Question to our German Friends

[RAF_Louvert 101]

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SPAM horrible?!! Vulcanized pork?!!

 

Food of the gods it is, manna from heaven. horrible...feh...you know not of what you speak Sirs. Now, good day...I SAID GOOD DAY!

 

 

 

 

 

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[Duce Lewis 3]

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SPAM horrible?!! Vulcanized pork?!!

 

Food of the gods it is, manna from heaven. horrible...feh...you know not of what you speak Sirs. Now, good day...I SAID GOOD DAY!

 

 

 

 

 

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It's all beginning to make sense now

...Vikings are from Minnesota

Marooned out on those long boats, they'll eat anything

[Olham 164]

Didn't know that sketch, Duce - the Monty's are absolutely bizarre, crazy, mad - but wonderful!

Now, how can I get rid of that picture in my mind: Lou with a Viking helmet on, singing "Spam, spam, spam -

it's manna from heaven!"

[Baldric 42]

SPAM is okay, but for a really good chew, nothing beats a tin of bully beef, washed down with tinned peaches

[Bullethead 12]

SPAM? Vulcanized pork???? Sounds horrible!?

 

My own aversion to the stuff comes from its association with miserable times. I can't think of Spam without recalling the circumstances under which I always seemed to eat it. Imagine your day beginning like this..... You awaken stiff, sore, cold, and soggy, rolled up in your shelter half. When you open your eyes, your vision's all blurred because the night's rain has filled in your sunken eye sockets. So you sit up to wipe that away and all the water that's collected in your helmet pours down the back of your neck. This produces a painful, chest-burning fit of coughing, which immediately triggers a migraine.

 

Not having eaten in a day or 2, you decide a good breakfast will make you feel better. So you root around in your sodden pack with your chapped, stiff, grimy fingers and pull out your last MRE, the one you been saving for a day like this. First thing, you find the packet of instant coffee and pour it down your throat dry, for quick headache releif and to numb your tastebuds for the horror to come. Then you get to the main course, which naturally is a packet of Spam. That's why this is the one that's still left--you ate all the good ones already. You tear the end off the pouch and squeeze but only get a whiff that smells like dogfood. The slab of cold Spam won't budge because it's glued to the inside by congealed grease. So you get out your plastic spoon and try to scoop some out, but the spoon breaks. Nothing for it now but to open the pouch completely, exposing the sticky mess inside to the blowing sand in the air, which is still flying around despite the continued rain. So you rotate to face downwind to shield your meal from the sand as much as possible, and start cutting and peeling the pouch. The wet plastic slips in your clumsy fingers and about 1/3 of the Spam slab breaks off and falls to the ground. You gnaw the rest off the remaining part of the pouch and, despite your best efforts, it still gets a fair amount of sand on it before it enters your mouth. So you don't chew it much and you swallow it quickly to get it off your tongue as fast as possible.

 

Ah, memories. That's why I don't eat Spam now.

[themightysrc 5]

Ah, you colonial heathens...

 

Despite all attempts to traduce the reputation of Spam - also commonly known, I'm reliably told, as The Breakfast Of Champions - it's still there in shops, squatting in its own inimitable, indigestible way. Believe it or not BH, there's recently been an advertising campaign on Briddish telly which shows happy enthusiastic Spam worshippers doing, er, interesting culinary things with Spam - although mostly frying it, IIRC. And all to the memorable little ditty: "Spam upppppppp... for the taste of it! Spam uppppppp....."

 

So, yes, Spam is alive and well in Blighty. Mind you, given that I live near Bury (pronounced Buuuuuuuuury), the centre of the universe in terms of black pudding, I really can't express too much surprise at this being the case. Me? I'm more your chateaubriand sort of champagne socialist, but there you go. Actually, champagne is overrated fizz and real ale is the answer to all our problems.

 

YMMV.

[Rickitycrate 10]

You're right on Lou. Spam is from our great state and Hawaii is the Capitol of Spam consumption. In Hawaii they serve a Spam and egg McMuffin at Rat Ronalds. It's in all the grocery stores and you don't have to hunt for it or buy it in shame. I think the Spam produts are going to do very well on the mainland when the big spenders get their way with the VAT tax coming our way soon.

[UK_Widowmaker 571]

 

 

Sorry guys...but you asked for it!!

Edited October 9, 2009 by UK_Widowmaker

[Mr. Lucky 0]

 

 

Sorry guys...but you asked for it!!

