You are still a nation of Basil Fawltys who mock us - say Germans
14th May 2007
Daily Mail
Don't mention the war!: John Cleese as German-hating Basil Fawlty, doing goose-steps when a group of Germans arrives at his hotel, in the hilarious "The Germans" episode of "Fawlty Towers"
Whatever you do, don’t mention the War - the Germans think we (the British) are obsessed with it.
They also think we are infatuated with money and are a nation of drunks who spend our lives trying to drink as much beer as we can in the shortest possible time.
This latest salvo in the long history of somewhat rocky relations between the two nations comes from Der Spiegel, Germany’s leading news magazine.
The tirade says that Britons will always refer to Germans as “the Huns” because we prefer dwelling on the “evil past” instead of the democratic modern Germany.
“The Huns, that’s who we are, and a dislike of us is a folkloric pleasure that belongs to the UK, like driving on the left or the opinion that Victoria Beckham is a classy lady,” writes Spiegel in its latest issue.
“They drink large amounts of beer in a short space of time and go for walks in the winter without socks. In the age before Osama bin Laden the Huns were always the favourite enemy No1.”
Bemoaning the habit of portraying Nazis as the villains in computer games and on TV, the magazine says that wartime hostility evolved into a feeling of envy among Britain’s postwar generation at the German economic miracle.
“The Hun, so the cliché goes, travels with his Mercedes to Spain where he stays in the best hotels and steals the deckchairs on the beach. Frustrated Britons, who lost their industrial ability to compete after the loss of their Empire, say: ‘Who won the bloody war anyway?’”
The result is that one stereotype - that of the merciless SS man - has been replaced by the “humourless engineer” as Britons buy Miele washing machines, Porsches, Mercedes and BMWs, says the magazine.
But it goes on: “The anger changed to schadenfreude when the Teutonic economic machine during the Nineties stuttered and Great Britain, thanks to Thatcher’s and Blair’s reforms, began to force through globalisation.”
As Britain rejoiced at the new sick man of Europe, said Der Spiegel, it also began to “show off ” its new wealth.
“British life looks today like one big cosmetic surgical procedure: ‘Look better, live better, cook better’ as trumpeted in endless TV programmes.”
Not mentioned is that Spiegel regularly prints articles about the Nazis because they are still of enormous interest in Germany and boost sales.
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FAWLTY TOWERS - "THE GERMANS"
"The Germans" has been voted the best ever episode of "Fawlty Towers." A group of Germans arrives at the hotel, and no matter what Basil does he cannot stop accidentally mentioning the War, to the point where even simple sentences - such as the ordering of a meal - causes him to mention it unintentionally:
Basil feigns sleep until everyone leaves and then escapes from the hospital, arriving back at the hotel just in time to meet the German guests they have been expecting. The most famous section of all the 12 episodes takes up the last 10 minutes of this one.
Basil can't speak a word of German, and when they tell him, "Wir wollen ein Auto mieten" ("We want to hire a car"), he thinks that they're "volunteering to go out to get some meat". He responds with "not necessary, vee haff meat here in zee building!" He also uses charades to take another group of Germans through to the restaurant, to which the Germans reply in perfect English, "Can we help you?".
Basil is shocked and taken aback by the fact they speak English. He warns everyone "Don't mention the war".
However Basil (who, for a change, is actually concussed rather than simply rude) manages to make reference to the war in every sentence he speaks to them. He does an impression of Hitler (despite Polly's desperate attempts to have him do Jimmy Cagney instead)- "I'll do the funny walk" - and proceeds to goose-step across into the lobby and back, still wearing a bandage on his head.
When told by one of the Germans that he isn't funny and is upsetting one of their party, Basil responds with "Not funny? I'm trying to cheer her up, you stupid Kraut!". Basil takes their meal order as "two egg mayonnaise, a prawn Goebbels, a Hermann Goering and four Colditz salads".
One of the furious guests asks: "Will you stop mentioning the War?"
"You started it" replies Fawlty.
"We did not start it!"
"Yes you did, you invaded Poland!"
The episode ends when Basil is knocked out by the moose which is finally hung up on the wall, fleeing the doctor who has arrived to sedate him.
The German group after seeing this said, "However did they win?" This episode is quite popular in Germany.
dailymail.co.uk
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Bloody Germans. I think we have a right to still be suspicious of you.
