why a venamis do this in order to cool a beer down with a fridge you need to have a fridge and our country did not have like wiely access to electricity until like recently my Village did not have electricity until 1995 and my family did not have a fridge until 2007 therefore before that time in order to get ice we have to travel out of the village to a convenience store to get eyes and eyes were expensive so you have like a tiny block

of eyes like this and the only solution to you have a cold drink is that you crack a piece of ice and put it into the drink now almost everybody has a fridge in Vietnam but I think oh habit dies hot is that the right saying another reason is that Vietnam is very hot so if you put a beer on the fridge and when you take it out it's going to take the beer 5 10 minutes to lose its coolness so if you want to like keep having fresh and cool beer you have to keep

adding the ice that's the thing see we have a reason for that in Germany it's different they had electricity in the fridge long time ago the weather is kind of cool so that was never a problem for them I kind of noticed that German are not very jurgy or materialistic toward like cars or like clothing you can wear or do whatever you want and nobody judge you for that but they judge you hard when it comes to beer joice they're very proud of their beer the German beer and it's like something kind of sacred and

they want to drink it the right way and they want people to treat treat it with respect yeah that's the thing anyway do not put eyes in beer over here don't throw away bottles ooh that's good that's a good advice over here in Germany uh when you buy a bottles you have to pay 25 cent deposit so that after you drink it you give it back at the supermarket and you get back your deposit it is a wonderful system and I love it I love it like uh when you buy all of the bottles uh

I always feel so guilty even in Vietnam because when I throw the Bott Bott where I don't know where they end up with but in Germany they have a system to get back like I think 90% higher than that of all of the plastic bottle yeah keep your bottle put it back to the supermarket or you can put it next to a a rubbish bin so that uh people who in needs of money could collect it and then they get some money out of it don't be late this is a very stereotypical thing about German

people and it's completely true I have nothing else to say about it they lied be on time and they want you to be respectful to what they time to so just be on time you might say that being on time is something everybody should do anyway but like for example for my culture in Vietnam people are not on time that often and people are not really like upset when you're late because they kind of expecting that so like if you're late for 5 10 20 minutes it's kind of like expected already so that's why it's

not like globally okay but in Germany no no no no either you're early or you are on time don't be late the next thing is pretty interesting don't enter a home wearing shoes oh and I love it because in Vietnam people never ever wearing shoes in the house um over here it's kind of the same when you arrive into like a German house take off your shoe and then walk with basically your normally your socks I like it it's just like in my country is kind of similar cultural it keep the house clean everybody's happy

don't speak English and expect no one to understand okay this hits home to me when I sit in a public transport in Germany people speak German and at the beginning I don't understand it right so for me it just like why no it's like so when I speak English with German boyfriend I thought people would feel like it's why noise to them to because I speak a foreign language so sometime I just say like things I don't really my people would listen to me because I don't think they would understand me I don't I don't

know why I think that okay just weird brain thought the thing is I think most German can understand English very well so probably they hear everything I said there but yeah um Germans speak very good English that is very wonderful and they speak it with like barely any accent don't believe those like Hollywood actor who always pretend to be German and was like hello golden talk no no no no no they don't have any accent they s eloquent and uh they very humble about that too don't smile and talk to strangers yes do not smile

with strangers they would think you're crazy people over here okay the their defa face in public I like this which is okay but if you smile at them they would be like what's going on why you smiling you crazy they don't lie to be talked to in public if you approach them to ask for Direction they would willing will L help you for sure because they actually very kind and helpful but if you just want to have like a small talk sometime it works especially with old people they love talking to people but I just

noticed that not every country are like that because one day me and my boyfriend were sitting on the train in Germany and there were an American couple sitting next to us like in front of us actually and they sat down and they were like Hi how are you uh talking to us like we are friends and I love the conver I talk to them and I was like this is what happened in America people just sit down and they just talk to the people next to you I love it and I saw so many people

saying things like yeah but they are fake like they just pretend to talk to you but they don't care about you bro like at least I have someone to talk to it's not like it's easy to be friends with a German anyway so I'm not complaining get on public transport without a ticket it's pretty funny because if you visit Vietnam I would never give you this advice see since you cannot get into any public transport without a ticket there would be someone standing at the door checking your ticket but in Germany it's like it's based