 

Now that was offensive!

 

When I was in the Navy, we'd have killed for spam at breakfast. We got some kind of mystery meat that no one knew the name for. It was round and sliced but that's about the only resemblance to anything. Probably a Hun trick from WWI to demoralize us.

[Olham 164]

Mr. Lucky: It was round and sliced but that's about the only resemblance to anything. Probably a Hun trick from WWI to demoralize us.

 

Yeah, yeah!! When we Huns build something round to demoralise you, it won't be eatable - it would explode!

 

In Germany we have a a kind of meat-mud, that is put into a form, until it is cutable -

Leberkäse (directly translated: liver cheese).

Now, maybe in some regions they know how to do it right, but I say:

I am really happy, that we exchange recepies with the French today, instead of granades.

[Rickitycrate 10]

The simple American wiener is not an attractive food item when you consider how it's made. But they get eaten every day by the tousands and fed to our children. Hey if it doesn't kill ya it makes you stronger.

Edited October 10, 2009 by Rickitycrate

[Olham 164]

(To be honest: sometimes I really like some "junk food" like a Hot Dog or a Hamburger. )

[UK_Widowmaker 571]

KFC!...Yum!

[JFM 18]

First, if I must use labels then I'm a Yank and a Yankee. Second, I only speak English and chew gum. Third, no words are going to hurt me, especially on any forum.

 

This quote is interesting: "However, if you call me a "yankee" then those are fighting words". Not the quote itself but what it illustrates, which in my experience has been and continues to be a strong US southern position to uphold a north/south division. Not to the point of taking up arms, mostly, but no question there is a want to seperate culturally. And that's fine with me--what do I care how people in South Carolina etc want to live? More power to them. But it is interesting to me that this cultural divide is lacking in the north.

 

Examples. I've lived in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Wisconsin, Ohio. In between I also lived in Oklahoma, Texas, South Carolina, and currently Florida. My first venture south was moving to SC when I was ten (1976, I'm 44). After I had been introduced to the class the first question asked of me by a new classmate was, exact quote, "Hey, boy, you a Yankee?" This from a ten year old; i.e., the Yankee/Rebel divide had already been instilled by his parents. I was confused; I thought he was asking if I liked the New York Yankees. Everywhere I've lived in the south I've been asked if I'm a Yankee--as if they can't tell by the way I talk quickly and through my nose. Everywhere I've lived in the south people bring up the Civil War and slavery and often I've endured vitriol about many aspects of each, usually starting with "You Yankees (fill in the blank with some Southern-regarded bad thing done by a northerner during the Civil War)." "You Yankees," as if I were alive in the 1860s. That's like me asking my friend Takashi "How can you look in the mirror after what you sonsabitches did to Pearl Harbor? You almost killed my grandfather and uncle!" Even if he had been alive and actually attacked Pearl Harbor, I wouldn't say that or feel that way--I'd ask him battle questions. Once during a conversation I told someone that my family had owned slaves, and I thought he was going to have a stroke. I didn't even get a chance to say that we don't currently own slaves and the relatives who owned slaves hundreds of years ago lived in North Carolina, a state content to steal the claim of the Wright Brothers but not one to consider themselves "Yankee." Two years ago a woman I had just met at a Christmas party went into a tyrade about General Sherman--this was out-of-the-blue; I guess she heard me speak and lumped me in with the actions of men who lived 150 years ago. Why associate me with any of these things? A few years ago nobody in Germany ever gave me a tyrade about General Patton. Why even go there at a Christmas party? IMO in many southerners it's deeply rooted culturally from a very early age.

 

I'm not saying all that is wrong and shouldn't be the way it is if that's how they want to live but, contrastingly, nobody cares about that up north. Well, I can't say nobody because I don't know everybody but in my life, nobody has cared about that. If I or any of my family or friends met someone with a southern accent, which has been a zillion times, we wouldn't dream of asking them "Hey, boy, you a Rebel?" Not because it might be offensive, but nobody gives a crap about that or thinks that way or projects the events of 150 years ago onto their current lives. If I heard a friend ask someone "you a Confederate?" I'd break out in guffaws over how drunk he must be and then good naturedly make fun of him for saying that. Never happened, though.

