hetalia | [Official Site] France and Germany!

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[Official Site] France and Germany!

Himaruya's updates his blog yet again! This time with the recently rather buddy-buddy France and Germany. (Although, Germany looks unamused as usual. Even when they're getting along they don't get along well, do they?)

ウンフォラスティーロ！！

最近この二国の協力っぷりが異常。

もうそろそろ色々のお知らせできると思います！

追記；歩くの早い第一位はアイルランドさんだそうです。
アイルランドさんはいろんなイメージがあるのですが
どういうキャラにしようか結構悩む国ですね。
妖精の島や幻想的な風景は一度見てみたいものです。

My translator won't translate the blog title. . . .

Basically, in the blog, Himaruya says that the cooperation between these two recently is odd(in pretty much all of their history they've been at one another's throats, however, at present, they've been quite friendly and cooperative with one another).

In addition, he mentions, in post script, that the fastest walker is Ireland. However, the many images of Ireland make creating an Ireland character troubling, because he doesn't know what kind of character to make him/her.

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It's a friendship that's not really a friendship at all. XD It's more of a partnership for the sake of everyone else, irl, and they really continue to hate one another deep down. So. Hate-friendship?
I disagree. Merkel and Sarkozy might not get along very well on a personal level, and of course that affects their relationship, but that doesn't change the fact that France and Germany are very close and none would want to lose what their predecessors have built over the years. France and Germany don't hate each other at all anymore, and while it may not be all fuzzy pink feelings for the other and people still have their stereotypes (though they're nothing like the ones from before WWII anymore of course), we cherish the friendship quite a lot.
Also, it's not "for the sake of everyone else" but primarily for ourselves. Having a common franco-german army, a common franco-german history book for school, a bilingual franco-german tv channel, a gazillion cooperation programs in about every possible domain in public life, economics and yes, politics too, wouldn't make any sense if it were only for the sake of Europe.
Of course it's also about power and the stability in the EU is very important too. But that doesn't lessen the fact that the Franco-German friendship is very important to us on an emotional level in regard to history and that doesn't have anything to do with Europe at all (especially as it was initiated before the EU existed). And it's not exclusively about politics either, France and Germany are practically married to each other in the economic world (as in we have the highest mutual import-export rate in the world according to my international trade prof).

Sorry for ranting here, but I'm quite surprised to see the opinion that we don't really get along seems to be so wide-spread here. (Bad press in the English-speaking world maybe? It's quite well-known that neither the UK nor the US are very happy with Germany and France being that close after all.) It may not be a perfect friendship (or far from it), but it's not a hate-friendship either at all.Oo;

And of course I'm strictly speaking from a rl point of view here, Hetalia's France and Germany are entirely a different thing.

^ This!

Himaruya seems to have decided he doesn't want to take the postwar development between those two into account - can't be helped, they're his characters.
But people in this thread going "oh, so they don't -really- get along after all" makes me a little sad and is like casually disregarding how hard the two countries have worked to get to where they are. :'D

Considering they're nations, post-war development probably takes a bit longer for them. Rather, a lot longer. If you'd been in a spat with someone for as long as you can remember, and it's been a particularly violent spat, you aren't going to just. Make up, spontaneously(think of how long nations live/have been alive--a development that happens in a year is pretty much automatic to them--heck, several years is pretty quick when you've lived over a hundred and are supposed to do so for quite some time.) Considering what "violent spat" means for nations, Germany and France will take longer than their people, bosses, governments, etc to get along. In fact, they probably never really will, completely, between the two of them.

We're not disregarding that. We're thinking about the characters, not the actual, irl countries themselves. We(or, at least, I) know that Germany and France irl, besides their respective bosses, get along really damn well and have a close relationship.

The reason I commented on it was because their current political leaders, despite working together quite well, are just so different from each other and don't always agree. I find it amusing. No, no, it's true the friendship between these two countries is really quite real, as their cultures are (learning each other's languages, bilingual books, etc.) coming together. Although, with the availability of language options and the influx of foreigners, especially in Germany, I'd say that goes to all countries involved with the EU and not just France. Although, this is not to disregard the fact that both are on great terms with each other and have been for awhile now.

