Long post / reviews / travel tips / etc
i've spent a lot of time in oase this year over a several week span and have experienced many, many girls there. to give you an idea of how much time i've spent there this year, i spent just under 11, 000 euros in direct money to the girls this year alone (some of that is extras, so you can't just divide that number by 50 to convert to hours spent with the ladies). and, that amount doesn't include admission to the club, taxis, rental cars, or anything, just direct spend to the ladies.
i'm not going to review all of the girls i saw, but i will give a short list of the best and the worst (according to my tastes). but, first i'll share my opinion of a quick comparison ranking to the other clubs i've visited in germany.
[b]my comparison of the other clubs to oase[/b]
i don't remember the name of any of the girls at these non-oase clubs, so this is just a short comparison of the other clubs to oase (and corresponding overall service quality) , not a review of girls at each of these clubs.
my club experiences include palace, world, goldentimes, and living room. of all the other clubs, i've only spent 1 day at each of the other clubs, always quickly returning to old faithful, oase. i visited palace and world last year, and gt and lr this year. my ranking of the other clubs are as follows from best to worst: lr gt world palace. i would put oase above all of these other clubs, but i would rank lr very close to oase, perhaps on par with lr. i realize that my ranking of lr above gt may be due to the fact that i only visited gt during the day and not in the evening. some locals i chatted with told me that gt gets very busy in the evening, even calling it a fuck factory, but i did not witness this as i left gt in mid-afternoon.
i found palace to be the absolute worst of the list, with the highest percentage of girls with attitudes. granted i wasn't there long, but that's just what i observed during my short stay there. of course, this isn't shocking news as this simply reflects what has been shared on the forums innumerable times.
world had the nicest facilities and pretty good food, but again, i encountered chicks with attitudes there, something i almost never encountered at oase. it wasn't as bad as palace, but still, there were some definite attitudes or lackluster service. as others have mentioned before, since the walls downstairs at world don't go to the ceiling, you can hear everything in the adjacent rooms which can be distracting. i also found that i encountered a higher percentage of girls that didn't speak english at world, which complicated communication, sometimes leading to less than ideal sessions with the girls. again, i only spent a day at world, so please take these comments in that vein.
i visited goldentimes during the day on a saturday. the crew size was perhaps a bit smaller than what i would have seen on a saturday at oase during the day. there were only perhaps a 3 girls who i wanted to session with out of everyone (i can be quite picky). i found the girls there all eager to please with a service level on par with oase. since the place didn't have a big enough line-up to keep me interested in staying, i picked up a half-off pass to living room and headed over there around 3 pm in the afternoon. along with the pass, gt also gave a 5 euro coupon for my next visit to gt.
i found the service level of the girls at living room to be on par with those at oase. i liked the club layout. i liked that i only had to scan a couple areas to check the offerings as opposed to world where i feel like i have to walk through an entire ikea-sized store to check out who is available to play with. the food was great, better than the usual offering at oase.
if gt and lr weren't so far from where i was staying in germany this time, i definitely would have spent more time there. the 50/25/25 price structure at gt and lr is certainly a huge bonus as opposed to oase's 50/50/50 price structure. it's just too bad that gt & lr are so far away and close earlier than oase.
[b]back to oase[/b]
the club this year was just as i remembered from last year with one exception. it seemed like they turned the lights way down in the bar and lounge area. i didn't like that at all. the darker environment made it much more difficult to quickly scan the room and do my 'shopping' for my next session. with the lack of decent lighting, you really have to get much closer to your prospects to evaluate whether they might be suitable candidates. of course, this is already complicated by the fact that when i am walking by them in the lounge, i am already trying to pretend not to look at them while stealing quick glances at them so i don't have to deal with being harassed by each girl on account of making eye contact with them. i wish they would turn up the lighting to make it easier for us guys to do our 'shopping. '
oh, one other change i noticed. they removed the curtains at the entrance to the kino. that's a positive change as it opens that area up for traffic flow, which there could be quite a bit of when things got hopping on friday and saturday nights.
i do have one question about oase though. i have only been there in winter months. i worry about how hot it will be there in the summer. i don't really want to be sweating all over the girls in really hot rooms. is it still comfortable there in the summer? i don't want to be there if it's so hot in the rooms that i end up sweating all over the girls. i mean, we're already engaging in vigorous activities as it is. i don't want to add uncomfortably hot room temperatures to the mix. i only ask because i've never been there during the summer months.