on a just system so the public transport is open for everybody you just get in nobody checks your ticket and they kind of like trust you that you have the ticket and because Germans are really honest so the system works very well but of course there are still people abusing the system so uh sometime they would have like people uh to come and randomly checks the whole train or tram to see if everybody has a ticket but it doesn't happen that often but still do not do that because if they cost you you're going to

pay a minimum price of $60 also you're going to be very embarrassed in public but I have to say sometime is not the fall of the traveler it's the fall of the German public transport system the system is so confusing like if you want to buy a ticket there different Zone there are different li like go to this place but place I lived here for 4 years I didn't understand the system my boyfriend always have to buy me tickets every time I go because I was too afraid of like buying the wrong ticket and at

the end they find me so yeah it's sometimes it's just not our fault okay do not jwalk which is kind of true in Vietnam Where I Come From There are traffic lights too but uh not many people follows it so even when it's like green light for walking people the car and the Buy keep driving so um when I move to Germany I have to learn to stop at a red light to walk when it's green light and the thing is people respect Rose over here and they don't like it when people publicly disrespect it

so if you like crossing the street in red light get ready to be yell at by a lot of German on the street especially when a child is standing next to you people would be even more grumpy because you are setting a bad example for the giant you probably see some of the memes about Germans just standing there in the middle of the night in a completely empty Street waiting for the red light so they can cross the street it's kind of true I did that a lot with my boyfriend he didn't let me cross

if it's not green light at all so yeah don't do it don't address strangers with their first names this is probably for uh I don't know southeast Asia and Asia as well um because like in my culture people address each other by the first name because like 50% of us have the same last name already so that's why uh if everybody's is hard we address each other by the first name over here they address each other by their last name and also they have two pronounce to address the person that you talk to one is

z and one is do Z is like for formal when you first met or like on business setting or do is like more casual and um that is very important for you to learn when you speak German there is some kind of like formality for sure when it comes to like uh talking to people you don't know well so yeah don't walk in bicycle Lanes um before you come to Germany if your country don't really have bicycle lens maybe learn what is bicycle lens look like it's uh on the street it's normally look a bit

red and then there is a bicycle side so sometime it's a bit blending with like the walking lens so you should learn how to like uh tell them apart in Vietnam we don't really have bicycle lens so when I came here at first I couldn't really tell where is the bicycle lane and I accidentally walk on bicycle Lanes a lot the thing is bikers over here they are kind of scary okay they don't stop they own the street they just drive like this very fast if you are standing on their Lane they're going to curse

on you they're going to dry on you they're going to kill you okay so uh yeah learn about it stay away from them um they are scarier than the cars over here don't disrespect quiet hours yep that's true uh this country has uh a lot of quiet hours though like after 10: p.m. until the morning you're supposed to be completely quiet then on Sunday it's also quiet time there are some places you have to be quiet during noon as well so basically just be quiet all the time sometime when you're with a group of friends

and you get too excited in public that's not very good as well I mean I appreciate that because the public space is very quiet but at the same time I just missed the excitement of Crazy Fast Pace uh with a lot of like noise life for young people also people get really mad when you are being noisy at the hour that you're not supposed to be they call the police straight away you have friends coming over and the police would come and say like you guys are too noisy it's 11: this is your first warning

things like that um so yeah be silent don't expect credit cards to be accepted everywhere it's true though always bring cash with you when you travel to Germany you never know it's like 50/50 CH some places take Card some PES don't cash is still King over here I don't really have problem I always have cash with me just in case uh I have to pay it somewhere in the restaurant and uh it works next thing do not forget to tip although you heard that in Germany and Europe in general people don't tip that much but

it's still like kind of expected that you tip somewhere between 5% and 10% of your bill in Germany especially in a restaurant if you do s service or like uh in supermarket and things like that it's not that common but in restaurant yeah they do tip and uh at first it was very confusing to me because we don't tip at all in Vietnam don't photograph people in public yep Germany is very strict about it they are all about privacy that is why German boyfriend doesn't even show his face on my channel as far as I

