OUR MONEY CULTURE CLASH
We met back in 2015, our first conversation happened whilst sat on the floor in a Cambodian orphanage trying to entertain overly energetic children. A world away from our daily lives, and a slice of humble pie that our relationship grew from.
Roman is German and I’m British, and we’ve always found each others’ cultures and traditions fascinating and often just really funny.
Sayings such as:
‘Das Leben ist kein Ponyhof’ (‘Life is not a pony farm’) – life isn’t a bed of roses
and, ‘Ich glaub mein Schwein pfeift’ (I think my pig whistles‘) - I think I’m going off my rocker
have made it into our general day-to-day communication very effortlessly, and just one example of how we’ve blended cultures over the years.
One part of our culture, however, that wasn’t so easy to blend, was our attitudes to money.
During our backpacking days we were on the same wavelength – what’s the cheapest and most efficient way to do everything we want to. But real life is different. Real life has rent, bills, and all of the other stuff that comes along with it.
For years we were long distance, London <-> Germany, more recently Germany <-> Singapore, and after I had enough of the extreme pandemic-related restrictions on travel to Singapore, we decided to move in together, for real, in Germany.
This is when the real learning started – and here’s what I’ve recently found out.
Status is about finding the best possible deal
Saving money is really important to Roman, and as far as I know, to most German people too as the roots of German austerity run deep into history. German savings banks are legally mandated to encourage and promote saving, which they do with the support of local school authorities.
It’s a different story in the UK, and my lack of consistent saving and blasé attitude to money in general is stressful for him.
In the UK we tend to talk about money less than here in Germany. Germans will ask you directly how much things have cost and will tell you openly that you are an idiot if you pay over the top for something. They will look down on you for spending too much - having status (and respect) is about finding good quality items for the best deal around.
This first started becoming apparent when we were shortlisting flats to view and I was asked ‘well what’s the square metre price’… I was baffled – in London if a flat has two double bedrooms you kind of know what you’re getting. Before I knew it, we were only viewing flats in an acceptable ‘square metre price range’ that aligned with the government guidelines. It felt restrictive to me, but to Roman it was a non-negotiable.
Finding an appropriate deal goes into day-to-day life too and life in Germany makes this easy to do. Delivered to my front door every week is a stack of leaflets with all the ‘next weeks’ offers’ from the stores nearby. In the UK, this would be junk mail and generally ignored. In Germany, people actually read them. Roman will always wait until something is in the offer before he gets it. When Nutella is on offer, he’ll come home with five jars of it. Becks beer is clearly on offer when I see the stack of beer crates in the basement (to be fair 9.99 euros for 20x0.5L bottles is a good deal!).
Research is key to feeling good about money
If Roman needs a bigger purchase like a laptop or washing machine, firstly he’ll do everything he can to fix it himself, but if he must spend money, he’ll do research for at least a month until making a choice.
I’m impatient in all aspects of life, and my values on money reflect that. Amazon Prime is a dear friend of mine and if I like something, I’ll just get it rather than waiting for a sale. Needless to say, I cannot be bothered with research and when it came to furnishing our flat – this was a nightmare. A total clash of values, culture and personalities.
It’s taken me a while to understand that Roman needs to do this research for the benefit of feeling good longer-term. If he spends too much money on something, he’d feel annoyed every time he uses it. For me – this wouldn’t cross my mind!
So what’s the moral of the story?
My Dad tells me that I’m ‘independent and stubborn’ - which I completely agree with, but when moving in together, that had to change.
Instead of getting frustrated, I started to ask more questions to learn ‘why’ these were his money views. I had to unlearn what I thought money was (gratification for today) and started to show myself some respect by treating my money better.
Although I’ll never be one to take up the offers in the local magazines, we now have a much better understanding of each others’ values. Which will come in handy for our next challenging money task… wedding planning!