I don't think Himaruya is so much trying to disregard it so much as he is just not aware of how close the the partnership has become between the two countries as of late and doesn't quite comprehend the impact it has culturally. (That's quite evident considering his response towards an article about the French and English cooperating.) Traditional stereotypes show that European countries have a huge rivalry for each other and feel strongly about each other, war torn, blah blah, that many have forgotten that "recent" developments have been put in place to gather them together. He's probably starting to warm up to it as the country personas are. For them, a few decades is nothing, to us, it's a lifetime. With the changing attitudes of people, I wouldn't be surprised that any country who changes over time would have to play catch up since they are separate entities from the people, governments, etc, despite coinciding with their existence. And they play both a dual role as citizens and representatives, many people seem to forget that while they represent their respective countries, that most Hetalians are regarded as individual, regular people with the exception of some strange abilities. I'd argue that Germany and France may not be so buddy buddy, but they are very receptive and respectful of each other in canon these days, as are England and France are portrayed in some modern strips (just, with even less tension for the former). Way better than previous eras were they were at each other's throats, by far.

I think Himaruya is actually just warming up to the idea of global partnership (also outside of Europe), period. I'd argue and say that most of the powers and other countries in Europe (Spain, UK, France, Germany, Italy, Austria, the Nordics, etc.) are all probably trying to get along with each other for the common good nowadays, realistically. It's a wonderful thing to see.

. . .that's kinda why I was talking specifically about Germany and France in Hetalia. I don't know anything about it--I don't live in Europe. No matter how much news I read, they don't cover stuff like that. Really, by reading the news(or at least the news I get) you'd be a bit confused. There's agreeing and then disagreeing and cooperation and kindness and whatever and then there's stuff you can't really decode at all.

I wasn't talking about irl. I'm not quite sure how you figured I was.

Sorry, I did misunderstand you then. I guess it was the "partnership for everyone else" that seemed to talk about rl stuff for me, since we didn't hear that much about their partnership in Hetalia yet. (And since a few other people definitely talked about their rl relationship being not very good here, it just sort of mingled in my mind.)
That, and I'm probably a bit butthurt whenever I hear that Hetalia's present day France and Germany are said to hate each other, because while I don't ask for anything shippy like Germany and Italy in canon, it always stings to see people negate the franco-german friendship into repressed hate. It's quite important for many of us irl, you know? But I guess there's nothing I can do though except suck it up and hope that Himaruya will be a bit more specific about what their relationship really looks like now, at least it's a good sign that he's starting to get into it?:-\

It's okay. That's really just my interpretation of how they probably feel about getting along with one another, especially when it comes to EU manners. "This is for me" or "this is for everyone else" with a side of "I still hate you", then ~~maybe!~~ they shake hands and get to work. (Aside the political part and that Germans and the French themselves aren't constantly at one another's throats when we aren't looking, and do, in fact, have a pretty good relationship overall, I really don't know a whole lot. I try to stay on top of it, but it's difficult when I can't understand French and I don't understand German well, despite that I'm trying to learn. There are only so many sources who report about these things in English, and even then I find myself contemplating how much of it I should believe, because if I believe something written with too much of the reporter's bias, I won't get a full understanding at all. Plus things that aren't considered "interesting" or "notable" aren't really reported on, meaning I miss a lot no matter how much I try.)
Well, the two do probably still hate each other. All things considered, I can't really see them getting over their history which they remember and lived through very easily, and just that for about as long as Germany can remember France has been one of the last people, if not the last person, he'd cooperate with, so he can't really see anything else too easily. They're very history-based, considering their history made up their whole life. Yes, it's been a while since the treaty where they first started to cooperate, whether that meant getting along or not, but for them that's only been, what, forty years? When you live as long as a country does forty years isn't much more than a few days, maybe even a few weeks(by which I mean, it's a long time for us, but not for them.)
however, in Kusogame, they were shown to go places together(okay, they went with America, but that they even seemed to go someplace together in a remotely civilized manner, even with another person around, clearly means that they don't get along as bad as we think), and in the Let's Think About The G8 Members strip France even said "Haven't we been getting along recently!?" implying that, even though Germany didn't really want him around, they're not completely the worst of enemies anymore--perhaps they have bitter memories of and feelings about one another, but they're starting to get over it. Also also in the recent doodle about France's pessimism, it seems the first person he thought to call was Germany. Thathehashisnumberisamiracleinitself! While this could be because much of Europe (most of? That's what every news article I've read says) relies on Germany for monetary stability, and he has more money apparently, so of course if he wanted something he might call Germany, but considering their history and how they don't get along so well, that he calls Germany with concerns like this(and that Germany didn't just yell at him, showing he must call him with his woes often, so he's used to it) shows a bit of a good relationship between them, I think. Furthermore, when a lot of people from a particular country go to another country to live there, Himaruya's shown that the migrating peoples' country hangs out at the country they go to's house(see the strips with South Korea and China hanging out on Canada's couch due to immigration.) From what I know, there are a pretty good amount of Germans/Frenchmen in France/Germany. So they must be somewhat used to each other at each other's houses(rather, France at Germany's house--I can't really see Germany going to France, he might misinterpret that. . . .) They're frenemies--those friends that fight all the time and really don't seem to get along at all, let alone like one another, however they seem to spend a lot of their time together, and are much closer than they appear. It hasn't been addressed much, but you can draw some conclusions from what we have seen.
And I only partially ship GerFra, if that means anything. As much as I'd like to see shippy things, I like that Himaruya leaves some of it up to us, whether that's intended or not.

