As some of you know, I have been living in Germany for the past couple of months and I felt that it is time to post a few first impressions:

[B]1. German bureaucracy is this country's single greatest crime against humanity. [/B]I cannot count the number of times that I have been given blatantly false information by government employees, and most of them act as if they have never seen a foreigner before and have no idea where such a person might get the necessary paperwork, or even what paperwork IS necessary. I live (and they work) in an area that is at least 40% foreigners. There is no excuse.
Incidentally, I am a British citizen and as such, can legally live or work anywhere in the EU. This has not made navigating German bureaucracy much easer, because the Germans simply replaced the work/residency permits with a single paper that I had to sign (I must now wait several months for proof that I've signed it), and there were all sorts of things that I needed to sort out that are simply normal here. For example, upon moving to a new city/flat/etc. in this country, one must register with the local government and provide all sorts of personal information. Germans have to do this too and do not understand why I (and many others from English-speaking countries) immediately associate such a requirement with snappy black uniforms and straight-armed salutes.

[B]2. German bread is the best thing ever. [/B]Seriously. The variety is impressive enough, but what I love the most is the simple fact that I can get cheap, heavy, delicious bread for less than a euro at the local grocery store that is better than many of the more expensive breads back in North America. If/when I leave Germany, I will buy as many bread baking books as humanly possible and a lifetime's supply of rye flour.
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3. Germans do not understand the concept of customer service.[/B] Oh, sure, some individuals are helpful enough, but on the whole, you are expected to find things yourself, make your own decisions without help, and even pack your own groceries. Those of you from North America will be appropriately shocked. A visit to an Arab bakery in my neighbourhood reminded me of this recently. It was closing time, but they were still happy to make me a cheap pizza and even brought out a chair and gave me some free tea while I waited. They noticed that I was a foreigner too and asked me where I was from. I had finally started to get used to the lack of service in German stores, so it came as quite a shock to be treated so well.

[B]4. German children are extremely rare, possibly endangered.[/B] The daughter of a Palestinian woman in my German class sat with us this afternoon because of a power outage (or some similar disaster) at her school and doodled/wrote stuff on a piece of paper while the rest of us did grammar exercises. She wrote a list of all the people in her class -- must have been at least 20 or 30 kids -- and amongst all the Arab and Turkish names, there was only one German. One. In a large class. In Germany.
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5. Germany may or may not be stuck in a time warp.[/B] I'm just not sure what time I've been warped [I]to[/I]. I live in an old flat that is heated with coal (yes, seriously) in a neighbourhood where almost all the sidestreets are gaslit. I saw graffiti a couple of days ago urging the Allies to bomb German cities once again. A lot of people here don't seem to have figured out that both nazism and communism were defeated a very long time ago, at least judging by the ever-present graffiti, sensationalist newspaper articles, and occasional rallies. Also, in flea markets around the city, I have seen loads of old postcards and other items from the former East Germany, telegrams from Nazi Germany (one with a painting of a big warship with a currently-illegal flag hanging from the rigging, and another emblazoned with some sickeningly cute image -- possibly puppies and kittens), a broken statue of a man in blackface, and all kinds of ordinary antiques. I had been in the country for a matter of weeks when some old guy tried to sell me a copy of [I]Mein Kampf[/I]. No, I didn't buy it.
The thing is... history is all around me here -- in physical objects, architecture and ideas. As a Canadian, this is an entirely new sensation, and I love it.

More will probably follow, but this post is already far too long, so I'll stop here for now :) If anyone has any questions about life as a foreigner in merry old Deutschland, ask away!