 

Again, I'm not eschewing anyone's right to say these things or feel that way. I just find it interesting that I've heard "if you call me a 'Yankee' then those are fighting words" a million times, but I've never heard "if you call me a 'Rebel' then those are fighting words." Ever. Why the difference, because the south lost? Because people today don't just make mountains out of molehills, they search for molehills to turn into mountains? I don't know. Here in Naples, I'm "below the south." I've gotten less "you Yankee?" here than in OKC or Dallas or Houston or Charleston. Maybe because there are not many southern accents here; everybody seems to be from somewhere else. Mostly northern Snowbirds or Spanish immigrants.

 

Anyway, perhaps some southerners can chime in.

[Waldemar Kurtz 1]

I've always found the use of "the Dark Side" to be generally good-natured here. but on places like theaerodrome.com I sometimes find that there is this believe that the Germans were decidedly more wicked and cruel than the rest of the world on some fundamental level.

 

this seems to ignore the fact that England and France had some of the largest colonial empires in the world! did they treat their colonial subjects well? by the standards of the day they certainly did-- but it's still not very good by today's standards.

 

the Germans did bomb civilians with the Zeppelin and Gotha raids-- but this seems to overlook that the British and the French pursued night bombardment raids with even greater zeal than the Germans-- but little or no mention is made of the collateral damage and civilian deaths attributed to these raids.

 

the winners write history is definitely true. how many history books will mention Hitler's bombing strikes against civilians in London and neglect to mention Curtis LeMay's indiscriminate bombing of civilians in Japan?

 

the zeppelins were the beginning--but certainly not the last word.

 

yeah, the German nation was definitely 'the bad guys' in World War One. but on closer inspection everybody ends up looking pretty bad by the end-- well, maybe not the Belgians-- but maybe that's because I haven't read up on them as much as England, France, or Germany!

 

it always annoys me when people act as if the righteousness of the Allied nations can't be questioned... because it was always a relative measure against the Centra/Axis nations.

 

 

[RAF_Louvert 101]

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Waldemar Kurtz wrote:

I sometimes find that there is this believe that the Germans were decidedly more wicked and cruel than the rest of the world on some fundamental level. This seems to ignore the fact that England and France had some of the largest colonial empires in the world!

WK, those very points are touched on in this little vignette:

 

 

Blackadder Explains How The War Started

 

(yes I know I've posted this before, but it seems apropos yet again)

 

 

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(Above link repaired Oct 21, 09)

Edited October 21, 2009 by RAF_Louvert

[Bullethead 12]

we wouldn't dream of asking them "Hey, boy, you a Rebel?" Not because it might be offensive, but nobody gives a crap about that or thinks that way or projects the events of 150 years ago onto their current lives.

 

Obviously, sir, if you think the south's aversion to yankees all comes from the 1860s, you are sadly misinformed, or rather uninformed. The north-south division was brought over here by the colonists--it was just the same old English vs. Scots feud taken to a different arena. As such, the north has always treated the south like England has treated Scotland through most of recorded history, and continues to do so down to the present day. And the Hell of it is, you yankees don't even realize you're doing it, or if you do, you think we should realize its for our own good and just bend over for it.

 

But this ain't the place to get into such arguments, and there are far more pressing problems in the world to argue about anyway. So let's just agree to disagree on this and go back to flying OFF.

[Olham 164]

Yep, let's not step into the trap of raising a kind of political debate about those wars.

Otherwise the poor old ostrich really died for nothing.

[Waldemar Kurtz 1]

hah, good clip.

 

I haven't gotten around to watching that season of Blackadder yet. will have to add on my list of things to do.

 

that's worth posting over and over again.

rotfl

 

 

[Wels 2]

Hello,

Waldemar Kurtz wrote (among some other )

 

" ...I've always found the use of "the Dark Side" to be generally good-natured here. but on places like theaerodrome.com I sometimes find that there is this believe that the Germans were decidedly more wicked and cruel than the rest of the world on some fundamental level. ...

 

Yes, already became aware of this in the Aerodrome. The thing is that Germany had a propaganda department when the war broke out, something that England then also hastily created, and then refined to a new state-of-the-art. What is really disturbing is that some of it is still taught in schools, and can be even bought as books in hundreds of stores today. This is no joke, i did quite some research on this.

British government propaganda heavily affected the culture of publishing during the War. Formerly neutral publishers spontaneously, or forced, published all kinds of black and white propaganda material like "historical" books in the guise of being perfectly neutral - wasn't their publishing house renowned for neutral and factual reporting ?