I can understand where you're coming from, but in my headcanon they're far from disliking each other anymore like you seem to think. Of course it's always difficult to be completely unbiased about Hetalia without taking rl into account, but that's precisely why the franco-german friendship is so special: Because French and Germans really hated each other so much that they would have gladly sent each other to hell for quite some time being, but now there's nothing left of that hate anymore. And I really mean nothing, unlike the French and the English who still like to stab each other whenever they can. That's why this relationship is so precious to us (and possibly unique in this world so far), because we achieved to systematically eradicate all that hate in less than fifty years through lots of hard work. That's why me and

atiko go all sadface when you say that their people might not hate each other anymore, but the nations do. What have all these efforts been worth then? And what are the nations if not the embodiment of their people? (I know they have their own mind, but I don't think you can completely disregard their people's opinions either in their personality. But that may be the point where our respective headcanons might disagree.)

Don't worry, I don't blame you for not knowing a whole lot about France and Germany, it's hard to know about many things when you don't live in that country. Not to mention that it's impossible to know everything about every single nation in Hetalia out there. And I agree that news are not always to trust on that matter. I can read German, French and English and I can tell you that the general tone is quite different in each language, it's sometimes mind-boggling how different the reports can be even though they're talking about the same matter.
(My general impression irl is that France is always a bit anxious about losing Germany as that would mean losing a lot of their power too, they're the one with the strongest feelings about a possible betrayal of the Franco-German friendship. Germany is both a bit wary of France clinging at them because they're well aware that France needs them even more than they need France. But on the other hand, Germany is quite anxious about getting "divorced" from France as well, because I feel like they're all in all more emotional about the friendship than France. Germany was all alone after WWII and still has the trauma about being a "monster" until today, so having such a close relationship to another nation is very important on a more personal level.
UK on the other hand rather openly dislikes France and Germany being so close because they're fully aware that they have no chance in the EU against the "EU couple". And I suspect the US still hasn't forgiven France for going against Bush's Irak politics and that Germany "betrayed" their obligation to the US (Germany having pretty much been the US's lap dog because of the Marshall Plan until then) to side with France, but I rarely read many US papers so you'd probably know a lot better about that than me if that's still the case.
tl;dr, I have no idea about the general opinion in the English-speaking world, but I wouldn't be surprised if they were far from being as positive about the friendship as we are.:-\ )

Ok, enough for rl stuff, I had totally forgotten about the Kusogame, thanks for reminding me! Personally, I think you can explain Germany's grumpy or resigned face because of their different personality, they are quite the opposite after all, but that's not necessarily hate.
And I can definitely see them hanging out at each other's place, although I can see Germany going to France's place a lot as well, though mostly for work because Germany wouldn't want to admit that he likes France's, uh, coastlines a lot. RL Germans love to go to France for their holidays after all. *g*

Really, I'm taking much of canon into account in my headcanon: canonically they seem like they get along sometimes, then they just. Don't. Not as much as England and France, but they don't. It's mixed, and probably depends a lot on what the situation is, whether or not they get along. Don't sadface. It's just opinion and observation. (Of course I'm not saying that one/they can completely disregard their peoples' feelings and opinions. That's pretty much the opposite of what the nation would entail. The efforts haven't been for naught. They are getting along more, after all. However they'll need more time to become accustomed to the idea of getting along with the other. Much of my headcanon is based on the concept that a personification is really a person, and can hold feelings different from ones based on their people, government, and the like--of course, not completely, as then they wouldn't be a nation at all. A nation is a person being it's people, government, and history as well. If it wasn't, there'd be no need to even think about history when it came to the nations and their relationships. After all, when you live that long, and go through that much, you probably have an interesting view and some things you'll be hard pressed to let go of/give up on. One of the reasons we find things somewhat easy to go back on is because we weren't there, but they were, and lived through it, and a lot of things probably didn't feel so great.)

