What a Country!: A Love Letter to America

You welcomed me with open arms. You approached me, interested and friendly. You took me in for four months even though you had no idea who I was, what I could do or what I wanted. You didn’t care. You answered all of my questions, politely ignoring my weird accent and my mediocre English.

I only had to wait, indecisive, for a few moments on a street corner — someone who could show me the way always rushed to my side. I only had to stammer somewhat helplessly and friendly help came to me everywhere: in restaurants, at the post office, in hotels, at the barber, in offices, in the stores, at the gas stations and on the street.

You couldn’t know if I was important. My employer is not well-known here. But you didn’t care. Almost every door opened; I was allowed at least a few minutes of conversation with all the interesting, intelligent and successful people I had always wanted to meet. I could see the behind-the-scenes operations of all the firms that had always interested me the most.

Actions Speak Louder than Words

Not once did I sense the aggressive attitudes and bad tempers we are so used to in Germany. On the contrary, I was greeted everywhere with cool relaxedness and friendly self-assurance.

You didn’t really understand many of the stories I told of my home. Why is everything in Germany always so complicated? Why are the people so overcritical and severe — particularly with themselves? You live, work and think so differently from us. You don’t hold much with talking. You prefer to do something, without always being sure to know everything first. When something doesn’t work, you just start over and try something new.

Your friendliness is often seen as superficiality, especially by us Germans. I wish we had more of it. I like friendly surfaces. Maybe your friendliness comes simply from good upbringing. And behind all that pretty ritual speech lies many a clever head.

Don’t Judge a Person by Their Cover

It’s probably just the remains of British understatement. You can’t get very far with it in Berlin and the rest of Germany. There, loudness works well. But I get along better with your friendliness than with yelling and stern faces.

The strange man sitting next to me, reading and wearing colorful and well-worn sports clothes, turns out to be a professor of philosophy at Stanford. The CEO of a fairly large corporation arrives punctually for lunch at a very elegant restaurant, wearing an immaculate suit and extremely green tennis shoes.

The small, wiry, young Asian with a baseball cap is not an assistant but rather the manager of the store. No, you don’t find it necessary to clothe yourselves in the trappings of hierarchies. Here, everyone is simply who they are. I could wear my suits as well, without looking stupid among all the people in sports jackets.

Celebrate Success

The young people on your West Coast are busy programming a new world, one in which we are all going to live in the future. They are doing this intuitively and as a matter of course. Where are our problems, and how can we fix them? Every question must have an answer if you think about it long enough and if you are clever enough.

Impossible doesn’t exist here. Here, knowledge, technology and money have an almost magical connection. And you don’t care a bit what we think about it all — whether we have objections, concerns or thoughts. It’s going to happen, with or without us.

You celebrate success, rather than eyeing it suspiciously. Anyone can check the Internet to find out for how much and by whom the house across the street was sold. My neighbors drive two large Jeeps — his is black; she drives the white one. The two cars barely fit in the driveway. The neighbor on the other side has a small, blue electric car and a bicycle. They get along anyway. You demand exceptional achievements and originality, and reward them with large amounts of money.

Freedom Has a Price

In your restaurants, I have eaten the best food imaginable. Well, the best hamburgers. Your wines are adorable. Your seas, your mountains, your valleys, your cities, your deserts — these unbelievable landscapes, that we only know from the movies, exist only with you. Most of all the light — one has the constant feeling of being in a tastefully-lit film and of looking much better than one does in Germany.

Yes, on the street corners in your big cities there is plenty of misery. Anyone who doesn’t manage to keep up in your big game of money and achievement finds themselves on the street faster than they would in Germany. Behind your smiles, your happiness and the smooth sound of your language lies a measure of pitilessness. You are well-aware of the fact that your freedom, your beauty and your uniqueness come at a price. It must be fought for, and that can make you hard and unjust. But you know that. And as it appears, you are constantly capable of changing, growing and bettering yourself. I like that about you. Please don’t let us know-it-alls in old Europe throw you off your game. You’ll probably have to help us out of some kind of trouble in the end.