[b]the girls of oase[/b]
all in all, my experiences with the girls were almost all positive. almost all of girls were really friendly and seemed eager to please. for me, it was rare to find someone who didn't give good service or had an attitude. during my stay, i found quite a number of favorites and sessioned with them over and over, again and again, lots of repeats. some days, i actively tried to force myself to try a new girl. it's just hard to go with an unknown when you know you've got a sure-thing awesome chick / experience right there in front of you.
at first, i thought i was just super skilled at choosing the non-sharky chicks because every single chick i picked out turned out to be good to fantastic. after awhile, i realized that it wasn't my super sherlock holmes powers after all. it generally didn't matter who i chose, almost every chick in there gives decent to good to great service.
to give you an idea of the type of girls i go for, i usually go for the little, short, slender cheerleader types. usually less than 5'6' and anywhere from 18-26 year old, with most of my picks from 19-23 years old. of course, i did venture out of those zones from time to time.
i'm not going to review all of the girls i sessioned with, just the ones who earned top honors and a couple bad apples that i happened to run across. i know these write-ups are more just ratings of the girls and low on details so they probably don't qualify as 'reviews' per say. i have my reasons for not wanting to go into details about my sessions. in any case, here goes.
[b]sascha[/b]
the number 1 top honors goes to sascha. 22 years old, romanian. 1.56 m (5 foot 1 inches). cute little blond, spinner. when i was there, she was always working the evening shift. you will recognize her because she is the one who is always wearing a cute little tie. she has quite a collection of ties, all different colors. she does have one necklace that she occasionally wears that isn't a tie, but it falls in the same place you would expect a tie to lay on someone. i understand that she joined the oase last december. for a long time during my stay, i avoided her because i wrongly assumed that she had to have an attitude, being the hottest chick in the entire place. i thought that there was no way that a super hottie like her would give as good of service as the other girls there. i was so wrong. she is so incredibly exceptional. my only regret is that i waited to the latter part of my trip to try her out. i wish i had tried her sooner so that i could have spent more time with her.
to give you some examples of how service oriented she was, she was always asking me if everything was ok and whether she could do anything else for me. for example, when i had her giving me a hand massage in the kino, she would check in with me every so often asking me if i wanted a blowjob. sometimes, she would just take the initiative and go straight to a blowjob without me even asking her. i had to actually stop her from giving me a blowjob a couple of times and tell her to relax when i was just looking to chill with a hand massage (after some marathon sex sessions earlier in the day, i was sometimes kaput by the time i got to sascha). every now and then, she would ask me if i wanted sex or something else because she was always wanting to make sure i was having a good time. she was always so attentive and eager to please. to give you another example, there were a couple of times she went to get something when we were in the kino, for example, lube or drinks or something. unlike the other girls, she actually scurried quickly because she didn't want to keep me waiting. i mean any other girl would have sauntered slowly away and back, but not sascha. she wants to keep you happy, and actually almost runs there and back. now i certainly don't demand or expect anyone to scurry quickly on my account, but that's just an example of how service-oriented she is.
