Visiting Germany, but no idea what to do…?

…here are some suggestions 😉

So it’s this time of the year again, and no, I’m not talking about christmas, I’m talking about the summer and especially vacation.

So I thought I could do a ‘what to do in Germany’ post, if the title hasn’t already clued you in.

Please note: this is what I would want to know if I would want to visit Germany, I’m in no way a traveling agent or an event planner.
I wouldn’t do everything in just one trips. These are just some recommendations.
Also we don’t have any special behavior rules I’m aware of. Just be your nice, normal self ;D

I’m going to skip the basics like “Ask the place where you’re staying if you should bring bed-linen”.

First off some basic knowledge

1. If you are looking for an exit out of a building or parking garage or whatsoever, look for the word ‘Ausgang‘, sometimes you can find ‘exit’ instead 😉
2. In need of free Wi-Fi? Look for the words ‘freies W-Lan‘ (in some cases it can be ‘freies Wi-Fi’ as well). McDonald’s and Starbucks are a great source of free Wi-Fi. McDonald’s offers you one hour for free and Starbucks gives you unlimited access (I’ve once been at a Starbucks for 6 hours).
3. Need to call the police: 110
   Need to call an ambulance or the fire department: 112
   (just noticed what my priorities are, Wi-Fi over police and ambulance. Nice job, Emalie, nice job…)
4. We do not have the AM and PM system for time (I don’t know if this is common knowledge). We count to 24. So for example 7 am is 7 and 7 pm is 19 on our digital clocks.

Do:

• do get your money changed if you don’t have EUROS (€). You won’t get far if you don’t have euros. Just saying.
• do ask us Germans when you are lost and in need for directions. Most of us had at least 6 or more years of English in school. Doesn’t mean that we can help you or still speak english, but we can try. Just speak slow and clear and please, don’t correct us if we make a mistake. If you do it, it will likely cause us to act like we are unable to speak english the next time someone speaks in english to us.
• (Did you know that you don’t need a constant internet connection to use Google Maps navigation? You only need it to look up a route and if you want to use an alternative route, otherwise all you need is active GPS. So look a route up at a free wifi spot)
• do go sight seeing, I know, pretty cliche, but we have lots and lots of cool stuff.
• do take your camera with you and make lots and lots of pictures, so you can make your friends and family envy you once your back home.
• do try german candy, like Haribo, Milka [edit: Its origin lies in Switzerland; try Ritter Sport instead, that’s really German ;)], Funny Frisch.
• do try a ‘Bratwurst‘ … Is this one even german? Or am I making it german right now? LOL.
• do go shopping, but restricted yourself, you don’t want to pay the extra tax when you get home.
• do carry some change money with you. You never know when you could need it.
• do use your VISA or MasterCard, since most of the shops in Germany accept it.
• do visit a theme park if you have the time. (I personally love theme parks, so I would totally do that)
• do asked your german friends on Twitter/Facebook/… if they can help you find out what you could visit.
• do stuff your phone or music player full of music or audio books.
• do open up an instagram account (if you don’t already have one) and share your pictures with the world 😉
• book lovers: if you’re considering getting yourself german copies of your favourite books, look up the german name(s) before your flight (ask for help from us germans, if needed). It’s not in store? They can normally get it delivered to the store in less then 24 hours. Bigger local book stores are called Mayersche, Thalia, Huggendubbel, but we have a lot of indie book shops, too.
• (one thing I’m not sure about but do you, not European, buy a visa for just Germany or the whole EU? If it’s the second and you are close enough to the borders, and you have a car, make a trip to one of our neighbor countries. We don’t have Passport/ID controls at our borders ;))

Don’t:

• don’t use a cap, they are really expensive down here. If you’re rich, fine, your money, but if you’re kind of broke like me take the local train and bus system instead. It might take you a little bit longer, but you will still have a lot of your money left.
• don’t buy DVDs or games if you’re not living in the EU. We have region 2 coded DVDs and games which won’t worked back home if you don’t have the right player. (I had to learn that the hard way)
• don’t drink yourself into a coma, just cause you can get beer with 16 and everything else with 18. (I should have probably just not mentioned this point)
• don’t have your phone and wallet in the back pocket of your jeans. Way to make it easy for thieves. (this mostly applies for big and crowded cities)
• don’t loose your ID and passport(!!!), otherwise you could be stuck here for some more days (which might sound nice at first, but it’s not), till someone back home finds your birth certificate. Then it needs to get processed and so on… Just don’t loose it, ok?

And this is all I can think of right now. I hope this post was in any way helpful and makes your vacation in Germany a little bit easier. Do you have any questions? Or any suggestions that I should add to the list?