Lederhosen, schnitzel, beer,

bratwurst, order, bread and beer,

complicated history, beer,

no humor, EDM,

and gummy bears that will kind of like

give you diarrhea but it's like worth it.

Ugh! Those are such horrible stereotypes that every

German is so sick and tired of hearing.

Want a gummy bear?

♫♫♫

♫ It's time to learn Geography! NOW!!! ♫

Hey everyone, I'm your host Barby.

So we've conquered Belgium's castle,

jumped through Denmark's lagoon

danced to France's force

and now we've made it to the final boss of the EU,

Kingpin Germany!

Level one! Begin!

♫ Political Geography ♫

Ha, you know why I'm smiling!

Yep, Germany has a lot of territorial anomalies.

We'll get into that in a little bit but first,

Germany is located in central Western Europe

bordered by nine other countries,

(Don't forget little Luxembourg!)

with small coasts on the North and Baltic Seas

which they own about 50 small islands.

Now Germany like, the US, is a

Federal Republic which has 16 smaller states

or Bundesländer,

each with its own constitution,

three of which are cities,

the capital Berlin, Hamburg and

Bremen which is actually kind of like

two cities including Bremerhaven

on the coast but they kind of act like one entity.

Pfffhhh!

Fun side note: Lower Saxony is

actually geographically situated further

north than regular Saxony.

Now let's jump into the fun stuff.

Now we already discussed the Jungholz quadripoint

and the Vennbahn railway enclaves with Belgium and Austria.

However, there's a few more.

The entire town of Büsingen am Hochrhein is surrounded by Switzerland

where a part of Konstanz is cut off by the Rhine river

and surrounded by Switzerland,

however immediately across the river,

a small patch of empty land

on the German side actually belongs to Switzerland.

Finally they split the island of Usedom

with Poland in the north.

Germany is interesting because every

state in the country has its own

distinct culture, dialect, history, food,

and traditions. I mean Bavarians will be

quite drastically different from Schleswig-Holsteiners,

Mecklenburg-Vorpommern will be different from Saarland.

This all has to do with ancient and recent history.

Basically, in the quickest way I can summarize this,

Germanic tribes, Roman Wars,

Charlemagne, three kingdoms,

this guy marries an Italian, creating a whole new mess

called the Holy Roman Empire

made of about 300 smaller separate kingdoms,

states and dukedoms which had nothing to do with Romans,

Teutonic knights,

Brandenburgs became Prussia,

Habsburgs became Austrians,

Lithuanians and Poles made their own thing,

whereas the Hungarians join the Austrians.

Wars, wars, battles, battles,

Napoleon comes over and messes everything up,

and finally German nationalism surges

and in 1871, Otto von Bismarck

creates the first proto-German unified state,

and they're all like; "Oh dang, we came late to this game,

we gotta scramble for some colonies," and that's

how all of these countries at one point

spoke German. Oh and also keep in mind

like 300 years before this, a German

banking company obtained colonial rights

to Venezuela for like 20 years. They were

looking for the lost city of El Dorado.

So technically, you can kind of see

Germans colonized the Americas, but it

wasn't like a nationalized conquest thing.

Fast foward even more and then

you get World War I, the monarchy ends,

Treaty of Versailles, they lose land,

Nazis come in, World War II, Germany splits in two

for about 40 years, and then finally...

we get the Germany we have today.

East Germany consisting of these states is today

still quite different from the rest of

Germany as it was first occupied

and influenced by the Soviet Union. They are

generally not as well off economically

as a rest of the country as you can

still see the blocky Soviet-style

buildings brought throughout the regions.

In fact, the city of Berlin was split in

half and the west side was actually

an enclave of West Germany only accessible

by train and highway. You can even see

from a satellite image to divide.

East Berlin still uses the yellowish tinted

sulfur vapor lightbulbs, whereas the West

still uses fluorescent and Mercury arc

white tinted light bulbs. And the funny

thing is, although Berlin is the largest

city in Germany, the busiest airports are

actually Frankfurt, Munich, Düsseldorf,

with Berlin-Tegel ranking at number four.

Otherwise, some top notable landmarks and

spots would be the Brandenburg Gate,

the Valhalla, Cologne Cathedral, the Ulm Minster Church,

the tallest in the world, the Berlin Victory Column, and hundreds and

hundreds of castles all over. The most

notable one probably being Neuschwanstein,

the concept behind Disney's Cinderella Castle. Germany also has over

400 zoos, more than any other country in

the world, and of course, everybody knows

about the autobahn, the highway system in

which if you see this sign, it means there's

no speed limit, and it's like that for a

huge portion of the roadway. And no

wonder, considering how fast and wide those

cultivated countrysides can get.

