Today marks the 15th anniversary of German reunification and since 1990 this day (October 3rd) has been Germany’s national holiday. Schools, government offices, and most businesses are closed, but if you happened to be visiting Germany today unless you knew why everything was closed, chances are you wouldn’t have had any idea that today was the national holiday.
This is the fourth “Tag der deutschen Einheit” that I have been in Germany and I think that it is fair to say that unlike the Fourth of July (aka Independence Day) in America, “Reunification Day” in Germany tends to be a pretty low-key event. There are a few parades here and there, the occasional fireworks display, and there might be a speech from the Chancellor commemorating the day that the five reestablished federal states of East Germany formally joined the West, but that is about it.
The reasons for this are varied: One explanation that I have heard has to do with the fact that the high cost of reunification has become quite a bit of a black eye on the German economy and the other that I have heard has historical grounds: Because of The Third Reich, Germans seem to be reluctant to celebrate their nationality in the gung-ho manner of say… Americans.
However instead of these reasons, I would like to propose that the reason Germans don’t celebrate their national holiday in a grand manner has mostly to do with the fact that it is in autumn. In my opinion, fall just isn’t conducive to such a holiday: The kids are no longer on summer vacation and the days are short, cool, and more often than not, rainy. Seriously, who wants to stand outside and watch a parade in the rain or see a fireworks display while bundled up in winter coats?
For me the fun of America’s Fourth of July was always about spending the day seeing the parades, grilling hotdogs or hamburgers, swimming or boating until you are as red as the stripes on the flag, and waiting until it finally gets dark enough at 9 or 10 pm for the fireworks display that had been a whole year in the making.
And though I am not passionately patriotic, on the Fourth of July I was always proud to be an American and thanked my lucky stars that I lived in a place where I enjoyed such independence. (At least I felt that way until a certain moron came into office and slowly began whittling away at my most basic freedoms… but I digress.)
But imagine Independence Day in October: Parades in the rain (or maybe even the snow!) and if your grill does manage to heat up, instead of cooking a burger you would rather warm your hands over it. You can forget about swimming and maybe if you are lucky you can see the fireworks from your kitchen window while you are eating your dinner because the sun has already set and the kids have to be in bed soon because they have school the next day.
Honestly, what kind of a national holiday is that anyway?
Therefore in an effort to reawaken the German population’s interest in their own holiday, I propose moving Germany’s national holiday to sometime in August. (August 19th sounds like a good date to me.) Most Germans are already on vacation in August anyway and I believe that if the holiday is celebrated in appropriate summertime glory everyone would like it better anyhow.