Goodbye England, hello Munich!

Hi there, Just signed in to tt germany to meet some new people as my deutsche fiance and i have decided to leave England and move to munich in august. I have visited Munich about six times over the last two years and had three weeks last year for the weltmeisterschaft and loved it everytime. Many reasons for leaving England though i love it so, the lifestyle in Munich and Bavaria is fantastic. Swimming and bbq's at the lakes in summer, snowboarding at weekends in the winter, loads of bars, restaurants and biergartens for warm evenings out, historic yet modern and open minded. I have visited other citys in germany but Munich i felt by far had the best vibe ,lifestyle and culture. Has anyone else done a similar thing? Would like to hear other peoples opinions. Hope to meet some cool people once we get there!! Im even buying erdinger beer, even though it costs about four times as much, it makes other beers look like my grandads bathtub home brew! Prost!

Er, yes, all of us!

Welcome to Munich.

yeah i guess that was a stupid question wasn't it, thankyou.

Consider that your first sarcastic kick in the slats from us all at TT. Plenty more of these good times to follow.

p.s. We know Munich is pretty cool with great sports, beers, weather etc etc. But you will soon learn the general idea here is to bitch and moan as much as possible.

Yeah, wait until you've tried the supermarkets a few times...

always nice to see the progression on TT of an individual poster from innocent, joyful and expectant first post sprinkled with German words to bitter and twisted moaning expat complaining about the rotten veg and lack of sky TV

Have a good time, I'm sure you'll love it

one serious point - be aware that relationship dynamics can change from you being the local person who kind of knows what is going on to her being the one more au fait with how to handle things and you possibly being frustrated with not being able to communicate. On the other hand - there are lots of positive things too about moving to a new country

TT. We tell it like it is. With a German Fiance make sure you bookmark this link for quick reference:

Getting divorced under German law

@JE

Such enthusiasm, its fresh air over here in between all the moaning , welcome to Munich ian and am sure you will have a good time. As with others you might turn cynical later but still not want to move back!

Boys, let it last for a few days, makes me remember me early days in the city

Aye let him enjoy it until the cow at the supermarket or the DIY shop barks at him. (our local Baumarkt (DIY shop) may be the shittiest shop on earth)

Erdinger? Ah yes enjoy the mass produced taste of this beer till you find tastier smaller breweries like Maxl Rainer beer for example.

Make sure your mother in law doesnt make you clean the floor of the family weekend place the first week you are here.

True it doesnt rain as much as in the UK, the weather isnt as crap.

And women often lie naked in the sun here.

Regretfully that also includes the 80 year old ones with skin like prunes, legs hairy enough to scare a tarantula, and have something resembling road kill hanging between their thighs.

But let's not burst that bubble of enthusiasm too early huh.

JE I am more worried about the poor chaps taste for Erdinger.

Did my ex-wife move to Munich???

That has NEVER happened to me in 22+ years... Clearly there are drawbacks to living South of the river Main...

I'm with Jeremy. Erdinger? Gross gross gross.

Me too. Erdinger is awful. Its the only "weissbier" that I've ever had that tasted like a freaking helles. It might look like a weissbier, but it sure as hell doesn't taste like one.

More like "Sheissbier". At least that's what I call the wife's Erdinger Alkoholfrei. She got off the beer when pregnant with Daughter One and stayed on the wagon. God knows why as the beer helps here to ease lots of problems away! Beer! The solution to all life's problems!

Ian good luck with the move but is that your real name? It is much better to use an anonymous login name then you speak freely and insult who you want - like I do.

well BB, its ok to use whatever name cuz if you come out once you would be known anyway. Me personally would always say what I want to whether behind a keyboard or in person in front of you

You are a good honest man arshoo - I was just kidding. I don’t have time to come out as I get behind in my work by surfing too much. I hope people don’t call you by your login name when they meet you out places.

they do!!

thanks for your input folks! feel at home already! I did see plenty of nudies last year in the english garden and at nearly all the lakes we went to, hairy pies all round! As for the erdinger, i know its not the best among german beers but its about the only weissbier i can get here, or its the pils!

We'll convert you to helles don't worry

nice one, need to get some games of footy in too.

I would be interested what you think after you have been here a couple of years.
Everybody loves to knock Britain. I find Germany very narrow in outlook, and the longer you are here the more it gets to you. So my advice is to judge over a period of time and dont write Britain off. The grass is always greener on the other side of the hill.

Looking forward to meeting you, ian. We will break you of various bad habits such as driving on the wrong side of the road, binge drinking and wearing clothes.