at first, i thought that maybe she was just like that with me because i'm a pretty good customer. i mean i'm pretty nice to the girls; i'm decent looking (not brad pitt great looking mind you, but not fat, not too old, slender to average build) ; and i give a little extra now and then when a girl goes above and beyond. sure, i don't get sascha-type girls as girlfriends in real life, but i do get my share of cuties in their late twenties / early thirties in real life. so at first, i suspected that she might just be giving me over-the-top service maybe because i'm a better than average customer. but then, i noticed sascha scurrying to get something when she was with another client (who wasn't at all a looker) , so i assume that it wasn't just me that she was being so service-oriented with. i think she's just eager to please. sometimes when i took her to the room with another girl and told her to just relax and smoke a cigarette or whatever because i wanted to play with the other girl a little while without sascha, she seemed genuinely worried about not being able to participate and wanting to make sure that she could please me. i didn't do that two-girls thing very often mind you, but i had to try it a few times during my stay.
so, i share this information about super sweet sascha with only one request. please be extra nice to her. please don't run her off. she's one of the ones we want to keep around, hopefully a long while. i certainly hope she's still there at the club when i return later this year.
the one caveat i would share about sascha is that her english is quite limited. i don't think she speaks much english. i happen to know that she speaks spanish, french, and romanian of course. i'm not sure what other languages she might speak. i know she doesn't speak german. if you don't speak one of her languages, communication could be a bit of a challenge, but still, even without being able to speak one of her languages, i suspect a session with her would still be quite pleasurable. and, i'm sure that her english will improve over time.
then again, you might want to disregard everything i said about sascha in light of the fact that i probably have a little crush on her and so that probably colors everything about her for me in a positive light. in my defense, i did spend a great deal of time with her, and i'm pretty sure that any other guy spending an equal amount of time with her would find her just as irresistible as i did.
[b]sammy[/b]
sammy. 25 years old, from kazakhstan. killer body, pretty face. in fact, a bunch of times i would see this super hottie from behind walking across the room and say to myself, 'oh my god, i have to have that now! ' and then realize that it was my little sammy. she was always eager to please and very sweet. the award i give sammy is the best hand job award. i don't know why her hand job felt so much better than all of the other girls, but her hand jobs always drove me so crazy. if we went to the kino, it wasn't long before she had me so wound up, that i was begging for the zimmer to finish things off.
[b]ivannah[/b]. young 20s, slender body, romanian. wow, what great service. sessioned with her many times. she was always eager to please.
[b]amelia[/b].19, romanian, dark hair, i was never disappointed with her. she's a daytime girl from 10 am to 10 pm. so, you won't see her after 10 pm. she always gave good service.
[b]diana[/b].19, blond, romanian. saw her in early january, but she went missing the rest of january. always eager to please and very sweet. she probably gets the 2nd most sweetest at oase award.
[b]dina[/b] from latvia. 30 (or maybe one of the other 'l' countries). speaks both english and french quite well. i forget what other languages she speaks. she was very pleasing and accomodating. if you like how she looks, you can count on exceptional service with dina. she is really sweet.
[b]amira[/b].22, romanian. very nice on the eyes. evening shift girl. she gets the most-gfe award. she also gets the prettiest face award. she's very soft and gentle with everything she does, e. g, caressing you, etc. a session with her is like a real date with a 22 year old non-oase girl, which is a nice way to mix things up compared to the other oase girls. she's a good one to relax with after you're already kaput if you just want to relax with a really sweet young pretty thing who is going to make you feel really good while you're recharging your batteries for some wild crazy sex with one of the other oase girls. i even took amira to the room with another girl once. sessioned with amira plenty of times. i was disappointed that she went missing for a week and half during my stay in germany. turns out that she was out sick during that time.
[b]judy[/b] from hungary, early twenties. she's just a bit outside the usual type of girl i go with, but i felt compelled to try her out based on all of the times i saw her being so exceptional with other customers in the kino. i tried her out, and i will just say that she can be super affectionate. she is another one who i regret that i waited so late in my trip to session with. i would have definitely spent tons and tons of hours with her had i had not met her so late during my stay there.