Hahaha, honestly, I stopped watching television and reading newspapers a while ago--I rely on the Internet for my information and news, and pay more attention to international things than ones inside my own country. . .it's just that they force "AMERICA IS THE BEST" on us, so I'm not as interested in it. And even when I did pay some attention to it, it seemed like they reported very few international things--after all they aren't "interesting" enough to the American public. I'm sort of afraid to do so, since I read some translated French and German articles, articles from BBC(which is British to my knowledge), and there's already enough contradiction that American news would just give me a headache.
Ah, of course. The New York Times is supposedly pretty reliable, but I don't trust my own country's media to bother reading it without being linked from another site that I trust more.

Yeah, I seem to remember a lot of random canon things. It's probably just that France does this a lot(calling Germany to ask for things or talk about stuff) and it gets annoying--so, yeah, not hate, but contrasting personalities. At least the timeszones are the same--he'd be much angrier if he called him at some ungodly hour.
XD Well, yes, of course for work he'd go over. I feel like, for some reason, Germany doesn't like leaving his house for anything but work. XDD Germans love their vacations, I know that much! Hell, I read an article on that recently. Something about them not spending as much money on leisure activities--y'know, except holidays. Which they'd rather spend more money on than anything else, apparently. I like to imagine that France, Italy, and Prussia(and other countries close to Germany with more relaxed attitudes, but mostly those three) like to do the holiday planning for him--especially France and Italy, who know how to get the most out of a vacation. Then again, last time he canonically had a wonderful vacation he ended up wanting to work even more. . .all the reason to milk a holiday for all it's worth! /switches between the Queen's English and American English

OT: PruGerFraIta is pretty much my favorite foursome--Italy is Germany's personal best friend, France is his political-going-on-personal best friend, and Prussia's part of him. As far as I'm concerned, nations probably have some difficulty seeing how singular relationships work out--I mean, nations have different sorts of relations everywhere, with most everyone, so the only thing that, in their eyes, would be "cheating" would be being with someone whom another nation they're with isn't fond of. I dunno, I like the idea that some human things are hard for them to understand, despite that they're human themselves, mostly. /random

We have to agree to disagree on parts of the headcanon then, although we seem to have come to a consensus here. I did get "not always getting along" because of different personalities etc. as that's pretty much what happens in canon after all. It was just the "they still hate each other" that hurt (as I said before, we can have pretty strong feelings about this friendship here), because yes, history is important, but that's precisely what makes the rl friendship so special. That they don't hate each other anymore despite history and despite the remarkably short time.
In my headcanon they have their own personality, but their own free will and personal opinions are more limited than those of a regular human. Or more exactly, I think they're closely linked to their people, so whether the people influence their mind or the nations influence their people is pretty much the same thing. (Which is not to confuse with their governments' actions and opinions of course.) So imho some of their feelings and opinions are personal, but it would very rarely (or never) be vastly different from the general popular opinion of their people.

I definitely agree on the holidays part. Work is important, don't anyone deny it, but do not DARE to take away our holidays! And it would probably be better that France, Italy or even Prussia organize Germany's holidays, or else he'd probably do his usual thing and stay at the beach and fight towel wars with England and Netherlands for the deck chairs at the pool. And France and Italy better pack his suitcase as well, or Germany would run around with shorts and sandals and socks again.XD

By the way, sorry for spamming your mailbox so much with my comments today. Especially as I usually rarely comment in the main comm.

