10 Differences
between German and Malaysian Homes
After having lived in Singapore, the UK, California and now Munich, Malaysian designpreneur Su-Lin Chee shares some things which make living in Germany unique.
1 Tilting windows
Visitors to Germany are often taken aback when they turn their window or door handles to the top and find it falling onto them, worrying they might have broken it!
Fear not, German windows all “kippen”, or tilt, in order to ventilate rooms once a day. The rest of the time, windows are closed air-tight to keep the heat in and noise out. Especially during winter, moisture may condensate on cold glass and cause mould, which is why Germans insist on ventilating for about 10 minutes daily. This is so ingrained into their culture that some rental contracts have it written in.
Germans seem to have put their famous engineering predilections into such building accessories and generic plastic windows with double sheeted glass may be purchased in DIY stores for under 100€.
In Malaysia, we mostly leave the windows open, especially to catch cool morning and evening breezes. During hot days, however, we could benefit from Germany’s air-tight windows to close the house from heat, dust and noise, even if we are generally less sensitive to external bustle.
Window on right is not broken but on tilt mode, while roller shutters may be seen half closed (note controls on left).
2 Roller shutters
Closely related, most German windows have roller shutters over them, something you won’t find in the UK or US. A lot of times, they are electrically controlled and kind of cool to play with: up, down, up, down.
But why do they have it anyway? They do keep the glare and heat out during summer, but Germans generally don’t get huge amounts of sunlight. Perhaps they provide extra security over windows? But my supplier says they are easily broken into.
Are they a privacy screen? Yes, but some homes have curtains, as well as roller shutters! I suspect it’s a historic evolution from wooden swing-out louvres and that Germans generally like completely closing off their homes. Once you get used to them though, pressing a button kind of beats pulling curtains.
Posed vegetables!
3 Oven racks that slide out
Small detail, but ovens in the UK and US don’t slide out and you end up needing to reach in and possibly burning your hands on the hot sides.
Of course, most Malaysians hardly use ovens except to bake cakes. Even the Spanish jokingly call their hardly used ovens trouser cabinets. I guess cooking styles in cold countries evolved to use a slow, constant heat source which also heated the house. Once you get used to it, it is often easier than Asian cooking, with its various dishes and chopping. So kudos to Germans for sliding them racks out!
4 Sensor lights
Another home accessory to receive teutonic engineering love is sensor lights. Visitors marvel at them in most stair landings and corridors so one need not switch lights on walking through the house at night; they follow you like lit pavements in Michael Jackson’s Billie Jean video.
Not to be found in most UK or US homes, it seems rather high-spec in German homes, but they are really pretty standard-issue. It’s rather handy when stumbling to the bedroom after your schnapps or whiskey nightcap, or going to the bathroom in the middle of the night. Which brings us tidily to the next difference...
5 Lack of attached bathrooms
Typical motion sensor for lights by a stairway landing.
German homes rarely have attached bathrooms, even million-€ homes often feature one bathroom per floor, shared by two or three bedrooms and accessible through the corridor.
I’d become used to bathrooms considered somewhat a luxury in the UK (Malaysians homes sometimes have more bathrooms than bedrooms!), but attached bathrooms are at least more common there than in Germany. Give me an attached bathroom any day, so I don’t run from a steamy bathroom through a drafty corridor--something Germans are apparently used to!
Typical apartment floor plan. Notice how there is only one bathroom accessible through the corridor and in this case, even placed at the entrance for convenient toilet use before leaving the home.
6 High-rises are looked down upon
Most Germans, especially in cities, live in apartments or “Wohnungen”. These can be generously sized, with two or three bedrooms, living room, kitchen, etc. but they often take up a portion of a floor within a house no more than three stories high.
There are tower blocks, but the locals snub these. As in the UK, they were often built in the ‘70s as social housing. Condos, as we know them in Malaysia, are virtually non-existent.
In a way, Germans miss out on extravagant leisure facilities like landscaped pools, rooftop games rooms and entertainment halls to impress friends with. However, the times I have lived in high-rise apartments, I found it a pain to take the lift several floors down, anytime I forgot something in the car.
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Kids’ pool at public open baths. Note slide into larger pool in background. Overall fun if you can stand cool water temperatures!
