The bavarians are not the least bit worried about this, as they are well aware that they are no longer seen as the backwoodsmen of the nation. This is confirmed by the fact that many Germans would like to live in Bavaria, especially in Munich. But, as so often in life, it turns out that even these desires conceal a number of persistent misunderstandings. For instance, the majority of people plagued by such longings tend to confuse Bavaria with Old Bavaria. Roughly speaking, this is the area that stretches from the Danube to the Alps. But Bavaria actually extends to the River Main, Germany’s „veal sausage borderline,“ which means it includes expanses of landscape that have nothing in common with the sub alpine idyll of the yodellers and folk dancers and can be quite rough and barren.

The same applies to Munich as well, which probably ranks highest among Germany’s municipalities, not only in the cost of living but also in real financial terms. Yet all this does not really count because Bavaria, and especially Munich, radiate an air of selfconfidence comparable only to that of the two city states, Hamburg and Bremen. The reason for this is that Bavaria is the only German territorial state to have maintained its geographical shape since Napoleon’s great land relocation scheme of 1806. This explains the origin of another of Bavaria’s typical paradoxes: at that time the most diverse types of terrain were united beneath the umbrella of state consciousness engineered by the Bavarian administration, which was wise enough to respect the various cultural characteristics and traditions.

This, in turn, illustrates why the continuity of traditional custom in Bavaria is more than, and different from, just folklore. In the long-run this has consequences that in other places might provoke a pitying smile, but in Bavaria anyone seeking political success has to bow to these traditions. That is why Edmund Stoiber, Bavaria’s current ministerpresident, has the uniform of the mountain troops hanging next to his dinner jacket in his wardrobe.