Ah, you can count on JN to stand up for Britain Britain is nice to go back to for a holiday, like France or Italy too, but then the food is better in those countries.

To all the moaning about supermarkets here there's a very simple remedy - Don't shop in supermarkets when they don't sell you what you want! Revolutionary, I know, but it works. My tips for happiness here would be get a bike and cycle everywhere preferably in fancy dress, develop your own eccentricities and practice them in Englischer Garten on Saturdays, learn the location of all city centre beer gardens and best route to each from any other point in Munich, and start learning how the MVV tickets work now.

Welcome to Munich.

Mr Blair said last week that ' Britain is the greatest nation on earth' so it must be true.

Saying things like that is bound to annoy the Yanks!

I do love england for a lot of reasons and it will always be home, but I want to leave for a lot of reasons too. I know nowhere is perfect, grass will always seem greener, its human nature, thats what makes people travel and feel compulsed to move around. but for the lifestlye i would like, i think munich has it all to offer. Being close to the mountains and loads of forests around will be great,but its whatever floats your boat i guess. Understanding and accepting a countrys views and traditions/buraucracy(spelling?) is just part of intergration, as long as i am accepted for me i think its good to see how other countries work, what their beliefs are and what they stand for. interesting i think. Its so easy to get around now that visiting home can be done in a weekend so my nan will realise I'm not in australia or anything.

True, but sometimes appears for the oldies it would be easier for them to accept it if you did go to Australia or anywhere except Germany. One old neighbour told me when I moved here that I should find me a nice English girl to settle down with. Now I am actually engaged, many years later, I'm sure she'd find it easier to accept that I'm marrying a French girl than were my fiancee a German. As you may have seen in another thread today there's a continuing assumption amongst older Brits and Daily Mail readers that Germans just aren't like us Brits, that they're somehow not to be trusted. Odd really as IMHO Munich is an extraordinarily safe and trusting place to live, and a distant world compared to the crime, vomit & vandalism ridden city centres in England. Still it only takes a short visit to Munich to make this clear and even my Dad, a classic Surrey-bunker dwelling lost-in-1945 xenophobic old fart, has to accept that life in Munich is pretty good.

I found a nice German girl to settle down with. Took a long time I know but my parents were perfectly happy.
Mind you, my father was a university reseacher & lecturer (= fairly open-minded) & we had spent a year in Munich in the mid-60s whilst he
worked with E.O. Fischer at the TU München.

Ian. You will find Johnny Norfolk is very much in the minority over here. He does not like Germany - that is fine, clear and understandable.

But over 90% of people on this forum appreciate the good life over here. You will find numerous previous threads extolling the advantages and virtues of living here.

As to the 2 year issue. Well my wife warned me that 6 months was the time when it would stop feeling like a holiday and I might get homesick. It has been 3 and a half years now and I am yet to feel homesick even for a day. Also in the UK I would have a "bad day" maybe once a week when issues would conspire to get me down. Just doesn't happen for me over here.

Sunday was a good example for me. Had in-laws round for lunch (so German chat), then kids went to the circus with grandma and mum. I went for a long cycle round the lakes, got home, changed into my leathers and went for a motorbike ride round the twisty no-traffic no-police roads. Came home and watched my UK SKY TV. Best of both worlds? Too damn right.

Oh yeah - and if you like going to gigs - Munich is superb - everybody plays here and tickets are easier to get and venues smaller.

Spot on. Munich is very close to the mountains. If you soend a few years and like the city eventually you may move south to be nearer them as we have done. We live in Holzkirchen just off the Salzburg Autobahn and like it a lot here. You can see the Alps from our house in fact, Tegernsee is 30 minutes drive from us and in winter Lenggries is 20 mins for us by car for skiing.

The comment about the supermarkets is also true. I recommend the small local veg shops (The older Germans call them "Tante Emma Laden") for friendlier treatment. Expect to cycle a lot more than in UK. The Germans in my opinion are way way ahead of the UK also in recycling so you will get used to sorting your waste into paper, plastic glass etc very quickly. I am a regular - almost weekly visitor to our waste centre which allows you to dump a cubic metre of garden waste for free, buy a cubic metre of soil for 20 Euros or so, and has a wonderful flea market which has supplied my garden with loads of plant pots and troughs as well as a cold frame!

Cross country skiing is also wonderful - we live 300 yards from a 40km circuit - valled a "Loipe" here.

Enjoy your move. Don't take much of our moaning too seriously, especially mine!