Mm. Really, hate's way too strong a word I used, and I apologize for that. It actually makes me pretty happy to hear that it's much better than it used to be, and that the people feel passionate about it--especially from someone actually from France. It's much more believable that way. Really, the only reason they might not like each other so much still in my headcanon is that the remarkably short time is even shorter for them. I don't doubt their ability to come together in a short time, though. Nonetheless, moving on.
For me it depends on several factors, especially the strength of the nation-tan themself or their government(which can make up a good portion of the way they think, in my headcanon, especially if the nation is. . ."weak-willed", I guess I want to say? Or very loyal. It varies--my headcanon has different versions depending on how serious I want it to be,) but for the most part they have a fairly high free will. But I understand your headcanon--after all, if they didn't share their peoples' opinion, at least a little there's really no point to them being the nation. (Although Russia showed that they can have different opinions from their people in the Bloody Sunday comic. Then again, Russia's a bit messed up in the head.)

. . .I wanna see him in a towel war with England and Netherlands! D: My France muse and my Italy muse made the most horrified faces at "sandals and socks". Germany-muse, however, looks confused. I think the only problem he sees is that sand doesn't come out of. . .anything.
It's kind of silly, the idea of nations being monogamous! I mean, in some cases, yes, like Belarus, but overall it's a bit ridiculous. ♥ I don't really understand pairing wars, either. Besides that people are fairly opinionated, at times, or don't understand the reasoning for other pairings, or just don't like the characters.
Delishus foursomes! ♥ And Moresomes! Which are orgies, but "moresome" is a fun word even if it's not really a word.

It's fine! I don't mind at all. In fact, my inbox is very clean.

No problem, thanks for your understanding.:)
And I'm both German and French (I have both nationalities, I'm bilingual etc.), but I'm originally from Germany, so my "German side" is a bit stronger than my French one. I'm currently studying in France, but I'm not sure that counts as being "from" France, though I can guarantee that I know quite a few French (who are more French than I am) who feel very passionate about this friendship.;) ~~The only reason why many kids hate the other country today is because they get tortured with French/German grammar by incompetent teachers in school.~~

Oh yes, that part with Russia. orz That happens to me everytime I have a headcanon based on frequent observations in the strips, and then woooosh, something happens that totally contradicts said headcanon! *sigh* But I can live with that as long as Russia going against his people and the like are only exceptions to the rule... or that's what I'd like to think?
I do understand your headcanon as well though, though I'd love to think that all nations are more or less equally loyal to their people. Or did you mean loyal to their government?

Do you know that fancomic yet? (http://community.livejournal.com/eurotalia/2794.html) And I love my Papaland I really do, but I hope there's always an Italy or a France around to discreetly hide the socks from him when he's on holidays. Nor is getting sunburned on the beach one of his better ideas, and yet he never learns!D:

Fff, now I'm confused. But I understand. I have zero European blood, to my knowledge. ~~Gah. Grammar. The bane of learning another language.~~

Well, Hetalia contradicts itself sometimes, so it's okay!
I can see him being the exception. Russia's rather, different, after all.
Oh! Yeah, I meant loyal to the government. I hope they're all loyal to their people. . .it'd be very disconcerting to think your nation doesn't care about you. ._.;

. . .that was. Oh, wow. No, actually, I didn't. XDD And it was an amazing comic. Poor Sealand looks so confused. AlsoUncleGermanyawwww. The socks is something we can only hope for, however, hopefully Grand Frére will take care of little Germany and put the strongest possible sunscreen on him. D: We don't want Lobster!Germany.
Fff, I don't read as much either way, but in Hetalia a moresome is a sign of success worldwide! Someday--we just have to try! ♥

Sorry to interfere, I see many interesting things in your post. And it makes me think : maybe Himaruya doesn't know what to think about the German and French cooperation because the Franco-German couple looks "odd" when seen through some American newspapers. Just a theory.

PS : PruGerFraIta : it sounds like the name of a delicious "gelato".

I'm pretty sure he's calling it odd because, throughout history, up until fairly recently(I guess 60 or so years is kind of recent?), the last thing they'd do would be cooperate. Also, considering he's back in Japan now, I don't know how many American newspapers he reads, except perhaps online. . . . ~~Or if American newspapers even cover this sort of thing. . . .~~

. . .I'd eat it. I've had gelato only once, and it was delicious--I think PruGerFraIta would make wonderful gelato. Mmm, pairing snacks. . . .

the last thing they'd do would be cooperate.
As far as I know, there had been attempts in the 1920s from the French side with people like Aristide Briand. But I admit these are not very well-known facts by now.

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[Official Site] France and Germany!

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