The German Phenomenon of House Shoes

Walk into the front door of any German house, and you'll be confronted with shoes. Shoes upon shoes upon shoes. In my in-law's house, for example, there is a a shelf full if shoes - dress, crocs, Birkenstocks, hiking boots you name it - that goes all the way to the ceiling. It's on your right side when you walk in the front door, and it contains enough shoes to cover the feet of every football player in the AFC North. They sit in slots upon slots, sort of like the key-holders of an old-fashioned hotel.

You see, there's never a moment, especially for German men, when their feet are exposed to open air. That means wearing socks with sandals, and that means having different shoes for indoors and out.

I am, of course, a product of the great state of Florida. Whatever else that may mean, it also means that I love the flip flops. I love the moment when my feet are freed from the confines of shoes and socks and, naked as the day they were born, exposed to the earth's atmosphere. Need to go outside? Put on your flip flops and embrace the tan lines. Need to come in side? Kick off the flip flops if you want, but it's a pretty laissez faire attitude towards foot ware. Part of the thrill of getting home from work was always to free my feet from their prison of leather and cloth and feel the coolness of our home carpets.

This is also different than the Japanese custom, where any foot gear inside is verboten (to use a German term). In college, I had a Japanese study partner. Whenever she came to my college apartment (which at the time, I shared with two good friends), she would remove her sneakers and place them neatly upon our the illegible brown scratchy thing that passed for our welcome mat. She said she couldn't believe how we Americans would soil our floors by wearing our foot gear inside. I was worried our carpet would soil her otherwise clean feet. Of course, if we studied at her apartment, I would forget the rule and step like a clumsy barbarian, full shoe upon her silky, white, shampooed and conditioned floor. I would then meet an icy stare from my study partner and wondered if I hat kicked over some Japanese holy scripture-book. Then I would see the impeccably straight row of sandals and sneakers by the door and retreat to the front door to remove my foul sandals, sniffing like a punished puppy.

Here in Germany, it's not a matter of taking your shoes off, but it's about constantly changing your shoes. Whenever you come inside, you take off your outdoor shoes and put on your house shoes. Whenever you go out the back door, you take off your house shoes and you put on your garden shoes. A good German has the appropriate shoes at every exit, and appropriate house shoes waiting for them, perhaps more.

There are several varieties of house shoes. There's what we Americans would call bedroom slippers - warm cushy things to make February more liveable. Crocs are very popular here, both the name brand and a variety of imitations. They also double as garden shoes, but you're not supposed to have your indoor crocs be your garden shoes. But the most popular house shoes by far are Birkenstocks. Birkenstocks migrated to the United States on the feet of hippies, and millions of us like them for their comfort. But, weather permitting, we wear them everywhere, and without socks. After a couple of months, an American's Birkenstock sandals each have a foot imprint that perfectly matches the owner's foot for maximum comfort. That footprint is always so black that one wonders if the American's bathroom floor is made of coal.

Most Germans exclusively wear their Birkenstocks inside. Men always wear them with socks, as if their toes would fall off if given too much oxygen. Although I suspect the real reason here is hygiene. Keep in mind, if you wear socks with your sandals, you will be less likely to have feet that smell like a cattle farm at the end of the day - "cheese feet" is what the Germans call them.

And frankly, I'm a bit insecure because I don't know if I have the shoes to keep up. Sure, I have some bedroom slippers for the winter (somewhere), but if I put them on in the summer, my feet sweat like a jungle explorer in a cannibal's stew pot. I went and bought some generic crocs at Lidl (a store that must be the result of breeding Trader Joe's and Wal-Mart), but then I discovered that these shoes were good for painting the house, but I couldn't wear them anywhere else. I would need painting shoes (for good reason), garden shoes, outdoor shoes, and house shoes, not to mention other outdoor and indoor shoes for every entrance of the house. And this does not include your basic running shoes, dress shoes or hiking shoes. I think that, per year, the average German spends as much time changing shoes as Americans spend watching television (ok, maybe not that much).

In the coming weeks, I have to get to a store and get a couple more pairs of generic crocs and maybe some Birkenstock sandals. In the meantime, I'm still wearing my Gap sandals everywhere. The cheese feet of the loud American.