[b]nelly[/b] from bulgaria, no english (only speaks bulgarian and turkish i believe). very short, slender girl. very nice smile. she gets the most-pse at oase award. i only sessioned wtih her once. man, does she get freaky in the room. one day, i decided to session with her even though we couldn't communicate much since i don't speak any of her languages. still, despite our language barrier, she still managed to communicate the essentials. i had a positive experience with her that left me with some porn star-like memories to take home with me. you should definitely try this girl out at least once.
i sessioned with a bunch of other girls that were good but i'm not going to list them all, just the top winners above. most of my sessions lasted a minimum 1 hour, often an hour and a half, and sometimes 2 hours. i would rarely do only a half hour with a girl who i really liked. every now and then, when it was slow, i would feel sorry for some of the girls that weren't getting any business and do a quick half hour session in the kino with one of the girls who looked a little sad if they were one of the ones who went out of there way to be super nice to me throughout my stay at oase. i mean, some of these girls were always being so sweet and nice to me, and after awhile of turning them down over and over during my several week stay, i felt compelled to throw them a bone.
i know many of you will lament the fact that the above ratings are mostly devoid of details of activities in the room. i have my reasons for being silent on these details. i'm giving you the best information that i feel comfortable giving. you can take it for what it's worth or disregard it if you don't find it helpful.
[b]the worst of oase[/b]
my list of 'avoids' at oase is relatively short (just 1 girl in fact) since almost everyone i encountered there got at the very least an a for effort even if they weren't one of my top award winners.
the absolute worst of my entire stay award goes to [b]adina[/b]. without going into specifics, i'll just say that she gave me the absolute worst service and attitude i've ever received in any of the clubs ever. i knew 10 minutes into our time in the kino that she was going to be absolutely terrible and i so wanted to hightail it out of there, but i forced myself to stick out the entire 30 minutes with her so that she wouldn't get 50 euros for a mere 10 minutes work. of course, referring to her minimal efforts as 'work' is being quite generous here. i have no idea why she was so disrespectful to me. maybe she was just having a bad day and decided to take it out on me. i was so disgusted with her that when i paid her, i just handed her the money and turned and walked away without saying thank you or anything. it was annoying having to sit with her for so long. it's too bad she was so terrible since she's got a great body and a great face. i would recommend avoiding adina unless you have reason to believe from someone else that this experience was just an aberration.
[b]two low ratings[/b]
[b]amalia[/b] (not amelia) is a little spinner, great body, dark hair. possibly the shortest girl in all of oase. she often sports a little flower in her hair, though not always. i sessioned with her a few times, maybe 3 times total. the first sessions were mostly fine, but my last session with her was one of the rare times i saw a poor attitude from an oase girl. i am not saying 'avoid' on this one, just saying that you should be cautious with this one.
[b]marie[/b] the tall, slender german girl. blonde. previously reviewed on the forum. i usually don't go with tall girls but i figured i would give her a try. first, kissing was absolutely off the menu. when i say off the menu, i mean she wouldn't even allow a light peck on the lips. that's not a deal killer for me, and really, i could have asked before taking a session with her, so i'm not really complaining about that, just letting you know my experience. in the room, she was fine, but not enthusiastic. you could characterize her performance as lackluster. she was probably just tired by the time she got around to me. the thing that caused me to decide to avoid her and not repeat occurred about 45 minutes into our session in the room. so, i happily came about 45 minutes into our hour session. i've heard about chicks considering the session over after a guy comes, but this is the first time i've ever personally witnessed this at oase. after i blow my load in a room with an oase girl, they will all still cuddle up with me and caress me during my recovery. usually, they even slide their hand down every so often to check on little junior to see if he's ready to wake up for some more fun. they may even try to wake him up with a little massage after a few minutes have passed. basically, i like my cuddling / caressing / groping time after i've come, and every single oase girl i've been with has always cooperated, usually without me ever asking or saying anything. now, i don't always take my full hour, sometimes letting the girl go a little early because i want to eat or something, but it's always been my decision to end the session early, not the girl's decision. in my session with marie though, after i came, she decided to sit a distance away from me on her knees. i invited her to lay down next to me by patting the towel next to me, but she said, 'no thank you, i am more comfortable sitting. ' i was like, 'wtf! ' i've heard about this sort of thing before, but until then, never experienced it myself at oase. all the other girls always cuddle with me after i finish. she's the only one that's ever just stopped working in the room, deciding that she was done working with 15 minutes still left on the clock. i often session with girls for more than an hour, but she'll never know whether i would have went an hour and a half with her, because she seemed to decide that our session was over. don't get me wrong, she was still quite pleasant during these last 15 minutes and the conversation was quite enjoyable. i just wasn't accustomed to a girl cutting me off from further services with 15 minutes left on the clock.
