The Black Forest Clinic in Denmark
Exhausted from the day of hiking and the beach, we fall onto the sofa in the evening. Because there isn’t much energy left for other activities, we turn on the television.
There are two TV channels, both Danish channels. I am with my parents in a holiday home in Denmark. The “Black Forest Clinic” is broadcast on several evenings on a TV station with the original German soundtrack and Danish subtitles. We wouldn’t watch it at home. But here we have no other choice on television, after all we can understand the language, and we are too exhausted for other activities – so on some evenings we watch Professor Klaus Brinkmann together as he listens to the concerns of his patients, themselves fights with his son, etc.
I get an idea why the residents in other countries speak foreign languages so well: When television productions from abroad are constantly running in the original language – in Denmark, Sweden or the Netherlands a lot of German and English – and not dubbed in the national language but only be subtitled.
Note: Written in 2023 from memory. At the time of writing I realize that I am very unsure of the date and the details. I would have dated that earlier, maybe 1980, but according to Wikipedia, the Black Forest Clinic wasn’t broadcast until 1985. On the other hand, I also remember that there were sometimes English-language programs (again with Danish subtitles) on Danish television, and by 1985 I should have understood them a bit. I’m probably mixing up different memories of vacations from my childhood and youth here: I mean, we once saw the dream ship in Sweden (has been produced since 1981) in German. Well, at least that’s how it should be.
(Molinarius)