Typical “flow channel” where circular jet streams are turned on for around 10 minutes every hour.
And as much as exclusive luxuries make one feel special, isn’t it cooler to be in a society that is overall awesome? Of course, this is not always possible.
In Munich, for example, there are indoor and outdoor pools owned by the city and which you pay a few Euros to get in. The kids’ outdoor pools have great water features while indoor heated pools have slides and steam rooms. There is also a fun “flow channel” (Strömungskanal) which pushes bathers in a circular direction, something you wouldn’t even get in rich Silicon Valley’s community pools.
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A posh Münchner, however, may disdain being thrown in skimpy clothing into close quarters with migrant youths, often from middle Eastern countries (called “mit Migrationshintergrund” or with migration backgrounds in polite society). I myself experienced liberties being taken, followed by cheekily ambiguous expressions! As such, locals who differentiate themselves from the masses join private gyms
with swimming pools. Overall though, there are no exclusive country clubs, as in Malaysia and Silicon Valley.
7 Germans’ names are parts of their address
As mentioned above, most apartments are really bigger houses, divided into up to six or if in the inner city, more. These apartments share the same front door, with multiple post boxes and doorbells as well as names rather than apartment numbers.
I found this surprising at first. Germans are famously privacy-sensitive. On Google Maps’ Street View, for example, many houses are blurred out. Nevertheless, all German homes have names displayed at street level, which most Brits and Americans would squirm at. It’s even compulsory when you register with the city (also legally required).
So if you were to visit Erika at Brückestrasse 17, she may live in an apartment and you’d have to know her surname, or play a guessing game as to which doorbell to press. I do like this aspect of German homes as it makes the neighbourhood feel more personal and addresses simpler.
A typical new development which looks like a house from outside but is really divided into five apartments, as can be seen from the number of letterboxes and doorbells outside.
Socks hung on a typical German laundry stand. I try not to throw them into the dryer! Note our beast of a heating system in the background. Heating technicians love to compare its complex system to that of a car.
8 Laundry dries in cellars
Most German homes have “Keller” or basements. Some say this is because foundations must be built below where the ground freezes, to be stable. Also, heating systems seem more elaborate in Germany (our boiler, water tank and digital controls are separate components, for example) and are essential cellar residents.
The washing machine and dryer are often also kept there. What astounds me is how hung laundry dries in the basement without an ounce of sunlight. In Malaysia, laundry sometimes stays damp even in the open air, thanks I guess to the humidity. And God forbid it should start raining!
The cellar often holds a workshop room where you can hold your tools, and what is often sold as a “hobby room” where you keep your table tennis table, wine and fruit and vegetable preserves, or junk, which if you’re going to have, is probably better underground than in your guest room.
9 Kids walk to school
This is actually the best thing about German living. Communities are at least deemed safer than in the Klang Valley while pavements are narrow but consistent, with ubiquitous pedestrian greenways for walkers and cyclists. Like in Japan, kids are often expected to walk, cycle, scooter or take public transport to school, so there is safety in numbers.
Short cut through some urban woods. Hope there’s no big bad wolf!
10 Driving is a pain
Driving within neighbourhoods is a headache, however. In many Munich neighbourhoods, even outside the inner city, roads are only as wide as two cars. Most people park on the street, either because their driveways or garages are taken up by their first cars or more junk, or because their apartments don’t have driveways and it’s easier to park on the street than in the basement.
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As a result, getting in and out of your neighbourhood involves sidestepping into oncoming traffic, which inevitably results in occasional confrontations.
Germans sometimes say this is wholly intentional, to discourage driving and encourage public transport. To me, that makes as much sense as covering up half of your television to discourage watching television. Again, I reckon, they are just used to it.
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Indeed, as much as we like to think that we are all rational, ever evolving beings, historical inertia is probably something all societies deal with. Perhaps a peek from an outside perspective sometimes helps shake things up. You see, people with a “Migration’s background” can be useful after all!
Typical Munich neighbourhood street: since traffic drives on the right side of the road, this oncoming car is technically in the wrong lane but since cars are parked on his lane, he has to drive on the “wrong” lane and veer in the moment he sees a car from the other direction. This is a constant occurrence in Munich and it’s not uncommon to see cars mount the pavement, which would be a true no-no in the UK and US!