Just thinking about...Europe

Larry’s Lollygaggings
Volume 3, Number 1
10 September 2010

After my recent trip going overseas for the first time, I offer some advice that I wish I had before I left…

Larry’s European-American Dictionary (abridged version):

a. Shirt Size Large = Try on first
b. Refrigerator = Thing that makes food just cool enough for you to wish it was cold
c. Handicapped access = does not translate AT ALL
d. Water pressure = NEIN! Ve vill tell you how you vill shower!
e. Ladies’ fashion trend = Every woman always looks like a supermodel on her way to a photo shoot.
f. Men’s fashion trend = Every man always looks like a gay punker on his way to a bongfest poetry slam at the local hookah palace.
g. Old = Made before the USA even existed


h. Antique = Made before the years had 4 digits


i. Ancient = Anything in Italy


j. We don’t accept credit cards = We don’t accept credit cards
k. We do accept credit cards = We don’t accept YOUR credit cards
l. Here is your change, Mr. American = I just ripped you off and kept 3 dollars in coins.
m. Vegetable = Pommes Frites (French fries)
n. Ketchup = Mayonnaise
o. Personal transportation = bike
p. Group transportation = bikes
q. Mass transportation = lots of bikes


r. Wealthy-people’s transportation = scooter
s. Turkish is to Europeans as Mexican is to Americans
t. Automobile = 2-seat sub-compact car
u. Luxury automobile = the same 2-seat sub-compact car with 2 extra seats crammed in the back.
v. OSHA Safety Regulations = See c. (handicapped access)
w. US: Opened 24/7
x. EU: Opened 8/6
y. Italy: We may open sometime. I said maybe. Now go eat gelato.
z. Weird=eggs at breakfast
aa. Really strange=bacon at breakfast
bb. Unheard of=potatoes at breakfast
cc. Don’t even ever THINK about asking=white bread
dd. Bricks=bricks
ee. Aluminum siding=bricks
ff. Ground floor=Zero; Second floor=One; Basement=Negative One



European life lessons:

1. Ask your host or hostess which one is the body wash, which is the shampoo, which is the toothpaste, and which is the foot cream. For clarification; foot cream tastes a bit more sour than body wash tastes.

2. Bring your own ice cubes and air conditioning if you want some.

3. Figure out how to use the toilet before you use the toilet.

4. That is an umbrella holder, not a trash can.

5. Just because a coin looks like a penny doesn't mean it's not worth five dollars.

6. If you don't understand what the person said at the (lunch counter/grocery/bus stop/church/museum/brothel/proctologist), don't just say "yes".

7. All dogs wag their tails bilingually.

8. Knowing what size clipper your barber uses in the US doesn’t help in Germany. Needless to say, when I said a #2, she used a 2mm and now I look like a chemo patient.

9. I actually saw an elevator so small that it had a limit of one person and 150 pounds. Hello…could you imagine the stink those people in the electric scooters at Disney World would raise? Needless to say, I opted to send my suitcase up alone and meet it after I ran up the stairs which were so old I think Jesus built it while still in his first profession.

10. The good news…you CAN drive as fast as you want on The Autobahn. The bad news…the Polizei will give you a ticket for driving as fast as you want on The Autobahn. And staying in the left lane too long. And for honking your horn. And for flipping off another driver. Especially when he is an unmarked cop. And for flashing your brights at that unmarked cop so he gets out of the fast lane. More good news…the cops take cash.


11. In-sink trash disposals in Europe are as rare as a Jehovah Witness combination birthday party/blood transfusion-athon at a skinhead-sponsored support of racial and religious equality during a peace sit-in at The Providencetown, Mass Civic Center Gay Rights Room. And THAT’S rare!

