There’s been a lot of talk in Germany recently about how to best integrate the country’s 15 million foreigners. It’s shocking how little has been done to bring immigrants into mainstream German society. Yet it seems to me that forcing them to integrate won’t really work. To read a brilliant (wink, wink) article on the subject, click here.
As part of Eur
oYankee’s ongoing effort to document the creeping Americanization of German food, I bring you a twofer: easy cheese and hunt’s hickory smoked bbq sauce. Both were found for sale in Strauss Innovation, a store beloved in Germany for dependably offering up cheap underwear. My in-house cheese lover considers orange cheese out of a can to be an abomination to dairy. I find it on par with string cheese for entertainment value. It’s fun to make shapes on crackers or squeeze it directly into a friend’s mouth. I’m going to talk it up to my skeptical German friends as an American version of Obatzter, a chunky orange spreadable delight big in Bavaria.
(photo credit: jamieca)
It’s hard to imagine the US government launching its presence onto YouTube with a montage of sex scenes from Hollywood movies. Yet that’s essentially what the European Union has done. EuroYankee finds it a bizarre way to get attention. But it seems to have worked. Plenty of people are clicking. If there were a showdown between sex scenes in Hollywood versus European cinema, the EU would win hands down. There’s a lot of PG-13 self-censorship that goes on in the States. In Europe, people get less riled up about sex and nudity in movies. But I find the "let’s come together" slogan a little much. I mean, fostering a European identity is one thing, but it creeps me out to have the EU trying to be sexy or in any way funny.
Baby showers don’t exist in Germany. I know, not necessarily a bad thing. Yet Americans in Germany apparently do “tempt fate” by giving presents to the mother before the child is actually born (a huge taboo here.) Thus, EuroYankee played the dreaded diaper game Sunday. Yet with guacamole, chocolate chips, spring roles, Pepsi and other delicacies heaped on the table, the silliness was easily tolerated. It was also surprisingly fun to shop for baby clothes. The small sizes make everything look so cute.
Today, Portugal took over the European Union presidency from Germany. A not-very-exciting event. The EU seems determined to be as unsexy as possible. But at least it inspired this brilliantly written article (wink wink).
