Here's a piece copied from this weeks' The Week in Germany [info@germany.info].
Misunderstandings: You May Jockey for Position at the Supermarket, but Woe Betide Anyone who Attempts to Jaywalk in Germany…
This week, we continue our occasional series on cultural misunderstandings. And we reiterate our call to all TWIG readers to send in comments on this piece or to send us your own stories.
There is an apparent paradox in Germany: Pedestrians wait patiently and calmly for the appropriate signal to cross the street but these very same individuals just might morph into competitive slalom-style shoppers jockeying for position to pay for their groceries as soon as they set foot in a supermarket.
Conversely, many Germans find the haphazard crossing of streets when the light is clearly red and the leisurely, at times seemingly comatose, pace of supermarket checkout lines in the United States alternately appalling (jaywalking) and an excruciating waste of time (slow pace of checkout lines).
Expatriates from the United States, the UK and many other countries, by contrast, have long marveled at the orderly way in which Germans conduct themselves on the streets, obeying all traffic signals and signs, be they walkers, cyclists or drivers. The system generally works and no one gets hurt in the process.
Anyone who tries a cheeky crossing on foot at a red light (even when the road is wide open!), however, will at best get the evil eye from someone and at worst get slapped with a jaywalking fine from a vigilant cop.
"Coming straight from NYC where pedestrians are encouraged to cross when it is a red signal with no traffic approaching (because it helps the traffic flow that wants to turn after the light changes) I began with the indignant stage. 'Ha! Stupid locals!,'" a blogger named profundo wrote about relocating to Munich in 2003 at www.toytowngermany.com, which bills itself as "the English-language community website for Germany", with some 6,000 individuals swapping stories online.
Profundo then went through a series of subsequent stages regarding jaywalking, ranging from denial to paranoia to anger: "I got the strange feeling that something terrible was about to happen to me, like a piano falling from a crane or a manhole cover really being a lion trap."
Then profundo got political: "This is what is wrong with this country! You people are enslaved! Jaywalking is the foundation of Free Enterprise and you need to WAKE UP and JAYWALK or you will never make it to CEO!'"
The famous Ampelmännchen - the little green and red men used in the former East Germany were widely considered much cuter than their western German counterparts and have become popular German symbols. Here an eastern German green light man indicates it's OK to cross the street.
In most responses to profundo's personal jaywalking rant, everyone seemed to wonder why the Germans were so strict about it, although most agreed that out of guilt, fear or a sense of duty to their host country they never jaywalked in front of children or policemen. One woman noted that a friend of hers was even "busted" by a German police officer and received a 40 euro fine for jaywalking.
TWIG editor David Brown also recalls the disapproving looks of German children when he jaywalked in Berlin, as they pointed at him and shouted: "Look at that man, HE crossed the street when the light was red!" These initial humbling experiences cowed him into jaywalking only when no tikes were in sight.
Germans cross the street in an orderly fashion, which could be part of a cultural desire for orderliness and social cohesion that permeates much of German society. And might even be a mirror for some pretty positive aspects of Europe.
As American economist and commentator Jeremy Rifkin suggests in his book "The European Dream" (2004), Europeans tend to have a more "collective" versus "individual" view on how to achieve success as a society. Rifkin posits, moreover, that they just might be on to something in Europe, notably when it comes to energy, environmental, social and healthcare policies. But that's another story, one best discussed after hearing out arguments made by Rifkin and others in the context of a wider transatlantic dialogue.
But why is it that Germans can turn into seemingly hyper-competitive individualists as they jockey for position in a Darwinian fashion at supermarket checkout lines, where Americans and most other people in the English-speaking world tend to wait their turn patiently and, arguably, far more light-heartedly?
While some Americans view waiting to cross the street as a waste of time, Germans can get incredibly impatient in the leisurely, magazine- and candy-laced, wide aisles of our vast supermarkets. The personal stages that profundo describes in feeling forced to wait to cross the street in Germany could be superimposed onto how some Germans feel waiting in line to buy their groceries in America. This is where Germans exhibit their own kind of CEOesque "carpe diem" tendencies, and fail to comprehend what they consider the passive complacency of their American cousins, the utter lack of breakneck speed and efficiency of the laid-back cashiers.
Maybe we are all just impatient or prefer to follow rules in different places and in different contexts?
DJM: If you'd like to see the "Ampelmaennchen," google will bring up an article on Wikipedia. The little man is everywhere in Berlin, and people pay attention to him.