12. Since they don’t have American Idol, Jersey Shore or Glee, (could you imagine the German version of Glee?!? What would they call it? Misery?) there is nothing for people to do here at night. They compensate with one of two activities. A) Hanging out of opened windows and watching everyone else or B) Hanging outside of bars, sloshed on Jagermeister shots and Heifewiesse Bier and watching everyone else. They don’t say hello. They don’t wave. They just stare. And it is considered rude to stare back. Hmmm. Something isn’t kosher here in Germany. Um. Forget I said that.

13. Everyone wears American clothing - Hollister! Hard Rock Café! Nebraska Surf Company! Oh, well. I guess what they don’t know won’t hurt them.

14. Germans listen to American music. Yes, seeing people rocking out to Neil Diamond, Barry Manilow, and Brittney Spears is comforting, but they have no idea what the words they are singing mean. Maybe it’s for the best that they don’t. Besides; how long can you listen to Nena, Falco, and The Scorpions, anyway?

15. There are no bumper stickers on cars here. None. Zip. Nada. Zilch. Nein. There is also no trash thrown around. I think the two are related. In America we think that saying something cute about saving the environment or visualizing world peace stuck on the back of our Hummer Humvee H1 tricked out with optional machine gun turret and bullet-proof Playstation 3 mounted on the hood will actually change things as you cruise the treacherous landscape of suburban Bethesda, Maryland. In Germany, they instead opt to actually clean up the parks and – SHOCKER – they wait until they are at a trash can before they get rid of trash!

16. McDonald’s has Lemon McChicken, McTeriyaki Steaks, Veggie McBurgers and McShrimp. Yes, McShrimp. It still McStinks, but it sure is McExotic!

17. Germans put mayonnaise on everything! Now, I love mayo. I spent many of my finest memories from my formidable (re: weight challenged) years slathering the stuff on all kinds of food. Even French fries here are served with a dollop of creamy egg and oil goodness right there – gloop – on top. Kinda yummy! However; I never would have in my wildest imagination thought that I would turn down mayo like it was miracle whip until I saw my Hun friends spooning it onto pizza. Pizza is sacred and that is where I draw the line. I guess Andrew Zimmern should not fear me replacing him on his Bizarre Foods show.



18. I think they have a helmet law in Europe for bikes and motorcycles – a law that no one is allowed to wear one! I never ever saw even one being used NOR sold in any bike shop. Maybe it is all for the best anyway. There is nothing that dims a proper gentleman’s fantasy quicker than a gorgeous, exotic European woman in a magnificent form-fitting dress with a slit three-quarters up her legs and 3-inch stilettos riding her bike WITH A HELMET ON!

19. Speaking of bikes, here is my absolute favorite thing in all of Europe! They have corrals all over cities called, oddly enough, City Bikes. You put a credit card and cell phone number into a machine near the bikes and a code is texted (is that a word?) to you. You enter it on the bike keypad and take the bike for your ride to wherever. When you get wherever, you relock the bike in the nearest rack and tell the machine where the bike is. It gives you a lock code and charges your card 6 cents per minute! **In best Billy Mays voice**Sounds great? There’s more! If you have it less than 30 minutes…IT IS FREE!!! **In best Ron Popeil voice** That’s right! Free travel. Help the environment. No cost. No parking. No traffic. No overcrowded gridlock. No honking and cursing. Just smiling people happily peddling away. Ahhhh.


20. People back home have been asking me if the subject of me being Jewish and Germany being the place Hitler and company called home came up during conversation at all. Yes. It did. And I must say that every time it did, whoever I was speaking with was mortified, embarrassed, and appalled that this horrible atrocity went on. There are few German flags hanging around and German Patriotism is an oxymoron. I received apologies from 20-year old Germans who obviously had nothing to do with the choices of their countrymen and women 70 odd years ago. Today’s Germany is filled with memorials, museums and the like honoring the victims of those dark days. There is an especially magnificent Jewish Museum in Berlin complete with a Chinese Restaurant next door. How apropos that even our religion’s collective favorite take out food is both well-represented and nearby. I can hear it now. “Hello, this is Chayim Abromowitz over at the Jewseum. Can we please have the house special Lo Mein and an order of Kosher Crab Rangoon delivered?” “Total 14.63 Euro. Ten minute”. I guess some things are the same worldwide.

