6 days ago
15
Name: House burping.
Age: New to America, ancient in Germany.
Appearance: Breezy.
House burping? Obviously, I try to burp at home and not in our open-plan office, but it depends on what I’ve had for lunch. Sometimes it just has to come out, you know? That’s more information about your digestive tract than I need, given we’re talking about whether houses themselves need burping.
A house doesn’t have a stomach. So: no. “House burping” is what America’s content creators have christened the German practice of Lüften, or airing out their homes by opening windows, presumably because it’s a bit like burping a baby. TikTok is full of them enthusiastically describing it as a “mom hack”, or explaining it’s “supposed to keep sickness away”.
Does this Lüften keep sickness away, then? It’s supposed to shift stale air, ensure adequate ventilation and prevent mould buildup, all of which are good for people and places (Lüften is even mandatory in some leases in Germany). The idea that it’s a health essential got even more popular during the pandemic, when Chancellor Merkel said Lüften could be “one of the cheapest and most effective ways” to prevent the spread of Covid.
And what do the Germans think of Lüften going viral Stateside? Mostly they seem to be mocking these TikToks with their own amused reaction videos and comments like “America discovers fresh air. God help me …” and “Lüften is a TIKTOKTREND?!”.
But they must basically approve, right? Make America Fresh Again! Actually, Lüften isn’t uncontroversial, even in Germany. Paradoxically, Germans are also reputed to be extremely averse to draughts. There’s a well-known retort to people who insist on airing when it’s Baltic: Erfroren sind schon viele, erstunken ist noch keiner.
Meaning? Many people have frozen to death, but no one has ever died from a bad smell.
That’s not what my colleagues say when I’m eating my sardine and egg salad al desko. Are there other objections? Yes – in 2021, researchers suggested Lüften could be undermining energy efficiency, thus contributing to greenhouse emissions. As researcher Amelie Bauer told Politico, despite living in well-ventilated buildings that didn’t need airing, residents “stuck to their habits and kept opening windows”. Plus Lüften can lead to relationship breakdown.
What?! In a report on the house-burping trend, the Washington Post spoke to a woman who said her half-German boyfriend’s insistence on airing their Berlin flat overnight, however cold it was, “actually became one of the bigger friction points in our relationship” (apparently three bats flew in one night). They split up.
Yikes. Are you supposed to leave windows open all night? No. According to a German foreign ministry Instagram account that explains German culture to the uninitiated, Stoßlüften (that’s shock ventilation – opening a few windows wide) only takes a few minutes. Freezing to death and bat visitors are definitely optional.
Do say: “Open the Drehkippfenster (tilting window), bitte, it’s time to querlüften (cross-ventilate).”
Don’t say: “Someone crack a window, I think this flat has farted.”
