Earlier this morning we were waiting at the Strassebahn station with another dozen passengers. When it arrived a young guy with headphones plugged into his years–he couldn’t have been more than 18–entered first, made two steps and just stood there, blocking the enterance and not letting anyone else get in. Which was weird: he had like five meters to step in, but he couldn’t care less and just stood there.

When we arrived at the station we were supposed to get off, I started to pull the Kinder Wagon toward the exit door, but there were at least six people who stood outside and very close to the door, eager to get in. I had to tell them in broken German that maybe they want to try the breakthrough concept of letting people out before the get in, and that the Bahn isn’t going to run off, and only then they parted a way for me to step out.

In general I would like to send all the residents of Berlin to New York for one week of studying the etiquette of riding the public transportation, the whole thing: how to treat oldies and pregnant women, how to behave so everyone would be comfortable, how to maximize the space to fulfill the part of “public” in the ride, how to be considerate toward the other.

But what I want to touch here and what I really don’t understand is why people in Germany are standing on passageways. I don’t just talk about the Strassebahn, it is narrow anyway, but about everywhere. When I walk to the Kita in the morning there are always three parents having a conversation and they will always stand in a circle at the gate, or on the U-Bahn platform where a group will always stand spreaded, blocking your way , and mainly when I go out. There are always people having conversation at the exit, between the rooms and mainly on the way to the toilets.

Can anyone explain this behavior to me?