4+1 Fun Facts About Germany
1. Education is free. Including college. But, all things must come to an end, and some German universities began charging course fees in 2005, which would not surpass 1,000 euros (1,474.06 dollars) per year. Sounds like chump change to us, but some 10,000 students in five cities protested the new fees anyway.
2. Prostitution is legal. And widespread, and it’s taxed. However, every city has the right to zone off certain areas where prostitution is not allowed, which could include virtually the entire city (Munich). I’m not sure what to think about this.
3. Anti-smoking bans were just implemented on January 1. They bar smoking in bars, restaurants and cafes. This is in a country where a third of the population smokes, compared to the U.S., where 20 percent of people smoke. Not surprisingly, there has been and will be a lot of opposition to this law. Personally, I’m rooting for it; I couldn’t even stand waiting in front of the DMV Friday for my mom to pick me up. It seemed that every time one smoker left, another one appeared. Yuck!
4. Germans are two inches taller than Americans on average. Not good for a 5’4” Vietnamese girl, though it does create the interesting possibility of taking a picture of me with a bunch of tall white guys titled “Sarah’s Harem” (credit to Tiffany Chen).
|
|
Male |
Female |
Age |
|
Germany |
5 ft 11 in |
5 ft 6 in |
18-19 |
|
United States |
5 ft 9.2 in |
5 ft 3.77 in |
20+ |
+1. 1 out of 1,000 citizens are Vietnamese. I wasn’t able to find the percentage of Asian citizens in general, but I think it would be safe to say around 1 out of 900. Thus, a school the size of Lynbrook (about 1,800 students) would have a grand total of two Asians.
Sources:
http://www.radio-d.com/dw/article/0,2144,1604308,00.html
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,23002336-663,00.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Germany
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_height
http://www.inwat.org/eurfactsheetgerman.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overseas_Vietnamese
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/print/gm.html
http://www.lungusa.org/site/pp.asp?c=dvLUK9O0E&b=39868
http://www.americanheart.org/presenter.jhtml?identifier=4559