Not sure about the recycling these days - Germany used to be ahead but maybe not such a diff now

You can see the Alps from Munich too...sometimes

Thanks Johnny, I was beginning to wonder if this was just a site for the english to have a good moan!! We are known for this in some parts of the world. I won't take it too seriously All Sounds good to me, i hope it all works out as well for us. Gigs sound great , here, by the time you hear about the gig its sold out! just one more little reason but they are mounting up!

..and after the gigs (and if you happen to also like classical music etc, there's a great selection of that here too) you can still meet your mates for beers until at least 1:00am (many places later)...and then walk or ride your bike home:
it is normally not a huge distance (unless you happen to go for a flat a fair way out)
AND it's safe!!! The main thing to worry about wandering home pissed (ad this applies also to women by themselves) is if the cops stop you, will you also get a point on your driver's licence..

When I left NZ, it was my intention to head slowly towards London. My parents are pretty old (maybe close to your grandparents' age), and my British father visited me in Munich the first months I was here, then went to London for a visit. He sent me a postcard saying Stay in Munich! I took his advice and have been here for 18 years so far

funny you mention the recycling Jeremy as one of my friends here in lincolnshire is a 'waste management improvement officer' note the 'improvement part of that title! Poor chaps not having much luck because people here just don't get that the amount of waste we produce for landfill is unsustainable, so they just bin everything together thinking all is well. morons.We went to Holzkirchen last year to see a friend of my fiance and went boarding in Lenggries, must be nice having all that so close to you. That would be the plan for us in the future i think, then your virtually in the mountains and not far from munich at all. Swimming in the Tegernsee was fantastic last summer too, especially in the warm summer rain.

raupehu, thats a cool story. made me laugh, I can understand your dad saying that. And it#s probably worse now! safety is a big issue for me. i was out with friends just 2 weeks ago and some drunk guy for no reason just punched this student in the kebab shop, just to look cool or something the wanker, the poor guy on floor with his shirt covered in blood didn't know what happened and it made me so angry i just grabbed korinna and took her home, i am ashamed of english culture when i see that crap going on. still bothers me now!sorry for droning on. It's not much to ask to be safe on the streets really ,but here, unless you live in a little village in the middle of nowhere you just have to be aware all the time that something could happen. people are becoming more desensitised to violent crime because unfortunetly it is so common here.

Forgot to mention that Hackensee is just a bike ride away in the tiny traditional village of Kleinhartpenning. Clothing is forbidden there it seems. I call it Nackensee! Not far also is the lake of Kirchsee right near to Kloster Reutberg which is pretty.

Nackensee = Neck Lake, so lots of action. Or do you mean Nacktensee [/pedant mode]

WTF? Care to explain, since when to you get points on your licence when drunk on foot???

If you happen to cause an accident while drunk on foot.

Ian. You picked a good time to arrive, and like the others rightly said, this place has a lot going for it. You'll love it.
Sure there are crappy things about this place just like everywhere else. Currently you appear hugely optimistic. The trick is to keep that up the whole time. And learn to avoid the bad bits, then you'll be fine.

I'll give you an example. Although not so bad these days, service in shops here can be comical in its incompetence. It really can be extreme. But when out with other non-locals it is easy to get lured into telling anecdotes about some "idiot in Karstadt" or "the hotline did not understand it was their mistake" sort of thing. Avoid that and other things and you'll end up staying here "Forever!"

Hands up whose been here the longest! 10 years? 20? ...

25 (since November 1982) with 5 years back-and-forth beforehand.
But thats in the North so maybe different factors count!

Newbies! 36 as per 30 April, 25 in Munich as per mid-September.

Noooooooooooooooo. Very Bad advice. The trick is to be totally pessimistic all the time about stuff. Assume that going to the shops to purchase a box of 6 inch nails will see you ignored and ridiculed by the staff for your hopeless German, assume you will have to visit 8-10 shops, assume you will need to get a TÜV to go with it, assume they will not sell you the product without a special "nail operator" licence, assume the lady at the checkout will huff at your €50 note.

Then on the off chance it goes smoothly it can be a real pleasure.

Then wouldn't it be a good idea to improve your German ?

German service is pretty crappy but hey what can you do... oh yes smile it will either get you better service or it will get up the nose of the person in the shop but normally it helps

Just wondering... Do most of tt users speak fluent german? or for some is it mostly a case of knowing enough to get by? I've been learning for a couple of years with help from my german fiance but i hope i'll get a lot better after a while in germany.

you have the whole spectrum here I would say

It really isn't easy when you try and learn a bit somewhere else - with a bit of application you should improve rapidly once you get here and are immersed