As a Brazilian who has recently moved to Hamburg, I’m sure I’ll find many more cultural experiences like this. My husband and I were in the process of buying our white goods and I volunteered to stay at home while it was delivered. For that whole morning, I was practicing what I was going to say when the delivery man arrived. Suddenly, the doorbell rings and here he is. I opened the door and tried to be friendly just like every Brazilian and, with my very poor German, I started the conversation.
- Hello, is that the fridge?
In the best German style, the guy gave me a very short answer.
- What were you expecting? You didn’t have a fridge, so here it is now.
No hello. No nothing. Straight in. I felt embarrassed but thought to myself, “It’s okay, Germans are a little different”. So, he hoisted up the fridge and brought it through the door into the hallway – and that was it. I tried to complain but my German had unfortunately reached its limits. I did manage to understand that it would cost another €25 to carry the fridge a few more meters into the kitchen. This was just too much so I declined his offer and that was it.
The real annoying part was having this empty fridge staring at me until my husband came home.
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