The Wrong Attitude

Eastern Europe often gets a bad reputation in America for being corrupt and for having edgy or rude people, while Western Europe is often seen as being developed and friendly. From what I have experienced in Berlin the opposite is closer to the truth. While all of the Germans I met personally are delightful people, I have had to deal with more bad attitudes in the past 3 days, than I have in the past month in Romania. This started about five minutes after I arrived in Berlin and looked for a place to eat. We had to try two places. The first had high prices and an extremely condescending waiter, to the point where we ended up walking out of the restaurant. The second place had even higher prices but we just decided to swallow them at that late hour. I was actually in sticker shock the whole time, but I think this is simply because of the higher price levels in Western Europe. I got ripped off at the St. Nicholas museum, when a woman with a bad attitude yelled at me for not having a ticket. I asked if the ticket was for the audio guide which I did not want. She said no, and then made me go to the counter and get an audio guide for three euro. It ran out of battery halfway through.
While there may be few correct signs in Romania, it is still easy to figure out how to go somewhere and what you are supposed to do through common sense, by looking at the layout of a building, the line, etc. In Germany things like the airport or subway system are so counterintuitive that it is hard to figure them out even with the signage. It’s even hard for Germans to figure out how to buy a subway ticket. While I was only in the Netherlands’ airport, it was even more counter intuitive. If this experience is any indication, Moldova is much nicer than much of the Euro Zone, yet the Moldovans get the bad rep! Suffice it to say I now have very little desire to go to the Netherlands. Beyond the passport control desk, my Tarom flight awaited me. While I did have an amazing time visiting Berlin, I was happy to be heading back east. The flight attendants seemed more pleasant than those on KLM. I sat next to a woman from Constanta, we struck up a conversation, and when I mentioned I had trouble taking the Bucharest bus system, she gave me a month long bus pass ( she was going directly back to Constanta) and told me how to take it. She also invited me to the Danube delta, when she next goes with her friends. Bottom line, the reputation for service in both the East and West seem undeserved. The good reputation for service and efficiency claimed by the West probably causes many travelers to be disappointed, and makes them assume that Service in the East is even worse. It’s not. If you want good respectful service, if not always a downright friendly attitude, head for Eastern Europe, it’s a great improvement over the West. At the very least, our Roma don’t harass you for money.