Tom Pugh

6 days ago | thelocal.de | Tom Pugh

For decades, when people thought of Germany, “efficiency” was often the first word which sprang to mind, nicely summed up by the Audi logo Vorsprung durch Technik (progress through technology). The idea still has power – numerous foreign residents arriving in Germany expect to find a country which ticks along as reliably as clockwork.

6 days ago | thelocal.de | Tom Pugh

What does O bis O mean – and what does it have to do with the tyres on my car? Take a drive through the suburbs of a German city on a Saturday or Sunday in April and it’s not uncommon to see groups of neighbours passing lug wrenches back and forth across the garden fence. The phrase O bis O means from Easter (Ostern) to October and acts as a reminder that car owners in Germany need to change from winter tyres to summer tyres in the spring, and then back to winter tyres again in the autumn.

1 week ago | thelocal.de | Tom Pugh

Why do I need to know Zwickmühle? Frankly, who doesn’t find themselves caught between the devil and the deep blue sea every now and then? Over the long weekend, many of us will spend time with our extended families – and we’ve all spent the last few weeks (or possibly years!) watching politicians desperately search for good solutions to impossible problems. What’s the literal translation?

1 week ago | thelocal.de | Tom Pugh

In the lead-up to their coalition negotiations with the SPD, the CDU and CSU were openly in favour of reintroducing military conscription in Germany. At the start of March, defence policy spokesman Florian Hahn told Bild that Germany's "suspension of conscription no longer fits the current threat situation". "The first conscripts will have to walk through the barracks gates in 2025," he said.

1 week ago | thelocal.de | Tom Pugh

To their credit, negotiators from the CDU/CSU and the SPD have produced a coalition agreement far more quickly than many of their predecessors. The relative rush, however, seems to have produced more than the usual amount of ambiguity. On immigration, for example, there are significant differences in the way the two parties are interpreting the word "alignment" – as in, the new government will deny asylum seekers entry at Germany’s border "in alignment with our European neighbours".