so, here again, i'm not labeling marie as an 'avoid, ' i am just sharing my experiences with you so that you have a better idea of what you might be getting yourself into with her. in other words, you might want to exercise some caution before sessioning with her or at least have more conversation with her to feel her out ahead of time.
i am curious though. what is everyone else's experiences? have you seen any other girls stopping work after a happy finish midway through an hour session?
[b]random observation[/b]
i found it really interesting how all of the guys in the club have different tastes in the ladies. there were so many guys going for women that i would never have gone for. and, i was always surprised that the men there hadn't already stolen my favorites by the time i got around to visiting with them (since they were clearly the absolute hottest chicks in the entire place, at least according to my tastes). it's a good thing that everyone has different tastes or else i would never have a chance of sessioning with my favorites since my favorites form a relatively small portion of the oase population.
[b]miscellaneous[/b]
if you happen to be taking 6 showers a day at the club and staying in germany's dry winter climate for any period of time, you'll find your skin drying out. one day, your skin will just start itching all over, and you'll be like, 'wtf is wrong with me? why am i itching all over? ' until you realize that the problem is your skin drying out. don't worry, a couple days of lotion from the local pharmacy will fix you right up. use that in the morning and before going to bed, slathering it on anywhere your skin feels dry. i never realized that my skin would dry out like that because i've never taken 6+ showers a day before, but evidently, that's what happens. one of the benefits of having sex with 6+ chicks a day i guess.
one other comment. after dinner, i would always brush my teeth so that i would always have nice, fresh, minty breath for the ladies, but i rarely saw anyone else brushing their teeth in the locker room. what is wrong with you people? brush your dang teeth after you eat so you're not blowing bad after-dinner breath on the ladies. maybe everyone was using mouthwash when i wasn't looking or something? granted, i didn't spend a lot of time in the locker room monitoring the activities of the boys, but i just almost never noticed anyone brushing their teeth after dinner. or maybe everyone else blowing chicken sauce breath on the ladies during sex?
[b]public transport tips[/b]
although i had a rental car for part of the time, most of the time, i used public transport. here are a few tips i wish i had known before my trip so i could have avoided these mistakes.
if you're using the metro train system a lot, buy a weekly pass good for 7 consecutive days from the ticket office at the hauptwache station. you can't buy these from the ticket machine. be sure to tell the attendant that you want bad homburg included in your 7 day train pass. unlike paris, your 7 day pass can start on any day of the week. that is, it doesn't have to go from sunday to saturday for example, meaning that you get a pass that went from a friday to a thursday if you wanted. the 7 day pass is a lot cheaper than buying tickets everyday. it's a ton more convenient not having to mess with buying tickets every time from the ticket machine too.
when using public transport, for example taking the s5 to bad homburg, don't get smart like me and decide to go to the friedichsdorf stop, because google maps shows it as slighter closer to oase. always get off at the bad homburg station. the taxi cost from both is almost the same. the problem with getting off at any station other than bad homburg is that you might find a taxi there, you might not. your best bet is to always go to bad homburg. there is always a taxi there. i came and went at all hours and there were always, always, several taxis waiting there.
