"Spießer" (that symbol "ß," by the way, is nothing more exotic than the equivalent of a double "s") is one of those words that's nearly impossible to translate. A "Spießer" is a square, a bourgeois type, someone who has their house and their lawn and their two-point-whatever kids.
It's generally used as an insult, but this bank is clearly trying to work against that (as part of a campaign for their building loans and retirement plans – as if Germans needed more encouragement to save, build houses and have retirement funds!).
Here's the ad from my bread bag:
It consists of 26 images of household items, with a little box to check if you own that thing. The items range from the simple (a comb, a doormat) to the rather ridiculous (a cuckoo clock). As a special bonus, try to spot the quintessentially German ones like the little egg cup cozy, for keeping your soft-boiled egg warm at breakfast!
I'm pleased to say I only have 11 of the 26, which doesn't seem too bad, especially when even a clothes pin or a tea ball qualifies! (And shut up, yes I have a tea ball; I live in Germany where I make a lot of loose-leaf tea.)
The whole Spießer thing reminded me of a TV ad from several years back (unsurprising, since it turns out to be for the same bank). In it, you see a father and daughter living in one of these counterculture caravan parks you can still find occasionally around Germany (holdovers, I'd say, from a generation ago, when Germany was more alternative than it is now...)
The daughter is talking a bit wistfully about kids in her class who have their own bedroom, or an apartment with a view over the whole city. The dad says dismissively, "They're all Spießer." Digesting this, his daughter looks up at him with big eyes and declares, "Papa, when I grow up, I want to be a Spießer too!" ...And the father spits out his coffee in shock.
It's pretty cute, here you go:
I can't see them all so well, but I seem to have about 14 of them (of course including the tea ball, of which we have five). I'm hardly surprised that I'm more Spießer than you. Is the first one a Green Man?? Oh no, it's a cuckoo clock! A Green Man would probably be more counterculture than square.
ReplyDelete!! If you have a Green Man (or any other pagan deity or symbol) in your house, I hereby give you permission to automatically subtract 5 points from your Spießer total :-)
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