Well, I had this discussion countless of times as well: There is a slight difference between "I don't like Germans" and "I do not like a Nazi-German army occupying my home, deporting and killing all jews, communists or whoever else they feel like".
I have lived in the Netherlands and got a fair share of jokes based on my nationality. But to be fair were all of them in a WAY better spirit and truly jokes compared to the stuff I have to read in the Swiss media. (And we never invaded Switzerland...)
As a kid we frequently holidayed in Holland. I have clear recollection of one B&B we stayed at where the elderly owner was very proud of the fact that all nationalities were welcome in his house except Germans. It could be that as a kid I was too young to detect the twinkle of irony, but I do believe it was genuine. In another hotel I remember there was an enamel sign on the dining room door with a long list of languages, each with a flag and the word for "dining room" in that language and only the German one was scratched out. Also, I remember one beach where there was a sign in many languages asking picknickers to take their litter with them. Only the Germany translation said eating on the beach is prohibited. This was in the 1970s.
You must be as ancient as Wolli then. All this is surely true but it probably ended before I was born. I can fully understand any of the generation that was oppressed kept a grudge. They are usually dead by now.
When I lived in the Netherlands nearly a decade ago were as I said all comments jokes. Unless we are talking football, there are really no serious anti-German sentiments in the Netherlands.
Well my Dad and my relatives just make jokes about Germans, in my eyes this is already the generation that do not take things all to seriously. I was never allowed to ask my grandparents about the war, but I'm guessing if I had experienced that I might have a bit of a grudge.
I like germans, I like swiss, I like anybody who is easy going and open minded.
My parents in law (Dutch people) remember the war time with a lot of grief (understandable of course), they had to go through famine and rationing it was not easy. But they know that it would be silly to generalize and they do like Germans as much as anyone else.
There are some funny jokes though...ever tried saying Scheveningen Treverus?
The diphtong ui is definitly the one to target in foreign speakers. The dutch /v/ is another one but the Amsterdammers can't pronounce it the "official" way either. By the way, if you hear an old Amsterdammer talking, you'd swear he is foreigner or something... that accent is not comon anymore in the city!
The Montenegrans I believe are now that they are a separate country. Great women there. :-) I think that is where the Amazonian legends come from personally.
I remember some study suggesting it was cheese and dairy products but that does not really explain the the Swiss, unless they were all really Barbegazi a couple of hundred years ago and milk and cheese are really doing wonders for them.
I like your sea level theory the best...it could also be to spot plants of certain useful species in the fields?
"you" did not invade Switzerland. But your "Empire" encircled CH and converted it into a kind of "free" prison-area. This at least was how my mother experienced it. She in 1937/38 lived in Paris and dreamt about continuing similar programs in Wien or/and Milano, and all her dreams got crushed. Sure, her hometown was not bombed in a way comparable to the fate of Friedrichshafen or Konstanz, but far more than any other city in Switzerland. That the bomber squadrons enroute to Friedrichshafen and some other places each night flew over the house of my grand parents and did not attack the place may be nice, but not your Reichskanzler but general Harry Truman paid for the damage to the house. I alwayx found it amazing that my grandfather after having been, as a "Germany specialist", in the CH-Abwehr during WWII, already in about 1947 invited my father to join with him and to take over care-programs for German families in need, he a family of people from Königsberg and the Sudetenland, and my father a family from Stettin, arguing that Europe now had to grow togeter and that we were right in the middle of what started to be West Europe
You see, his argument was that the bombardment of Schaffhausen was a city-walk if compared to the one of Rotterdam
And you speaking about the "media in Switzerland". There never since the 50ies was much of anti-German anywhere. Due to a lack of command of NLerish, I cannot judge what it is in the NL, but it is obvious to me that you of course here in CH understand the fineties. And you may in the past have DISliked the fact that people in German speaking Switzerland, whenever Germany in football lost an important national football match started partying
Well, since noone it else seems willing to comment on this, I will.
Wollie, I find your post to be uninformed, out of touch with the realities of modern Switzerland, and also downright offensive. Whilst you berate Treverus for what "his" people did to Switzerland, you conveniently continue to try to project the usual whiter-than-white of the hard-done-by WWII Swiss, conveniently forgetting what "your" people got up to.
So, since you mentioned Schaffhausen and for the sake of balance and for the benefit of others who might not be aware of it, here's the executive summary of the Schaffhausen raid to which you referred:
in April 1944, approx 50 USAF Liberator bombers "accidentally" bombed Schaffhausen amongst the Schaffhausen buildings "accidentally" very badly damaged were factories that were making anti-aircraft ammunition, jewel bearings for bomb-sights and spare parts for Bf-109 aircraft the aforementioned anti-aircraft ammunition, jewel bearings for bomb-sights and spare parts for Bf-109 aircraft were being "accidentally" shipped to the German war machine Germany "accidentally" paid Switzerland hundreds of millions of franks per year for this materiel (equivalent to something in the region of 2 or 3 billion p.a. today):
And whilst we're covering veritudinal inexactitudes, I think you'll find that Truman's rank was Colonel, not General.
ha, the Dutch are by means taller! it happened that in amsterdam i (185cm tall) asked for a light and got tapped on my shoulder. when i turned round my face hit the belly of a girl! when i looked up, somewhere in the clouds i could see her smiling down on me and holding the lighter. phew! huuuuuuge! (but beautiful )
I had many arguments about this with my wife. In the region around Leiden (where I am from) and in some parts of Noord-Brabant french fries with peanut sauce,mayonaise and onions is called a patatje flip, whereas in the rest of Holland this usually is called a patatje oorlog. For me a patatje oorlog is fries with ketchup/curry sauce, peanut sauce and mayonaise. This clearly makes much more sense, because it is like a war between all sauces fighting for your taste buds.
I miss the Dutch snackbars. Next time in Holland I will try a "kapsalon", never had that before.
For the Swiss, High German isn't a foreign language, it's the formal part of their mother tongue; much as it is for most Germans who speak dialect at home and use High German in some more formal environments. For the Swiss, speaking High German has the same formality to it - it destroys the social closeness a group-chat among friends carries. You should see this positively: they have accepted you as their peer. However, if you don't understand what they're saying, let them know and I'm sure they'll switch to English or High German without making any fuss.[/QUOTE]
That's absolutely not true. I have spoken to many Swiss who keep insisting that for them, German is a foreign language. Even if they know you speak German but not Swiss German, in a group of Swiss they WILL NOT speak in German continuously. They will keep switching to Swiss German because, whether it is classified as a dialect or not, it is their mother tongue, not German. If you want to function in Swiss society, understand what the mad man on the bus is blabbering about, or participate in group conversations, you need to know Swiss German.