Wed, 15 June 2016, 8:06 am: Oh, I will. I just won’t be taking it from this particular store.
We just landed in Dusseldorf a little while ago, so it’s too early to load up on souvenirs. In retrospect, though, I’ll wish I’d purchased one of these.
I think those are chocolate bars but I just want the packaging, for the cool rendering of the cityscape.
Fresh off an overnight flight— no shower, little sleep, and even less coffee— and I don’t look half bad. That’s not meant to sound boastful; it’s my awareness of how truly bad I COULD look under these circumstances.
There’s a surprise, alright, when you’re an American tourist who starts gnawing on one of these chocolate eggs thinking it’s just like one of our typical Cadbury “creme”-filled Easter eggs. Decreed years ago by the US government to be choking hazards and therefore illegal in the States, these are actually plastic toys with a layer of chocolate encasing them.
File these death treats along with David Hasselhoff in the “Why is it predominantly Germans who go crazy over this?” cabinet, but this “candy” is actually produced by Italians… the same Italians who manufacture Nutella and those Ferrero Rocher chocolate balls advertised on TV at Christmas time in snobby British accents.
I witness time and again on my European travels how much less uptight German parents are than American parents. We’ve gotten to the point where some moms put out an amber alert if their kids wander to the refrigerator unattended. Whether it’s letting preteens congregate at a tram stop and ride without supervision, parking a stroller outside a bakery with the youngun still in it during a dart inside for bread, or leaving a toddler to dig in a sandbox unattended at a beer garden while they queue up for sausages, Germans don’t feel the need to yank a leash on their offspring the way we do.
This “Kinder Surprise” curiosity seems like another prime example to me. Mutter und Vater trust that Junior has the good sense to chew carefully and not swallow anything whole. Aunt and Uncle Sam fret that little Tommy will suffer a paper cut opening the package, never mind the choking horror of the demon snack itself. (Although if we’re such worrywarts over our kids here, why do we let them get so fat? The US isn’t the most obese nation on earth because parents care TOO much.)