I love Germany and the German people

Great folks! Very interesting. Rich culture and love the folklore.

I do not see them as horrible nazi people ((though I do joke around with that thing ._.)) but I see them as interesting nice people. :] Deustchland ist das Land!

distantly.

Just like I see anyone else from anyone else, were all people.

Usually in the form of my grandmother, lol.

First I'd have to get on a plane and fly over. Then I would use my eyes to see them. I've been there (Koln and Berlin) and it's a worthwhile trip. I'd recommend Koln over Berlin as it's smaller and less "big city".

I am about as full blooded German as you can get but my family has been here for generations. I'd love to see Germany and Austria both as they are beutiful countries and I have friends there. German people are rather "stiff" when you first meet them, they don't smile at strangers or casually to other people like you might meet in an elevator or something. They also think Americans are kind of full of sh*t because we smile and talk to every one. They think it's kind of phoney. Once you get a few drinks in them in a social situation they really loosen up though and laugh and joke about basically the same things that we do. They are just more reserved in public. Dating German women is also much more matter of fact than it is here. That's the only way I can explain it. They can be romantic but they don't beat around the bush or play hard to get like some American women do. It's a nice place to visit but I wouldn't want to live there. Also NEVER tell nazi jokes or give a straight armed nazi salute to a German in an effort to make a joke. They do NOT think it is funny and are quite sensetive about it. You're liable to end up missing a tooth or two if you make nazi jokes to real Germans.

with my eyes...

I think of Steffie Graf, whom I adore. I've eaten Wiener Schnitzel (sp?) and I think it is delicious. Black Forest Cake is also delicious..isn't the Black Forest in Germany? Having never been there, I'm sure there is much beauty to be seen. I like the "The Blue Danube" waltz..isn't the Danube River in Germany? I don't think the current-day German people are responsible for the horrors perpetrated by the madman who was in charge years ago, so I don't blame them at all. My partner's heritage is part German and I love him deary!. All things considered, I have a very good feeling about the people and the country! :)

I agree with you that Germans are "folks that just want to live a happy life like you find most people to be" what I was trying to say is that they have some traits that distinguish them from everybody else. So do Italians for that matter, and the Brits and the Spanish and the French and so on and on. I'd say most people in Europe have totally different cultures, background, priorities and outlook in life from one another and none of them would want to change their ways for the next one.

I've been on three German exchanges, and the only family I didn't like was infact Polish. The other two were both warm, welcoming, and kind, They are all very enviromentally friendly, which I respected a lot, they were all also very health conscious, and cooked lovely home made food, and were all very slim, they all tried very hard at school, and spoke beautiful English. I suppose the only fault that I could fin was that all the families I stayed with seemed very old fashioned in the roles fro the man and woman, none of the woman worked, they looked after the children and cooked lovely meals, and the men went out to successful jobs. All their homes were completely spotless though.

Germany is a rich country filled with tall, blond and blue-eyed people.

The pictures I have seen of Germany make me want to someday visit there. I like historic architecture and other historic things. I work for a German company, and although it is in the US there are a lot of German employees and interns there. I really like all of the German people I have met through my work, but they all seem to drink a lot. I miss the interns who have gone back to Germany :(

Great people, great beer, great sausages, and really great sense of humor (in the people I've met so far).

Mullets, bad moustaches, David Hasselhoff lookalikes, and very beautiful women.

Well I travel a lot, and sadly to say most of the Germans I ran into striked me as arogant, they had this thing about them where they would feel better than anyone else. I'm sure it's not all of them, but a good number of them is like that.

I lived in northern Germany, Ostnabruck as a foreign exchange work student for three months in 1966. I found Germans to be extremely hard working but very much like my extended family who are Austrians and Germans. They talked of the war in terms of which of the allies bombed that part of Germany. In Northern Germany it was the Canadians and they still resented Canadians. They said some Germans were kept in Canadian prisoner of war camps in Canada until the early 1950's. They were very proud of their country. When I left to travel in Spain, one of the teenagers on the farm asked me why I would travel to Spain when Germany had everything. Its a beautiful country and the people were very kind to me. At that time I found I couldn't really get along on English. I had to learn German to get anywhere or to be understood at all if traveling alone. I don't know if more people in Germany today speak English.

