Germany (Lonely Planet, 6th Edition) - Andrea Schulte-Peevers [32]
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After 14 days of bad weather your average German would be prepared to pay €33.45 for a sunny day, according to the weather site www.donnerwetter.de.
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WHEN NAKED VEGETARIANS PUMP IRON
The idea of strapping young Germans frolicking unselfconsciously naked in the healthy outdoors is not new. A German Körperkultur (physical culture) first took shape in the late 19th century to remedy industrial society’s so-called ‘physical degeneration’. Out of this, Germany’s modern Freikörper (naturist) movement was born.
The early movement was something of a right-wing, anti-Semitic animal, whose puritanical members were scorned by some outsiders as ‘the lemonade bourgeoisie’. Achieving total beauty was the name of the game. Anathema to the movement, for example, was someone with a lascivious ‘big-city lifestyle’ that included smoking, fornicating, eating meat, drinking, and wearing clothes made of synthetic fibres, or anyone with predilections for artificial light. Early naturism also sprouted Germany’s first vegetarian Reform restaurants and shops.
The most interesting characters to develop out of this odd era were bodybuilders – predominantly vegetarian and naturist, but internationalist in spirit. Some achieved fame abroad under pseudonyms. Others were immortalised in Germany by sculptors, who employed them as models for their works.
Famous pioneers of the movement in Germany include Kaliningrad-born Eugene Sandow (1876–1925), who died trying to pull a car out of a ditch; Berlin-born Hans Ungar (1878–1970), who became famous under the pseudonym Lionel Strongfort; and Theodor Siebert (1866–1961), from Alsleben, near Halle, in eastern Germany.
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Abortion is illegal (except when a medical or criminal indication exists), but it is unpunishable if carried out within 12 weeks of conception and after compulsory counselling. Rape within marriage is punishable. Same-sex marriage (in the form of legally recognised same-sex partnerships) has been possible since 2001. Gays and lesbians walk with ease in most cities, especially Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne and Frankfurt am Main, although homosexuals do encounter discrimination in certain eastern German areas.
German school hours, which are usually from 8am to 1pm (until 4pm for the less common ‘all day’ schools), and the underfunding of child care make combining career and children difficult for German women. The plus side is that parents enjoy equal rights for maternity and paternity leave.
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The country’s first gay publication, Der Eigene, went to press in 1896 for the first time and – with a few interruptions in between – was published until the early 1930s and the rise of the Nazis.
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On the whole, the number of women employed is increasing. About 61% of working-age women are employed – high for an EU country, but lower than in the USA and Scandinavia. Almost half of these women work part-time, and in eastern Germany women tend to have more of a presence on the managerial floors.
Currently, most Germans have retired by the age of 63, but changes to retirement ages are gradually increasing this to 67 for those retiring from 2029.
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POPULATION
Germany is densely populated – 230 people for every square kilometre (compared with 116 per square kilometre in the expanded EU), although a far greater wedge is crammed into western Germany. The most densely populated areas are Greater Berlin, the Ruhr region, the Frankfurt am Main area, Wiesbaden and Mainz, and another region taking in Mannheim and Ludwigshafen. In eastern Germany, about 20% of the national population lives on 33% of the country’s overall land.
Most people live in villages and