Before I moved to Berlin, I had this idea in my head that Europe was one big classy, glamorous place where everyone dressed to the nines and ate gourmet food. Basically, I thought that the entire continent was the fancier parts of Paris or London. It took all of a day in Berlin to shatter that image, but I’m constantly learning new facets of Germany’s culture (or, lack of culture, as some German friends like to put it). Like every nation on this great planet we call home, Germany has its fair share of terrible pop music, reality television, and awful mass-market films. As someone who grew up somewhere else, I find a lot of this fascinating. I gobble up Schlager, televised spectacles, and vampire movies set in Berlin from the perspective of an anthropologist doing some cultural research. Or, that’s what I tell everyone, anyway. I secretly might like some of it.

Of course, many North Americans still think Europe is a classy place and that Germans are highly organized people who would rather debate philosophy than watch sketch comedy, so I am going to do everything I can to shatter that image. Thus, I bring you “German Video of the Week,” in which I will post a new German video each week. Now, I won’t limit this to “trash culture,” as there certainly are many Germans who enjoy classical music and expressionist cinema and focusing on the lowest of the lowbrow pop culture won’t fairly represent the culture of this country. Therefore, I’ll try to post as many of the odd, crazy, beautiful, interesting, and terrible German videos that I can find.

This week, I bring you a Schlager tune titled, “Und wir waren wie Vampire,” which translates roughly as, “And we were like Vampires.” I think that, even if you can’t understand any of the words, you can enjoy the cheesy costumes and terrible “Thriller” rip-off dancing.