myGermany

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myGermany podcast episode 7 features music by the excellent German band Spherical who are based in Hamburg. Spherical’s Oliver Fischer was kind enough to allow me to play three of their songs for this podcast: “decision”, “feeling everything” and “I wonder”.

OLIVER FISCHER is the composer, plays Keyboards and adds atmospheric guitar licks to the music while HANNS CLASEN focuses entirely on his funky bass. Mr. Groove himself is the excellent MICHAEL MAY on drums and the charismatic lead singer is CLAUDIA VALTIERRA. Atmospheric Trip Hop and warm-hearted electronic-sounds are the trademark of Spherical. Cool and attractive, especially playing live, they develop immense improvisational qualities. This band is taking the Germany’s club scene by storm. ‘Spherical hypnotize with a melange of Drum and Bass, Trip Hop and Big Beat that show the future of this genre. “tomorrow’s electronic, here today” is their tagline.

I can’t recommend them highly enough! Do check out their website and if you myspace, check out their page for more music and videos.

I recently subscribed to the FAZ, one of the best known and highly respected Germany-language newspapers and have been enjoying getting to know more about the German perspective on news stories. So, in order to give you a taste of what the German press is like, I briefly review some of the top news stories being covered in four German newspapers and magazines:

• Der Spiegel is probably the most well respected German weekly news magazine, the Mirror, as it is called when you translate it into English, also offers a great English language website as well as streaming video and a podcast. It is well worth a look, if you want to get your finger on the pulse of the German press.
• Focus is another German weekly news magazine which enjoys a good reputation and high readership. It is not as high-brow perhaps as der Spiegel and they do not offer any content in English.
• The FAZ or Frankfurter Allgemeiner Zeitung as I mentioned above is the premier newspaper in Germany. They do offer once weekly an English language section but don’t have any English language content on their website.

• Der Bild Zeitung, is a daily newspaper that you will find pretty much everywhere in Germany. It has the reputation of being the working man’s paper and as such, it features a large sports section. It is also know for the bombastic titles that it uses as well as featuring headline stories about the latest celebrity gossip. The daily page 1 girl is prominently featured daily, except Sunday.

I also give a brief introduction to the German school system in this podcast. After Kindergarten, which children attend between the ages of 3 and 5, children start Grundschule or elementary school. Grundschule goes from grades 1 to 4, usually with the same teacher accompanying the same class through all four years. Afterwards, children are separated and sent into one of three types of schools:

• Gymnasium, grades 5 through 13 ending with the degree Abitur which is the equivellent of the British A-levels and the American Associate’ s degree, given in Junior Colleges. Only students with an Abitur are allowed to go to University.
• Realschule, grades 5 through 10 ending with a Realschule degree. Children leaving the Realschule can either go on to the Gymnasium, if they have taken the necessary subjects and achieved satisfactory grades, or they go on to technical schools.
• Hauptschule, grades 5 through 10 ending with a Hauptschule degree. Gradutes from the Hauptschule generally compete for places to learn a specific trade like plumber, painter, builder, etc. Lerning a trade usually takes several additional years where they are apprenticed to a master craftsman. Oftentimes, however, such trade-apprenticeships are scarce and graduates end up unemployed.

This introduction to the school system is to serve as a basis for the next podcast where I have an interview with a school teacher in which we discuss some of the advantages and disadvantages of the German school system.

Thoughts Aside:
These days flights to london are offering comfort comparable to that of orlando flights. Now even flights to florida will be going that extra mile for us. However, comfort is most needed on flights to australia since those are really long. One can do without much comfort on flights to hawaii.

 

 Episode 7, Headline sin the German Press, German School System, Music by Spherical: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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• Episode 14: Christmas in Germany at 13.12.