Talk:Muenster, Texas

Untitled

Hello, Im from Münster, Germany. Funny to read that there is a town in Texas named after my resident town. And funny that you have a Christkindlesmarkt in Muenster, Texas, which actually we don't have in Westphalia :-) Greetings from one M ü/ue nster to the other! Stern 21:20, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I've actually never lived in Muenster, but it is my father's hometown. I don't think anyone in Muenster has ever heard of Wikipedia.

A lot of Germans ended up in Texas, as you can tell by the fact that the name Westphalia was already taken. I know a good number of the local families aren't originally from Westphalia, which probably explains the Christkindlmarkt. Of course, I'm sure its very good for tourism. The town plays up its heritage with the tourists. There's three German restaurants in town; the one the tourists like makes its waitresses wear little Bavarian-style costumes.

I did make a point to go to Münster while in Germany, just to see the original. My family got a big kick out of that. Laura Scudder 00:13, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I'm originally from northern Germany and there and here in the west the people are wondering (and smiling) about the german image abroad (not only in the US): Oktoberfests, Christkindlesmarkts, leather throusers, Alpes, this typical Tiroler Hut (even from Austria) etc. It would look very funny if someone in Münster would wear this. My teacher lived in Anchorage, Alaska for a while. He told me there was an advertisement for the Airport Frankfurt. But the photo showed someone in leather throusers. Very funny. But I think it is a cosy image and better than the militant stereotype, which still lives since 60 years in some heads abroad because of WWII. I lived in Sweden for a while and the image of Germany there is similar, even though it is so close. A French girl even told me, she thought Germans never laugh, before she studied here. Are there still buildings or symbols in Muenster, Texas that you found in Münster, Westphalia too? Or is it just the name that survived? Did you like Münster (it is not my hometown, you don't have to be polite :-)? Stern 07:59, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I wasn't in Münster very long, so unfortunately I don't really remember forming much beyond a superficial opinion of it - been a few years since that trip. I think that most everyone who eventually settled in Muenster were from all over the country (my own relatives were from somewhere in Prussia, I think Pomerania - the story is kinda vague but centers on wanting to avoid impressment) which explains the weird amalgamation of German traditions from all over.

They have rather a vested interest in keeping the general American image of Germans as fun as possible (lederhosen and all) since their tourism rather centers on the town's ethnic traditions. (I imagine that after the wartime propaganda that was rather difficult. However, the majority of the post-war animosity I've noticed is from the pacific theater, which we fought in longer and where we lost more people.) The small towns that totally Americanized are doing a good job at reclaiming their old heritage in the name of tourism dollars (ie Caldwell, Texas, which has gone from unregonizable as orignally Czech to the self-proclaimed "Kolache capital of Texas"). Muenster's annual Germanfest is a little like this.

When I lived in Germany a Norwegian friend started talking about a politician in his homeland who wore lederhosen and whose main platform was that hunting and whaling should remain legal. I had a pretty solid stereotype of lederhosen as a German thing, when of course I didn't see any in Germany, and here is a Norwegian politician strutting around in them, which was a pretty entertaining thought. There's some amusing American political figures for sure, but none in lederhosen. Laura Scudder 02:31, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)