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Welcome to Germany!
Home of 2 of my penpals,
Tinka and Katrin!
| Germany covers an area of about 357 050 square km, or 137,852 square miles. Germany is divided into 10 regions, or states, which are: Schleswig-Holstein, with Kiel as it's capital (Tinka lives near Kiel;) Lower Saxony, with Hanover as it's capital; North Rhine-Westphalia, with Dusseldorf; Hesse with Wesbaden; Rhineland-Palatinate, with Mainz; Saarland with Saarbrucken; Baden-Wurttemberg, with Stuttgart; Bavaria, with Munich, and the states of Hamburg and Bremen. Frankonia is like a sub state of Bavaria, and Katrin lives in Frankonia. Berlin, the capital city, is an artistic and cultural centre, it also has the largest Turkish population of any cty outside Turkey. Munich is a cultural and intellectual centre, it's the fashion capital of Germany and has a world renowned brewing centre. It is the home of the famous Oktoberfest! Frankfurt has been a banking centre since the 16th century, it is also a publishing centre, and holds an international book fair every October. Cologne was a major colony of the Roman Empire. Now it's a major rail junction and important inland port. Hamburg is built on the water with over 2,000 bridges over the Elbe river, Lake Alster, and many canals. Was once an important, prosperous port, but now struggles to compete with Rotterdam and the European Community tariff regulations. The northwest of Germany has west winds, cool summers, moderate winters, and a high annual rainfall. The northeast has freezing cold winters, since the area recieves the force of the Russian winds, with hots summers and fairly low rainfall. The Alpine region has warm, but short summers, and cold snowy winters. The Rhine rift valley has an early spring, light rainfall, warm summers and few frosts. It has a great climate for agriculture and tourism. Other immigrant communities aside from the Turkish, include Yugoslavs, Spaniardss, and Italians, with small numbers of Africans and Vietnamese. The Germans from the south are generally Catholic, while Germans from the north are mostly Protestant. The main groups of Protestants are Lutheran, Reformed, and United (a mixture of both.) There are also small numbers of other church groups, eg, the Salvation Army. There are large Jewish minorities, and Muslims (mainly the Turkish community.) German is spoken throughout Germany, Austria, and parts of Luxembourg, Switzerland, and the Netherlands. There are a few minority languages, and many former East Germans can speak Russian. Many Germans speak fluent English. The Germans don't have any national festivals, but each state and city has it's own festivals. Every year since October 12, 1810, there has been a beef restival held in Munich, known as the Oktoberfest. The festival lasts 16 days, ending on the first Sunday of October. The main attraction is the 13 massive beer tents where you can drink beer from huge quarter gallon glasses. After a few of these, there are side shows, a fun fair, and all sorts of stalls and performances to enjoy. (Info from the Cultures of the World series, Tinka and Katrin's letters, and off the top of my head!) |
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There are cute houses everywhere in Germany. | |
| Say "Tag" to Diddl. Diddl is all the rage in Germany at the moment. Everything is Diddl, socks, clocks, toys, stationary, t-shirts, you name it. Kind of cute isn't he? |  |
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 | This is a bit of the Berlin Wall, of which there is only about 1 km still standing. There is a sign up somewhere saying something to the effect of "It is prohibited to chip bits of the wall for a souvenir." |
| For a currency converter, go here To see pictures of this country's paper money, go to Ron Wise's Paper Money Homepage To see the language makeup of Germany go to the Ethnologue. For a page showing the holidays of Germany, look at the Global Calender |
Want to get in touch with me?
Email me at rosie_0801@yahoo.com
Say "Tchus" to Katrin and Tinka! "Tchus" to you too Diddl.
