One of my guilty pleasures is watching the German soap opera Lindenstrasse. I started watching it in 1985, when it first started and I was at university in Germany. I started watching again when I finally got a laptop that was capable of playing the web stream. To my delight, the majority of the characters I remembered were still there; except for one kid, there had not been any recasts. Some of the former child actors are now in their thirties while the former romantic leads are now grandparents. What makes the show interesting is the fact that the unapologetically left-wing creators of the show have the characters comment on recent events. Follow me below the fold for more.
The big deal this months was of course the Bundestag elections. Lindenstrasse has been known to insert up-to-the-minute election results into the plot itself (which sometimes requires the filming of alternate scenarios). Another trademark of the show is gay and lesbian couples who are accepted by all their neighbors and have everyday problems.
This week, the comments concerned the coalition between CDU and FDP, which will result in Angela Merkel remaining chancellor and Guido Westerwelle becoming Secretary of State. Anyway, the focus of the last episode was on a family whose youngest daughter (14) just found out she is pregnant. Before that bombshell burst, the scene showed her grandfather Adi (real name Adolf -- "I can't help it that my parents were stupid"), a former left-wing radical who named his conservative sons Jimi (as in Hendrix) and Ernesto (as in Guevara). Adi was reading the newspaper and went, "This is what people voted for -- Westerwelle representing us abroad! Westerwelle! As Secretary of State! During a crisis! What were people thinking?!?" Adi's daughter-in-law, Mitzi, tried to calm him down (after all, he's a diabetic with heart problems) and pointed out that Angela had done a decent job so far. Adi: "Yes, but WESTERWELLE!!!"
Then the result of young Caroline's pregnancy test hit the fan, which marked the end of the political discussion.
After viewing the week's episode, I usually go to the message board to read other viewer's comments. This time there were several who agreed with Adi. They expressed their worries about being represented abroad by a politician who comes across as arrogant and pretentious. One viewer wrote:
People in other countries already hate us because they think we're arrogant, and now we have a Secretary of State whose picture appears under "arrogance" in the dictionary.
The writer of this comment saw as a proof of his/her concerns that Westerwelle had refused to speak English with an international reporter.
The next comment said:
But the other countries can't hang the Nazi label on us anymore, now that we have a female chancellor and an openly gay Secretary of State.
Another viewer's response:
Thank God he is gay. At least he has one thing going for him.