Welcome to that unknown land called Germany. Moritz von Uslar travels to a small town in eastern Germany, stays for three months, and returns with this grand narrative, a story of the present that is both a report and an adventure novel. Outside, before the big city, where Hartz IV, alcoholism, emigration, and right-wing extremism are supposedly at home: this is where the story begins. The reporter searches for a place with a boxing club and a pub and finds it in the district of Oberhavel, about an hour's drive north of Berlin. Pension Heimat, Franky's Place, Gaststätte Schröder: beer at the bar, dictaphone in hand. The reporter listens, observes, drinks along, trains with them, chats, and is back there the next morning. The pub owner Heiko, the storyteller Blocky, the tattooed punk Raoul appear, and thus access is granted: to the rehearsals of the band "5 Teeth Less," to barbecues with the German flag, to hanging out at the Kaiser's parking lot and at the Aral gas station - and to the everyday lives of young men who may not have a great future but possess a pretty good sense of humor. The precise observations, verbatim conversations, jokes, sayings, fairy tales, and nonsense, along with the plethora of absurd, touching, and frightening everyday occurrences create a pull that draws the reader into life in the East German small town. This is classic and modern reporting. Moritz von Uslar has the courage, perseverance, and empathy to show that reality is always that place beyond expectation. In this book, there is room for all sorts of absurdities, but none for bleakness. German soil shines - it is the light of the gas station on the bypass road at half past midnight.