Time for level two!

♫Physical Geography♫

Okay think of it this way, in Germany, the

more down you go, the more up you move.

Basically, Germany lies on the Atlantic

shelf in the North that starts with the

mudflats in the North Sea. Seriously this

island right here is accessible only for

a few hours by foot until the tide comes in

and floods everything. Then everything

just kind of creeps up into the Alps

and the south by Bavaria and

Baden-Württemberg, with the highest

mountain, Zugspitze, located right

along the border with Austria. Kinda like

France, Germany is filled with a vast

irrigating network of rivers like

the Spree, Elbe, Wesel, Rhine and

of course the mighty Danube that starts

here. About a third of the land is arable

and another third is woodland, and after

a millennia of civilization, Germans have

cultivated the crap out of their

country! Most agriculture of course

happens in the north flat plains and the

central regions of the country, which is

by the way kind of like Europe's tornado alley,

due to its position sandwich between

the Arctic blasts of Scandinavia and

the moist warm jet streams of the

Mediterranean below, Germany can be an

atmosphere at war zone in the summer.

There are more tornadoes on average in

Germany than any other country in Europe.

Speaking of flat farmland, Germany is the

world's largest rye and hop producer.

Germans abso-freaking-lutely love their

bread! There are over 300 different kinds

of bread in the country more types than

any other country in the world and

almost every meal incorporate some kind

of slice or small bun or Brötchen of bread.

"Bist du gluten-free?"

"Nein!"

Germans are heavy meat eaters, specifically in pork,

they basically know every possible way

to cook a pig. Over 50 different types of

sausage exist, alongside Schnitzels, Rouladen,

Sauerbraten, Schweinshaxe, and a big

party, you might find Spanferkel.

Beer reign supreme

all over, as the third largest consumers

of beer after the Czech Republic,

(Even their president has no problem with public intoxication)

and Austria. Germany is world- renowned for their beer which

by the way, follows the Reinheitsgebot rule

in which they're only allowed to

use water, hops, malt, and sometimes yeast.

Nonetheless, about 1,300 breweries exist

pumping out over 5,000 brands. The oldest

continuously existing brewery in the

world started by Benedictine monks in

1040 AD can be found here. Germany takes the

environment very seriously and for the

past two decades, has been going on a

major Green Revolution. As of today they

have the largest installed solar power

capacity and green infrastructure

practices like home installed turbines

and solar panels. I've seen a huge

surgeons in the past 10 years. Forests

dominate the southern regions where the

landscape gets hillier and mountainous,

the most famous one being the Black Forest

or the Schwarzwald in Baden-Württemberg.

Deer, bears, boar, foxes, badgers and the

national animal the eagle can be found

thriving in these parts. Nonetheless,

economically, Germany is known mostly for

their exceptional engineering and

industry production. Companies we've all

heard of like Volkswagen, BMW, Mercedes-Benz,

Porsche, Audi, Telekom, Nivea, DHL, Bosch.

"Adidas!"

"Puma!"

"ADIDAS!"

"PUMA!"

Yeah, it's kind of like the whole "Biscoto/Bolacha"-thing

from Brazil. Remember? Well we

have mudflats, tornadoes, pork, beer,

mountains. All that's missing is people!

Level 3!

♫Demographics♫

Fun little side note: In Germany,

this is three, not this. Now, if the EU

was a family, Germany would kind of be

like the dad who got out of rehab,

reconciled with his wife and kids, and

taking his new life very seriously as

he's haunted by the demons of his past every day.

First of all, the country has about

82 million people and is the most populated

in the EU, second-most in Europe after

Russia and has the fourth largest

nominal GDP in the world. About 80 %

of the country identifies as

ethnically German, 12 % other Europeans,

mostly Polish, Italian, Dutch, and so on,

Turks make up about 3.5 %,

Asian at 2 %, and the rest are made

up of other groups like Africans and

Americans. Also they use the euro, they use the

C&F type outlets and they drive on the

right side of the road. Germany is

without a doubt a global powerhouse.

It is the strongest economy in the EU and

makes up about sixteen percent of the

union's population. It's the third largest

exporter and importer of goods in the

world, and after the United States, Germany is

also the second most popular global

migration destination. Germany

experiences a high standard of living,

tuition free universities, (If you can

accept that is) a mostly

government-subsidized universal

healthcare system. About a quarter is to

privatize and state pension for

retirement at age 65. Now when it comes

to language, things get a little tricky.

Each state kind of has their own type of

German, however to get by most Germans

learn how to speak "Hochdeutsch" or

"High German" which is the standard dialect.

The European Charter however protects the

minority languages of Frisian, Danish,

Romani, Sorbian, which is like a Slavic