What comes into your mind when you think about the USA? An association game. (President) Bush, Microsoft, English, Everywhere, Mixed Ethnicities was my answer. The other members of the class made also notes about their imaginations. The same we did for France (Baguette, blue-white-striped shirts, black moustache [this was indeed a picture which I have seen somewhere and which suddenly came into my mind!], (President) Chirac, Nuclear Tests, Vine Farmers, Cheese [foot in general]) and Germany (Wurst, Bright People [from the outside at least], Airport, Life, Order, Better Climate, Culture: Literature, Classical Music, Love Parade). We compared the answers of the course members and it was quite significant that the first notes of the participants to each country) except for Germany) were almost the same. For America the President played a big role, for France it was more the food. When it came to the question which country was easier to describe, it turned out tobe the most far away country USA (from us here in Germany), followed by the neighbour France. The home-country Germany turned out to be the most difficult to find stereotypes. And therefore the answers were pretty specific while in the USA-description everything was more general.

Another result was that the USA got a pretty negative stereotyped assessment. Foreign Politics (Iraq) and global market domination played in my eyes a big role. But Germany was assessed even worse in general. My ideas were more positive but the thoughts of others included for example Unemployment, which is a big issue here. We have two students from foreign countries in the course. The girl from China - although she is living here - thought as stereotype of Germany of Hitler which surprised me a lot although I have encountered it often that foreign people in foreign countries associate Germany with Hitler. I suppose this sympathizing with Germanys past regime occurs especially incountries with a strong leader. I once had an experience in Egypt on a vegetable market. The people there were really friendly and lots of them wanted to talk with us (although the language was a barrier). Asked where we come from we answered Germany and were friendly greeted with Hitler, Hitler!which made us shiver because actually in the national and international context it is something embarrassing and nothing to be proud of. But those guys meant it friendly and probably because of missing education expressed their pride on Germanys ex-dictatorship. But speaking about friendly, the girl from Armenia mentioned the unfriendliness of German people. I dont know if I share this opinion. Indeed Germans look unfriendly. But as US researchers have found out it is because of the German language. Due to the pronunciation of German people have always their mouths bent down (so opposite to when you are smiling). But when as a foreigner you dont talk to old women in the tram, you can find a lot of friendly and funny people here. [Bus drivers are in fact a special crowd: I go every day by bus and since they never greet me when I greet them, I had to improve my pronunciation into a loud and clear GUTEN TACH!]

But back to the course: Was it already difficult to describe the auto-stereotypes of Germany, it should become even harder to describe what actually means being German. I have thought about it earlier how to distinct us from other cultures. Yes, I think this is what you dowhen you prepare intercultural evenings in exchange programs. So forme being German is belonging to an association (or more), having lots of art (and artists) but it also means complaining although we dont have to. The biggest agreement in the course was the language which distinct us from others.

But the most exciting thing of the course still had to follow. The members were divided into groups of three (or sometimes four like in my group). We got a drawing showing a bench. At one end there were two people sitting, shivering with crossed legs and making themselves very small. At the other side there was black person sitting, turning into their direction and saying something (the mouth was drawn open?). Each group should interpret the situation, what do we see in the picture, and finally turn it into a small play which shall be acted in front of the class. In my group we discussed relatively long how the situation shall be. I thought the sense in the picture should be to interpret it as racial discrimination that the two white people move to the very end of the bench whenthey see the black guy sitting down. Finally the other three members convinced me that the white couple is not scared by the blacks skin colour but only because he behaves strange. Okay, so we invented the situation. The black guy comes out of the foreigners department angrily because he was not accepted to live in Germany. Because he or she makes such a noise the others are scared and move to the other end of the bench.

Almost in the same moment we had come to an agreement, Mrs Müller called our group to be the first one which performs. So we went to the middle. I could play the angry black man or woman. Afterward we saw some interpretations of the others who did it similar to my suggestion and put racial bias in the foreground.
I liked the scenes a lot. They were really funny and well acted sometimes. And to be honest, I am looking forward to the next acting exercises.

But the lesson had finished and we got some homework. How can the situation on the bench be interpreted completely different? I thought that maybe the white couple - they were only slightly dressed - could have made a trip to Mallorca or some other holiday paradise. They thought it would be always warm there and didnt take enough clothes with them. So they went to the beach but it is so cold that they are shivering. Another guest - the black guy - sees them and offers some clothes to them (in the picture he wore a jacket).
Another possibility could be that the white couple, they are very clean, were desperately looking for somewhere tosit down. They want to wait for an appointment with the black guy. They see the bench with a forth person sitting on it who is spilling all the coke over one half of it and the bench becomes terribly sticky. But because there is no other bench they take the clean corner to sit down. The forth person leaves. The black guy doesnt know about the cola there and takes a seat and wants to greet the white couple. But the white couple who knows about the previous accident there shivers of disgust that he took that place in the dried but sticky cola.

Well...stereotypes. We always expect things which probably mostly occur (or else we wouldnt have them) but in exceptional cases when they do not occur surprise us a lot. We sometimes insist on our ways of thinking, our patterns and previous experiences that when something new happens we wouldnt understand the world anymore. We can try to prepare ourselves for new situations but I wonder if successfully. The word unexpected actually already says that they are not expected and therefore impossible to prepare for. The only thing to learn is how to cope with unexpected things, how to react, how to avoid embarrassment but see it as a new aspect which enriches our view of the world.