another thing to keep in mind is that there are two bad homburg stations. one is the bad homburg on the s5 line. the other is the bad homburg-gonzenheim on the u2 line. do not go to the bad homburg-gonzenheim on the u2 line. yes, it's about 3 minutes closer to oase than the s5 bad homburg, but again, there are never any taxis there. i know this because my taxi from the bad homburg bahnhof always drove by the bad homburg-gonzenheim station on the way to oase, and i always looked to see if there was a taxi there, but there never was. if you make this mistake like i did, you either have to backtrack to the s5 or take the bus next a few miles to the correct bad homburg bahnhof. luckily, some young german kids were able to help me get on the right bus so i only suffered a 10 minute delay in getting back on track on my journey.
another thing to keep in mind is that bad homburg is about two stops outside the central zone 50. that means that your einzelfart frankfurt metro ticket doesn't cover your entire trip all the way to bad homburg. when you buy your ticket, you need to either type in the name of your destination if using one of the fancy touch screen ticket machines or type in destination 5101 if using one of the older push-button ticket machines. the machine will charge you about 2 euros more, but at least you'll have a valid ticket so you won't have to risk being charged the 40 euro fine. generally, you're better off always having a valid ticket since they check often enough that it would always be a bad business decision to think that you could get away without a ticket enough times to pay for the 40 euro fines. based on my math (and how often i saw the ticket checkers) , travelling without a valid ticket is a bad business decision (on average over time). also, the fine isn't just a fine. i'm told by the germans that it's actually like a misdemeanor crime that goes on your record, probably not a big deal for any of us tourists but you never know when you may be moving to live in germany later and have to deal with the fact that you have a bunch of train ticket misdemeanors on your record. you may think you'll never move there, but trust me, after you've been to oase a few times, you'll quickly start searching the want ads trying to figure out a way to live in germany, because the ladies are so addicting. in any case, better to be on the safe side on this one. in any case, none of this matters, since on average, it's cheaper to buy valid tickets. also, don't think that just because you're travelling at a weird time (e. g. midnight) that there won't be any ticket checkers on board. i can confirm that i saw ticket checkers at all the crazy hours in addition to during the day, not that often mind you, but often enough.
i found that the s5 was pretty much always on time according to the train schedule (posted at every station and also available here.
[url]http://www.traffiq.de/fm/20/2012_buch_linie_s5_ab_2011_12_11.pdf[/url]
and here.
[url]http://www.traffiq.de/fm/20/www[/url]
%202012_s5_v01. pdf). late in the evening, you can see that the s5 leaves bad homburg at 9:15 pm. 9:45 pm. 10:15 pm. 10:45 pm. 11:15 pm, and then at 12:15 pm. so, if you're taking public transport back to frankfurt, just be mindful that if you miss the 11:15 pm s5, and you get there at 11:17 pm, you're pretty much going to wait around for an hour for the last train back to frankfurt (unless you just hang out in the club until it closes at 4 or 5 am). during the day, the s5 runs quite regularly so you won't ever have to wait more than 15 minutes for the next one. the taxi ride from oase to the bad homburg bahnhof is about 12 minutes but you want to leave yourself a comfortable window of at least another 5 minutes to spare. if you set your watch to the official atomic clock time, you can be pretty much guaranteed that the s5 will arrive within about 20 seconds of the scheduled time. you can also be assured that it often leaves about 40 seconds after it stops (that was my experience anyways). so, if you show up 2 minutes late, you're going to be hanging out there another half hour which can really suck in this cold weather.
during my stay, i was told that the taxi hotline number is 069-23-00-01 or 25-00-01. i never tried this service though. i wonder if the person who answers speaks english? is this just for frankfurt or does it work anywhere in germany? i don't know. i would be interested to hear if anyone knows anything more about this taxi hotline or how people get taxis when they find themselves somewhere where there are no taxis. is it easy to use? do you have to wait a long time for the taxi?
[b]hotels[/b]
during my stay, i personally visited one of the hotels previously recommended on this forum: hof hotel munich, münchener straße 46, 60329 frankfurt am main, germany.
