Chapter Two: Cashless First Weekend

When we first arrived in Germany, we walked off the plane into the sunshine on a new continent after flying all night to get there. After collecting our mountains of luggage and piling it into three separate cars, we headed to the hotel. This was to be our new “home” for the next several weeks. After dragging all our belongings into the large, quadruple room, I practically collapsed onto the hotel beds. I knew the quickest way to adjust to the new time zone was to stay awake all day and go to bed early, but I just couldn’t keep my eyes open. So after all our helpers left the hotel room, I lay down and napped with my two and five year olds for a couple of hours.

Thus we didn’t have an opportunity to get to a bank before they all closed that Friday afternoon. We didn’t have any Euros and no way to exchange our dollars. While I napped my husband took off with one of his co-workers to go pick up the rental van and get his military ID at the nearby Army base. These two tasks took him the entire afternoon, so he also didn’t make it to the bank before closing time that day.

Therefore, we were left without any useable cash for our first weekend in Germany. Luckily, our airport greeters had stocked our hotel room with some very basic and necessary items such as bread, milk, cereal, lunch meat and cheese. We just didn’t realize that most small shops and markets in Germany still close on Saturday afternoon and don’t reopen till Monday morning. We also had grown accustomed to our American cashless society and it was a bit of a shock to us that we now needed cash (Euros) for most everything, everywhere we went; museums, markets, grocery stores, bakeries, post office, etc.

On Saturday we slept late, ate breakfast, got dressed and then walked to town in the late afternoon. By the time we reached, what appeared to be the city center, everything was closed. There was one small grocery store still open but they were cash only. And there was one Schlecker store open (a German drugstore chain) but again, they only took cash. So we enjoyed our walk and seeing the small town center and the fresh air, but everything was closed.

Back in America, I could write personal checks at most all places but Europeans had already removed most personal checks from their banking and commerce at the time we lived in Germany. Now that we are back in America, our country is also moving that direction. Most places in my hometown that use to accept checks, now remove those funds electronically, on the spot, and then hand my paper check back to me. Thus, it now makes a debit card a better choice for payment at those places.

So I learned in Germany to always, always, take my keys, cell phone and cash (Euros) before leaving the house. Large department stores and highly touristy places would take credit cards and especially on large purchases but most places still wanted and preferred to use cash.