14th May 2007
Daily Mail
Don't mention the war!: John Cleese as German-hating Basil Fawlty, doing goose-steps when a group of Germans arrives at his hotel, in the hilarious "The Germans" episode of "Fawlty Towers"
Whatever you do, don’t mention the War - the Germans think we (the British) are obsessed with it.
They also think we are infatuated with money and are a nation of drunks who spend our lives trying to drink as much beer as we can in the shortest possible time.
This latest salvo in the long history of somewhat rocky relations between the two nations comes from Der Spiegel, Germany’s leading news magazine.
The tirade says that Britons will always refer to Germans as “the Huns” because we prefer dwelling on the “evil past” instead of the democratic modern Germany.
“The Huns, that’s who we are, and a dislike of us is a folkloric pleasure that belongs to the UK, like driving on the left or the opinion that Victoria Beckham is a classy lady,” writes Spiegel in its latest issue.
“They drink large amounts of beer in a short space of time and go for walks in the winter without socks. In the age before Osama bin Laden the Huns were always the favourite enemy No1.”
Bemoaning the habit of portraying Nazis as the villains in computer games and on TV, the magazine says that wartime hostility evolved into a feeling of envy among Britain’s postwar generation at the German economic miracle.
“The Hun, so the cliché goes, travels with his Mercedes to Spain where he stays in the best hotels and steals the deckchairs on the beach. Frustrated Britons, who lost their industrial ability to compete after the loss of their Empire, say: ‘Who won the bloody war anyway?’”
The result is that one stereotype - that of the merciless SS man - has been replaced by the “humourless engineer” as Britons buy Miele washing machines, Porsches, Mercedes and BMWs, says the magazine.
But it goes on: “The anger changed to schadenfreude when the Teutonic economic machine during the Nineties stuttered and Great Britain, thanks to Thatcher’s and Blair’s reforms, began to force through globalisation.”
As Britain rejoiced at the new sick man of Europe, said Der Spiegel, it also began to “show off ” its new wealth.
“British life looks today like one big cosmetic surgical procedure: ‘Look better, live better, cook better’ as trumpeted in endless TV programmes.”
Not mentioned is that Spiegel regularly prints articles about the Nazis because they are still of enormous interest in Germany and boost sales.
***********************
FAWLTY TOWERS - "THE GERMANS"
"The Germans" has been voted the best ever episode of "Fawlty Towers." A group of Germans arrives at the hotel, and no matter what Basil does he cannot stop accidentally mentioning the War, to the point where even simple sentences - such as the ordering of a meal - causes him to mention it unintentionally:
Basil feigns sleep until everyone leaves and then escapes from the hospital, arriving back at the hotel just in time to meet the German guests they have been expecting. The most famous section of all the 12 episodes takes up the last 10 minutes of this one.
Basil can't speak a word of German, and when they tell him, "Wir wollen ein Auto mieten" ("We want to hire a car"), he thinks that they're "volunteering to go out to get some meat". He responds with "not necessary, vee haff meat here in zee building!" He also uses charades to take another group of Germans through to the restaurant, to which the Germans reply in perfect English, "Can we help you?".
Basil is shocked and taken aback by the fact they speak English. He warns everyone "Don't mention the war".
However Basil (who, for a change, is actually concussed rather than simply rude) manages to make reference to the war in every sentence he speaks to them. He does an impression of Hitler (despite Polly's desperate attempts to have him do Jimmy Cagney instead)- "I'll do the funny walk" - and proceeds to goose-step across into the lobby and back, still wearing a bandage on his head.
When told by one of the Germans that he isn't funny and is upsetting one of their party, Basil responds with "Not funny? I'm trying to cheer her up, you stupid Kraut!". Basil takes their meal order as "two egg mayonnaise, a prawn Goebbels, a Hermann Goering and four Colditz salads".
One of the furious guests asks: "Will you stop mentioning the War?"
"You started it" replies Fawlty.
"We did not start it!"
"Yes you did, you invaded Poland!"
The episode ends when Basil is knocked out by the moose which is finally hung up on the wall, fleeing the doctor who has arrived to sedate him.
The German group after seeing this said, "However did they win?" This episode is quite popular in Germany.
dailymail.co.uk
------------
Bloody Germans. I think we have a right to still be suspicious of you.
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