21. Now, East Germany is different. Even though the Berlin Wall and Communism both fell down in 1989, it is still a beat-up, run-down, dirty mess. I was detained in East Germany by the Graffiti Stazi for NOT defacing enough buildings. East Germans smile as often as my kids proactively clean their bedrooms.

22. I don’t know why Hamburg’s red light district has that name. No one there has the red light about anything at any time. And fifty Euro for 30 minutes is a great…nevermind.


23. Even Europeans don’t know that people from Holland are called Dutch. The Dutch really need to start a war and get noticed. Maybe with the Danish.

24. In Europe footwear is strange. OK. It’s different (my American puritanical hypocrisy is showing). If you wear athletic shoes anywhere except when you are doing athletics, you stand out like Lady Gaga wearing her machine gun bra on the wrong side of the male/female divider at a Hassidic Jewish Bar Mitzvah. They Europeans wear sandals with black socks. I guess they look OK with their pin-striped Capri pants (that’s the men!) So next time you see someone in Cincinnati dressed like this, say Guten Tag/Bonjour/Ciao or something like that. They also have shoehorns everywhere! I haven’t seen a shoehorn since the Nixon Administration. But in Europe they are in every dressing room, closet, bathroom. There were almost as many shoehorns as Starbucks! And that’s saying something! Another interesting customary tidbit…I remember as a kid when my friend Paul’s mother would make us take our shoes off when we came in and we had to walk around in our socks. Overseas, they do that also. But they also have a rack with ‘loaner slippers’ by the door in all sizes so you can be comfortable while you do not dirty up the floors. It’s kinda like getting the bowling shoes at the alley. I always want to leave my old sneakers and keep the rentals but never did. Needless to say, there are three houses in Germany and one in Denmark that are wondering both where the cool felt jobbies are and why there are size 14 clodhoppers in the mudroom.



25. The hooka pipes and headshop per capita ratio over there is amazing! I think they issue a pipe at birth in the hospital before nursing is allowed to commence. You can’t shake an occupied Polish orphan around here without hitting three headshop owners.

26. There are common balconies in apartments and hotels. Everyone shares. Nobody bothers each other. Nobody crosses the imaginary boundary into someone else’s area. There is a level of respect that me and my fellow New Yorkers only refer to as ‘Fantasyland’. Beautiful. Just beautiful.

27. Computer keyboards are very different from one country to another. So look down and be careful before you hit ‘send’. That way you don’t mistakenly buy a plane ticket to Milan when you meant to have a pizza delivered. Oh, well. Milan was nice even if I was hungry.

28. If you are feeling old, I have a solution. Go to Europe and try to use a payphone. You will feel like a 6 year-old again! Firstly, I had no idea which coins were which. Secondly, it wouldn’t have mattered because there was no notice of how much it is to make a call. Thirdly, I STILL have no idea what the tones are for. Was that a dial tone? Is it ringing or is it busy? Oh, I can always call the operator – IF THEY HAD ONE THAT SPOKE ENGLISH! I know, I know. I’m in Germany. They shouldn’t have to speak English. OK. I get that. But the why do all English messages offer “para espanol, marke estrella y dos”? Just sayin’.

29. There are only down escalators. No up ones. Yep. Just downscalators. No upscalators. For up they have things called stairs. And the downscalators ones are usually not moving. They have sensors that start up the escalator when you get close. I thought every one in the country was broken for my first three days there. At least I have nice calves now.

30. There are group train tickets. For 30 Euro, we bought a ticket that entitled five people to ride the train where one person cost 16 Euro. Now you don’t have to be a genius to know that that is a better deal. But – get this one – we then invited three others to join us on our ticket before they bought theirs at the ticket machine. By paying us 10 Euro each, they saved 6 Euro and we paid for the ticket! Then…when you arrive, you can use it again and again all day! Making money each time. And when you are done, you can sell it to someone else and get a last 30 Euro back! Sounds like a fulltime job making hundreds every day for riding the train for someone!

