- \n
- you can do anything you want unless there is a law stopping you<\/li>\n
- you cannot do anything unless there is a law permitting you to do it<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
I guess there are more countries with (1) and the UK is an example. This results in instructions [rules, laws \u2026] that tell you not to do things, which seems a little negative, but is ultimately quite freeing.<\/p>\n
I was in Germany recently and commented to a colleague that I did not see too many instructions telling me not to do things. He said that, first, I should look again and, second, that I should remember my very limited German language knowledge. So, I started making some observations.<\/p>\n
I visited the health suite in the hotel, as I wanted to have a sauna to relax at the end of the day. Outside of the sauna were some instructions, which were helpfully in English as well as German. There was quite a long list, most of which was standard stuff about people with heart conditions etc., but 3 rules stood out:<\/p>\n
- \n
- Users should shower before using the sauna (for hygiene reasons)<\/strong> – I can accept that one, as I do not want to be sitting next to a sweating, grubby person.<\/li>\n
- Users should sit\/lie on a towel to avoid sweat staining the woodwork<\/strong> – This is also reasonable, but I cannot help thinking that using a sweat-resistant material for the benches would be better, but I guess the wood is traditional.<\/li>\n
- Users should not wear swimming costumes (for hygiene reasons)<\/strong> – I am aware that Germans are very disapproving of the British\/American practice of wearing bathing clothes in a sauna. I have heard the word \u201cdisgusting\u201d used. The logic is that, when you sweat, all the toxins come out and you shower to get rid of them; if you wear a costume, the toxins soak into the fabric and are held close to your skin and a shower will not necessarily help. I do not question the logic<\/em> of the rule, but I do question whether it should be rule. As it only really affects the individual, should they not simply be given advice for their own wellbeing?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Elsewhere, prohibitions were expressed in other ways. For example, I saw a door [to a small museum] with some instructions on it:<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/51\/2019\/03\/CW-1-520x558.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nThe textual instructions stretched my German somewhat, but I figured out that they said \u201cno newspapers\u201d and \u201cno adverts\u201d – basically \u201cno junk mail\u201d. The graphical instruction was very clear about what they did not want done in their doorway! [Public restrooms are scarce in this part of the city.] The green squiggle is my censorship. If you would really like to see the original for your own amusement, please email<\/a> me.<\/p>\n
I have probably given the impression that Germany is a country where, actually, you are always being told what [not] to do. Maybe that is true, but I smile when I think back to the time we spent New Year in Berlin<\/a>. On every street corner there was someone setting off rockets from bottles. There were no signs warning about the health and safety issues!<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/s3-blogs.mentor.com\/colinwalls\/files\/2014\/01\/linkedin.png\")
<\/a>![\"\"](\"http:\/\/s3-blogs.mentor.com\/colinwalls\/files\/2014\/01\/twitter.png\")
<\/a>![\"\"](\"http:\/\/s3-blogs.mentor.com\/colinwalls\/files\/2014\/01\/facebook.png\")
<\/a>![\"\"](\"http:\/\/s3-blogs.mentor.com\/colinwalls\/files\/2014\/01\/wordpress.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I have concluded that perhaps I am not the easiest person to live with. There are a selection of reasons…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":71677,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spanish_translation":"","french_translation":"","german_translation":"","italian_translation":"","polish_translation":"","japanese_translation":"","chinese_translation":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[302],"industry":[],"product":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-8922","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-off-topic"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8922","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/71677"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8922"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8922\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10767,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8922\/revisions\/10767"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8922"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8922"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8922"},{"taxonomy":"industry","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/industry?post=8922"},{"taxonomy":"product","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product?post=8922"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=8922"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
- Users should sit\/lie on a towel to avoid sweat staining the woodwork<\/strong> – This is also reasonable, but I cannot help thinking that using a sweat-resistant material for the benches would be better, but I guess the wood is traditional.<\/li>\n
- Users should shower before using the sauna (for hygiene reasons)<\/strong> – I can accept that one, as I do not want to be sitting next to a sweating, grubby person.<\/li>\n