Böse Mädchen

I have heard on a number of occasions that watching German television, even passively, can help a lot with German language. In fact, an instructor of mine in a previous German course also highly recommended doing this, so I'm even starting to believe it. Even still, to this point I haven't watched too much German television, partly because I'm rarely home to sit down and take something in. However, recently I have caught a couple of episodes of the show "Karen in Action". This show is about a woman named Karen who goes to have a new, unique experience in a new place for every episode (by way of example, a recent episode saw her in a boxing camp for juvenile delinquents). Pretty entertaining, and the song at the beginning is also rather catchy:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ij4IwTtNT0

The next show I caught was a prank show with hidden cameras of the same ilk as "Candid Camera". The particular show is called "Böse Mädchen," which basically means "evil girls". I found it really interesting how this show differed from what I was used to for a similar type of show in the U.S. Probably 3/4 of the pranks involve being loud or similarly out of order (which irritates Germans), or in some way creating an inconvenience which would delay someone or make them late (which also annoys Germans). Then, after this annoyance is achieved, the targeted German usually furrows his or her brow and shakes their head, showing their annoyance. Here is an example clip:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3UwFEsnqN0

It doesn't take much to get under a German's skin. In contrast, the American equivalent of such a show usually involves a much more creative prank and the targets usually take it much more good-naturedly, and often even crack a smile. I'm not sure that the following link is strictly American, but it gives a taste of the difference in style that I am referring to.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSjRjaq6PuQ&playnext=1&list=PL826F1CBBC689BDBE&index=10

This seems to be a symptom of some of the general cultural differences between Germany and the U.S. Actually, the German sense of humor can also be quite different as well. Here is a poster I saw recently for a comedy club in Berlin.



The title essentially means "I make nonsense" and he is obviously holding some of the instruments that would normally be used to clean toilets. Hilarious! Perhaps, in a way that I don't really understand....