31. I also learned about ridesharing and couchsurfing. This is where you can travel in someone’s car for a share of the gas (or just to keep them company) and stay on someone’s couch for free (just to be nice). Really! We stayed all over and never paid a cent. We had people offering us beer when we arrived and made us breakfast before we left. They told us where to go, what to do, how to tour…it was amazing! I can’t wait for all these new friends we made to come to the US and I can return the favor. I gave ever person my home address. 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Washington, DC. I hope they come.

32. Construction workers wear normal clothes. You can’t distinguish if the guy tearing up the road with a giant pickaxe is a government employee or a frustrated lunatic aggressor recently paroled from his DWI (Driving WITHOUT Intoxication) conviction. (They drink a lot here). No hard hats. No fluorescent pinnie vests. No gloves. Just those pin-striped capri pants and a t-shirt. Oh, yeah. And sandals with black socks.

33. There are no painted markings for where to park in the street. They use different types and patterns of cobblestones to delineate that. I was so confused that I got a headache just typing that! Anyway, someone at Rent-Un-Vagon is in for a parking ticket surprise right about now.

34. There is no tipping. Unless some service is spectacularly exceptional, you don’t tip. I know. I sound like Mr. Pink from Reservoir Dogs but it is true. It wasn’t until the third day that I found this out. It was after I got curious as to why the wait staff at The Sauerbraten Haus gave me a standing ovation and wanted a photo with me that I asked. I thought they just figured I was Tom Hanks.


35. On the flip side, in Italy, where everything is different, they charge for everything. I mean everything. Go ahead. Try and get a pack of ketchup at the sausage cart. Twenty cents. A refill on a soda? Ha! That is called another soda – full price. And I double dog dare you to ask for linguine instead of spaghetti with your dinner. As soon as your order deviates from the menu, you are in for it to the tune of a small fortune. There is even an extra charge for asking if there is an extra charge. I should have known what I was in for when, as an appetizer, our waiter, Giovanni, rolled an ATM machine next to the table.

36. The menus in eateries describe the meal EXACTLY. Like schweinehostenfeffelbruggervessel. That means something like ‘roasted left rear rump shank of loin of pig raised in the east and fed cornmeal on Wednesdays by the left-handed farmer’s oldest son’. I like the US way of ‘breaded pork chop’.

37. Security people at the airport check anything that uses power. Anything. They take it out, put it in an x-ray machine, ask you what it is for, show it to their friends, try it out, and then only let it pass after rendering it inoperable with 40 yards of bubble wrap and duct tape. At least I now have a basement full of bubble wrap! Seriously…who doesn’t love playing with that stuff?!?

38. I was amazed at the beauty and grace of the women in Milan. If you are a leg man, stay away or get whiplash. Every leg there is perfect. And I know why. There are no toilets there. Yes, you read that right. They have only arm railings, two painted places to put your feet and a hole. You suspend and aim. Hey – you’d have great legs also if you had to do that! It also explains why the women are so thin. They don’t eat for fear of having to use the restroom a lot.

39. By law, everyone must have certain emergency equipment in their car and pull over to help if they see someone in need of help. You can be arrested for not doing so. Included in the equipment is a bright orange vest that the accident victim must wear until the police leave. It is a kind of vest-of-shame so all rubbernecking people can snicker at who is the moron that clipped a truck at 230km/hr.

40. When a plane lands, the entire group of passengers bursts into rousing applause. I still am unsure if they are thanking the pilot for a great landing or The Lord for allowing them to live.

41. If the bus driver selects a radio station that is not the first choice of the riders, they boo him or her. Yes, boo. They sneer and snicker and hiss until he puts it back on Mariah Carey.

In closing, I had a magnificent time overseas and suggest that if you haven’t yet gone, pack up your black socks and sandals and get over there!