Similar rules are followed for having lights on your bicycle at night, parking your car and taking your trash out on time.
Germans also have a very strong separation between their work and their private life. Whereas In the U.S.A, it is common to ‘talk shop’ with coworkers after work hours, or to discuss work issues. Germans like to leave those issues at the office (or school, or factory) and go home to a completely separate life at their home or apartment. Home is a private place in which to unwind and rest after a hard day’s work; and this rest should not be interrupted by emails or calls from the office.
Speaking of privacy, Americans often have difficulty making friends in Germany. This may be in part because Germans tend to be more reserved about their relationships and do not make friends as quickly as Americans do. We are used to meeting new people, spending time with them and quickly calling them our friends. Germans might work with someone or play soccer with them without calling that person their ‘friend.’ That person may just be a ‘Bekannter’ or ‘acquaintance’. This is not because Germans are unfriendly, but because they tend to prefer smaller groups of close friends over larger groups of more distant friends.
All of these differences can be quite jarring to newcomers when they first arrive in Germany. People who do not know what to expect might think that the German people are rude or unfriendly; but their behavior is simply a matter of cultural difference. A German coming to visit us might be excited when someone says, “You should come to my house for dinner sometime!” While in America this might be a real dinner invitation, people often say things like this in the U.S.A.
