It’s a cultural kind of thing, I guess. If a German dials the wrong number here he sometimes freaks and gets flustered and unfriendly and then just hangs up without saying anything, or much of anything. That particular phone call wasn’t planned to happen, you see, and Germans don’t like that kind of stuff. Everything has to nach Plan gehen (go as planned). And when it doesn’t nach Plan gehen and they dial the wrong number, well, it’s like they hold you responsible for being on the wrong (or is it right?) end of the line. Nein times out of ten, I would say, you get something like “Christoph? Wer (who)? Huh?" and then click.

Although I must say that every once in awhile I do actually get somebody friendly who will start apologizing and the whole bit, but the last few times that happened it quickly started rubbing me the wrong way for some strange reason and I got all aggressive and I told them to bite me and then hung up.

But I’m not paranoid yet. Honest.

PS: When you answer the phone here it is expected of you to be polite and use your name, you know, like “Schmidt” or something. I don’t do that anymore because I’m tired of always hearing “Wer ?” etc. Well, actually if I’m in a good mood, I do. But then I really do use “Schmidt” or whatever name happens to come to mind at that moment.