It is not that Germany would not liked to also have done this, if they only could, but the British propaganda ministry was far "better" and brought intended education and despise for "Prussia" as a general point of view to a new standard. This was not so easy, since parts of Germany (especially Prussia back then) had helped England more than once before, and vice versa, during the war against Napoleon and other events - and the Royal houses of now-Germany and England were closely related. Up to 1866 the Kingdom of Hannover was reigned by a british monarch, the "personal union".

 

People in Germany and especially soldiers were almost helpless against this new kind of "trick" and did not know how to counter this, which then developed in a definite hate against allied propaganda, and some obvious lies. Together with the british blockade and its effect on civilians this propaganda was one of the things that later made it easy for Hitler to stir the pot - who certainly used his own kind.

yeah, the German nation was definitely 'the bad guys' in World War One. but on closer inspection everybody ends up looking pretty bad by the end-- well, maybe not the Belgians-- but maybe that's because I haven't read up on them as much as England, France, or Germany!

it always annoys me when people act as if the righteousness of the Allied nations can't be questioned... because it was always a relative measure against the Centra/Axis nations.

 

This is what i thought, however i have changed my view, of only a bit. In WW1, Germany as such was not the bad guy. It was in WW2, but not during the "Great War", before they had to number them.

 

 

 

Regarding the bombing Zeppelins, those were not the immediate beginning of bombing, french planes had already attacked the city of Freiburg before and killed some civilians, but pointing fingers at anyone is of no use here. It is all about strategy, and always disregarding humane matter . Zeppelins were more feared than they did harm, but in the minds of the time, especially in those who had read H.G. Wells' "The war in the air" those big ships able to carry tons of bombs and suddenly appearing above London, felt like the doom of mankind. And until 1917 there was no way to cope with this threat. Apart from navigation errors and lots of accidents of airships there was no way to hinder german airships entering Englands air space.

 

Greetings,

Catfish

[Flyby PC 23]

Just reading Richard Van Emdens book 'The Soldiers War - The Great War through Veterans' Eyes', and came across this which seemed right on topic -

 

"Throughout the war, the nicknames given to the enemy by British soldiers reflected the attitude and feelings of men towards their couterparts at any particular time. Hun, kraut, Boche, squarehead were the more abusive; Allyman, Jerry, Fritz, Johnny, even (surprisingly) Dutchmen, were less abrasive, while sometimes the names seemed to combine respect with abuse, such as 'Brother Boche'. According to one tank officer, Frank Mitchell MC, the names changed as the war progressed. The talk of German 'frightfulness' was at its most vociferous in 1914 and 1915 and as a consequence 'when feeling against them was very strong, they were called the Hun, or simply Huns'. During the Somme offensives in 1916, Fritz came into use, probably from a growing respect for the enemy's fighting qualities. Mitchell believed that the name 'Jerry' came into common usage later in the war, also as a sign of respect."

 

 

Don't know the origins for sure, but I always thought Jerries was derived from the GER in German.

 

[Olham 164]

Very interesting, thank you. Yes, Jerry as slang for GERman would make the most sense to me, too.

[gordohk 1]

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Waldemar Kurtz wrote:

WK, those very points are touched on in this little vignette:

 

 

Blackadder Explains How The War Started

 

 

(yes I know I've posted this before, but it seems apropos yet again)

 

 

.

 

link doesn't work as it appears to have been yanked due to BBC copy right infringement claim

[themightysrc 5]

"This is what i thought, however i have changed my view, of only a bit. In WW1, Germany as such was not the bad guy."

 

I think it's fairly well agreed that there was plenty of blame to hand around for WWI, however it's not disputable that the essential causes of the war were German militarism which arose from having a non-democratic form of government allied to a desire to make an empire - not unreasonable from the contemporary POV in Germany, but a tad awkward for Italy, Britain and France. Essentially, it was a war between flawed democracies and even more flawed military imperial oligarchies. To deconstruct the war renders ideas of 'good' and 'bad' ultimately meaningless, however there is a strong argument to be made - and has been made by Prof. Gary Sheffield, amongst others - that the Entente victory in WWI spared Europe a rather unpleasant period of Axis domination. That said, WWII showed up the absurdity of WWI by Hitler harnessing false grievances from the first war to ensure that a second one became inevitable.

[RAF_Louvert 101]

link doesn't work as it appears to have been yanked due to BBC copy right infringement claim

 

Here is the current link gordohk:

 

Blackadder Explains How The War Started

 

Cheers!

 

Lou