Being a German it is quite interesting to see how others see us. After my opinion it is like a mirror. That Germans are not perfect, the Germans know very well and that Germans have for foreigner sometimes a strange atttitude, they all know about that. And that some people do not like us just because we are Germans, well we have to deal with it. And if some people want to cultivate all their bias against the germans, well let them cultivate. We can not be everybody's darling. And I think other natiosn have just a quite worse reputation as we have. But those who like to come to Germany are really welcome and I want to underline that especially in regard of our history we are aware, racism or xenphobic attitude is not tolerated and liable to prosecution. I think it can not be that bad otherwise our population would not consist of about 20 % foreigners who come from all the world.

Being German means that you are deeply hated by the rest of the world. I think nowhere in the world you will find anybody who would accept a German without hatred and so Germans have to deal with it. Maybe Germans are tolerated at an extremely low level but I think that hatred is the first and strongest feeling every foreigner will have towards a German. So Germany and Germans can do whatever they might, they will always be regarded by the rest of the world as the most inferior and most hated people. So it makes no sense at all to discuss on this topic and it is better for every German to accept these things as as a mere fact. You may go elsewhere in the world and you will feel that extreme kind of mere hatred just because of your German nationality and so you better hide that you are a German or keep staying in your own country. So it would be really the very best idea if Germany would have withdrawn as much as possible from all foreign countries and stay as much as possible for itself. Being around all the wolrld I never noticed that other nations were hated that much and that profoundly as Germans and so I prefer to I am really scared if I have to leave Germany. Even 60 years after WW II you will find nothing around Germany but extreme hatred and extreme animosity. We are nothing but odious for any other nation. And this kind of animosity is increasing as more as Germany gets involved in foreign countries. So the idea of Obama or Hillary Clinon that Germany should assist the US troops anywhere in the world I think this is the worst idea I have ever heard. Germans should not assist to anybody in the world whatever there might happen neither with money nor with troops. Germany should stay completely for itself and only concentrate on its own poroblems. With our history Germans should not mind at all what happens outside of the country because it never can be a German problem. The USA, Britain, France and all other countries are big and strong enough to solve their own problems and therefore there is no need at all of any German suport or assistance. Complete neutrality and a strict but friendly isolation to all foreign countries will be the best solution.

What happened in history has happened and cannot be changed. Most Germans now have had nothing to do with what happened to the Jewish People and the war. I have traveled and have met many German people, they are no different then any group of nationalities. There is always a few apples that spoil the rest in the barrel. People should not hold a grudge. I know you say, your family was not killed in the camps. But the Germans of today can not be responsible for what there father and fore fathers have done in the past. I think today’s German people are friendly and I enjoy there food and singing. We have to learn from the past and keep moving toward world peace for everybody.

I think the whole question is wrong because asking such a question you can foresee the answers. So I think this question is anything else but helpful. The answers are without any exception always the same and are ending at the very same point. So I never would ask such a question to foreigners. Already as a child Germans make the experience that we are hated by the rest of the world and that foreigners do not like us. Some foreigners are worse and very few are a ittle bit better. You can see, hear and feel it if you ever leave the country. But quite amazing to me it seems that millions of foreigners every year come to Germany, live in Germany and even work in Germany if we all are nothing but a nation of bastards and aasholes.

I just want to point bout that te official name used by the british army and the British government for Germans that is the word "pig". Pig is equivalent to German and in France they use in Government and Military the word "boches" which means the same as pig. Therefore in both countries the word pig is usual if you mean a German and in Poland they use the same word. In the German language there does not exist a word which would ever call a foreigner a pig as it is usual in most languages for Germans. In the German language we do not even have nicknames for foreigners of certain nations or foreigners in general. The German language does not even know any bad word about foreigners or special countries but it is quite interesting that even today the word pig is officially in use in many countries for Germans. I never called somebody else a pig.