+49 69/230066 · muenchner-hotel-hof. de. the non-messe rates vary from 40 euros to 61 euros for a single room i was told. i can personally confirm that the rooms were quite clean and nice looking, sort of what you'the expect from a la quinta inn in the states if you're familiar with that brand. the closet had a traditional electronic safe as well. nothing fancy here, just a clean, comfortable place to stay. i may even stay there for my next trip for the days i am not staying closer to oase.
where does everyone else like to stay at?
[b]cell phones[/b]
if you have an at&t or t-mobile phone (i. e. gsm phone) , just buy a sim card at any cell phone store and plug it into your smartphone. make sure you call your carrier to unlock your phone before heading over to europe. don't wait until your last day to unlock because the unlock process can be a 48 or 72 hour process for some carriers. cell phone stores are as plentiful in germany as mcdonald's are in the states. the prices are quite competitive. basically, for a prepaid month plan, you can get a german sim card for about 30 euros for voice, text, and 500 mb of internet. only 15 euros if you just want internet without any voice or text. even if you don't have a gsm phone, you can easily buy a decent one in germany pretty cheap. as they have more competition in germany among the cell phone companies, the prices are more competitive. the cell phone store i went to was right in front of the frankfurt hauptbahnhof. the guys there are super helpful. they set up my phone for the sim card, added the recharge cards on for me, and even changed the voice prompts to english for me so i could call the automated phone number to check my balance, etc. here is the cell phone store i recommend: simtalk world gmbh, münchener straße 48, 60329 frankfurt am main, germany, +49 69/2713965 ext. 0 &8206; · simtalkworld. de. i've been there several times, and the guys there always fixed me up good every time.
having an internet enabled cell phone for access to google maps and the internet is truly a life saver for getting around in a foreign country. plus, with google maps on your phone, you can also save on the 7 euro navigation fee for the car rentals. if i were you though, i would also buy another backup sim card from any t-mobile store (10 euros for 200 mb, good for one month). that way, if you accidentally exceed your quota on your first sim card, you're not hosed while trying to navigate on google maps in your rental car. frankly, i don't know how anyone gets around without a gps in germany. i would have never survived in the per-gps days. the roads are just so different than what i'm used to in the states.
[b]driving in germany [/b]
as a previous poster pointed out, look for the dotted lines across the road at each intersection or any place a street tees into another street (i. e. ones without stop lights). the dotted lines across the road means that cars on that road must yield to the cars on the other road. so, for example, if you have dotted lines on your road, the cars without the dotted lines will dart out in the intersection without regard for you. it's your responsibility to yield to the cars without the dotted line. so always keep this in mind.
and as always, stay out of the left-most lane on the highways. the cars can go super fast in this lane. sometimes they are going so fast at night that they wouldn't be able to stop for you if you are travelling a 'normal' american speed.
if you keep those two tips in mind and have a gps, you should be just fine driving in germany. you might google 'german street signs' to get an idea of what some of their signs mean. one that puzzled me for a long time was the circle sign with two cars next to each other. that one means no passing.
when renting a car from multiple car rental agencies, i found that all that i needed was my driver's license and my passport. your car insurance from the states won't work over there. also, the terms and conditions on your amex card state that the amex car insurance won't work either unless you rent the car from a us operator where the rental is charged in us dollars, neither of which will be the case when you rent in germany.
stuff i read on the internet indicated that i would need an 'international driver's permit' if i wanted to drive abroad. this permit is available from any aaa office for $26. i had this, but didn't need it to rent my car. i assume that i would only have to use it if i had gotten pulled over by a cop. the international driver's permit exists on account of some treaty that a bunch of countries have signed onto and aaa is one of the two entities licensed to issue these. maybe i didn't need this? but, i got it just in case. it's good for a year from the time of purchase.
[b]waschsalon[/b]
if you're in germany long enough that you need to do your laundry, just search 'waschsalon' in google maps and you'll find a ton of places you can wash your clothes at.
[b]closing[/b]
well, i hope some of you find at least some of this information dump useful. i know i profited greatly from the contributions of others before my first trip there.