In the early autumn, over pizza and wine, I had a conversation with a dear friend. He’s Turkish. We were in Ayvalık, a small town on Turkey’s Aegean coast, talking about cultural imprints, when he suddenly paused and looked at me. “You know what?” he said. “Whenever I ask you how you are, you never really answer. You go into a meta space immediately – talking about politics or about bigger things that worry you – but you never say how you actually are.”
I’ve been thinking about his observation ever since, debating in my mind whether it was true – and I’ve recently reached the conclusion that, unfortunately, he was right. As much as I like to be perceived as an easygoing person, the question “How are you?” stresses me out immensely. I freeze when asked and wish we could just skip it. I’d be ashamed to dive into a deep analysis of my being – which, secretly, is exactly what I’d love to do. But that might be overwhelming for the other person and impolite – not to say unfair to burden them with my inner troubles.
In most countries that I am familiar with – say, Turkey or the UK – people greet each other with a polite: “Hello, how are you?” No one expects much of an answer, just a friendly, harmless: “I’m fine, how are you?” It’s more of a social lubricant or a ritual than a real request for information. But in Germany, “How are you?” is anything but simple. It’s a sort of trick question. “I’m fine” is considered otherworldly, naive, shallow, delulu – and, most of all, dishonest. Who is fine, really? We feel compelled to answer truthfully while simultaneously debating how much to reveal and how honest to be without losing face.
Here’s my theory: we have a profound aversion to letting ourselves appear vulnerable, and a suspicion of superficiality. We can’t say something just for the sake of good vibes. Everything must be serious. Some might say that this obsession with depth is a good thing: no fake smiles, no empty politeness – and above all, precision. The German language has the ability to capture entire inner worlds in a single word. Who else has Weltschmerz (a sorrow or melancholy about the state of the world), or Geborgenheit (the feeling of safety and warmth)? But do those words really serve as a display of emotional range – or do they function more like fortresses to hide behind, protecting us from actually showing how we feel?
Over the years, as a journalist, I have interviewed many female authors and artists who grew up in Germany in the 1930s and 1940s. Many told me that, in their childhood, “How are you?” was an absent question – no one ever asked it. I think our issue with it is an intergenerational inheritance. It is tied to the devastations of the first half of the 20th century, and to what is often called German angst – that collective tendency toward anxiety, pessimism and overcaution. It carries echoes of shame and postwar guilt, and it keeps us from opening up, from taking risks, and – most tellingly – from speaking up when it matters.