understand in America once you are standing in a public space people have the right to like take pictures and film you but over here in Germany it's not working like that even when you are in a public space you are entitled to have a privacy and people cannot take picture of you and put it on the internet the rules is a bit complicated and I'm not a loyal so I'm just telling you guys what I understand because I make a lot of like video so I have to learn about this a lot if you want

to take a picture of a crowd where nobody like one person is on the focus it's kind of okay um but if you want to take like a picture of a person standing there in public mm no no no no video filming is the same if a person is on the focus of the video that is a no go to even when you blur their face if they have like tattoo or like distinguished body shape and clothes that can be recognizable that is not good enough I saw so many videos on the net about Germans

getting angry because someone is like filming a buildings and that person walk by and that person is like you are fing me at my face I mean I kind of understand that it's privacy for them but like sometime we're not even trying to capture you we're just trying to capture the building but yeah to some extent they could be like kind of extreme so be careful I'm not sure if I ever mentioned this on my channel but a lot of people lie to drink beer over here but you barely see drunk people in public in

Germany they have very very well control of their alcohol consumption so even though they are drinking beer in public they are not like getting drunk and going crazy and disturb people over here which I respect it so if you come here traveling and things like that enjoy the beer but don't be drunk in public don't flip the bird I don't know this uh word in English but I think you know what I mean like the middle finger don't flip the middle finger or even like uh insult someone with water over here years ago on a

short video I did that like a character who flip like a middle finger and all Germans was Super Shock under the comment section like you don't do that like that is so disrespectful but like in Vietnam and also like I saw a lot in America like pop control that I learned that is just a normal thing even for friends we do that just like messing with each other but over here it is like a very disrespectful gesture so don't do that don't go around where German flags that is very true over here if you see

someone walking around with a German flag and they don't look like a football fan people would try to like stay away from that person in Vietnam for example every manth we have another reason to hang the flag in America it's crazy right they have flag on everywhere literally but in Germany because of the history people have learned to like uh extreme nationalism doesn't lead to like good history so they try to like tone it down they don't really Express their love for the country that way and they see people who do that like happing the

flag in the house or if they hang the flag in the house or they hang the flag in the store or they like walking around with the flag they see it as someone who's very like radical is that the right word like very extreme and uh they wouldn't like it so yeah do not do that over here don't stare naked people H I think this advice is written for me because the thing is of course I don't want to like stare at naked people over here but it is such a like a weird thing in

my mind still so I I don't know how to behave in that situation people over here they like to be naked a lot and um it's a normal thing so just don't stare at them don't be awkward don't be shocked don't have like um I don't know blushers or anything or if you get to work which just don't enter those naked area because although they lie to be naked they are getting naked in naked area so they would be like naked beach naked River naked Forest just kindly get out of that place and your eyes

will be okay don't wish someone a happy birthday before their birthday this is a very important rule you guys do not do it because they consider it unlucky over here so you either wish them happy birthday on their birthday or later than that in Vietnam we really don't have something like that so we celebrate birthday when it's convenient to us maybe a week in advance or something like that but in Germany either you celebrate birthday on that day or days later and I didn't know about that so I was wishing German boyfriend earlier and he

was like freaking out so yeah try to uh keep it in your mouth until it's the right time the next thing on the list is do not show the Nazi salute I mean it's true but the thing is if someone ask me like I'm going to Germany soon what is the thing that I shouldn't do the Nazi salute thing is not going to cross my mind because for me such a common thing like you even think about going to Germany and do that that is like so clear that you shouldn't do that already I live

here for 4 years and I have never seen anyone do that over here it's literally illegal for you to like do the salute or like properly writing the Nazi side is illegal too I saw some people giving advice on Internet that when you talk to a German just don't bring up Nazi or Hitler ATO because it make the German very uncomfortable um I don't really completely agree with that because although it is a very like hard topic to talk about most German I know are very educated about that topic because they were taught about that

at school they learn about that by themselves they know what uh the country did wrong and they try to not repeat the mistake ever again also don't make any Nazi and Hitler joke okay that was a very long list I hope you enjoyed it I hope you learned something and let me know in the comment section if there's anything that people shouldn't do when they visit Germany and maybe I will review it on the next video thank you very much for watching and I'll see you in the next video bye-bye