I love Germany!! My view on the German people is that if we were to compare the British people as a whole, to any other people also as a whole - it would be the Germans. I see so many similiarities in German culture/perspectives/manners etc

You could probably see them ok if you were to fly across the country in a helicopter, I suppose..

I don't know. lol I'd love to visite Germany one day though. I imagine the country to be beautiful and the people to be like anyone else.

Thank you MissHoneyBee. You are quite confirming my experiences I made. I never say that I am German and I try to hide my nationality as much as possible when I am ina foreign country. It is always a feeling like a high wire act if you are offering that you are German.In America the reactions are usually moderate but they usually keep more distance as if youn would have an infectious disease. Finally you never know the reaction. And as far as I know the german accent seems to be the worst English speaking people can hear and they hear our accent even if you speak good and fluent after the first two words you say. In America usually you are not insulted or accused but they keep on cear distance to you. In Britain you can easily catch a thrashing. It is awful indeed but we can not change our origin and so we have to deal with it.

Like many countries, I see it as a complete dichotomy. Many wonderful Christian denominations are German or spent time in Germany, like Lutherans, Amish, Mennonites, Dunkards, Moravians, etc. However, they ended up in the U.S. and elsewhere precisely because Germany was not tolerant of their beliefs. Long before the Jews were persecuted in Germany, non-Catholic Christians were persecuted there. It never reached the chilling efficiency of Hitler's Germany, but they were marginalized to the sides of the Alps where they had to become superior farmers or starve to death. That is why the Amish and Mennonites are such fantastic farmers. This is fairly personal to me, as my family were among those who escaped Germany for religious freedom. But it is a weird dichotomy, as my family is also German, and Germany is also our Fatherland. My family spoke German until WWI, when it became dangerous to do so and the language totally died out in two generations. My grandparents learned it as a first language and learned English in school. They also learned to read and write in German. My mother could understand it, but not speak it. I can't even understand more than a half dozen words. I would love to see Germany, but I feel it would be a bittersweet thing. I'd love to see where my family came from. One branch from the Alsace, one from Hamburg, a third I'm not sure. The fourth totally Irish. Like most Americans, I'm a mutt. But the joy of seeing where my family came from would be tempered by the pain of what they suffered and the pain of WWII, in which most of my male relatives of that generation fought, several against their own distant relatives. I don't think I could bear to see Auschwitz. As for the German people, they are like any other people: some are good, some are bad. Like any other people, I would have to take each individual on his or her own merits. I would have to judge them by the content of their character.

I spent 20 months in Germany back in the '60's as a member of the U.S. military. I had the opportunity to see much of Germany during that time, and found it absolutely beautiful. Nothwithstanding my military status, which often draws contempt --mostly due to cetain behaviors related to alcohol abuse...even in military locales here in the States-- the German people were always very friendly to my military comrades and me. They were great. I liked Germany and its people so much that I've returned several times on vacation. +5

I live in Germany and I have a German wife. So I think I see them rather positively...

Beautiful countryside Friendly people and very polite Great cars and great roads Have a slightly different sense of humour from the British Well educated

i don't,have only been there once

I love Germany but Germans can be a bit strange at times. I am German, so I guess I can admit to that. I particularly wonder about the state of Angst that everybody seems to be in all the time. Germans can have fun worrying. I don't get it.

I love Germany and hope to go there someday. And despite never being there, I have met Germans, and they have all been absolutely wonderful. And I became very close to one of them, and she probably would've become one of my best friends had she stayed in America longer.

I went to highschool in Germany...beautiful country. My opinion of the German people, intelligent, serious and have a love of their country...

Aggressive and assertive - great, delicious food (especially breakfast!) Many Americans may feel Germans are rude or uncaring but they're not. They're just different. I love Germany, I grew up there. Good times... beautiful castles and greenery... the slopes...