Liechtenstein Local Custom Tips by Pieter11

The official language of Liechtenstein is German, but even though my German is pretty OK, it was often hardly impossible for me to understand the locals (about 1/3 of the inhabitants are foreigners) when they speak to each other. In the small country they speak a very special dialect that even for Germans is very hard to understand.

The "real" Liechtensteiner children learn this dialect at home and only start learning the official German language when they start to attempt Primary School.

Luckily, all people also speak normal German, so communicating in this language is never a problem.

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Speaking English in Liechtenstein normally will not cause any problems. Most of the young people understand and speak it, but especially older people -mostly living outside of Vaduz- don't know a single word. In those cases it is nice when you know a few words in German too, so you can ask simple things.

In most public places where tourists can be expected to come, you will find an English translation besides the German texts. These places are banks (ATM's too) parkings, tourist shops and most of the restaurants and bars too. But be prepared that there also are a lot of places where you have to depend on your knowledge of German: even at the public transportation everything is only written in German.

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Liechtenstein's national colours are red and blue. These are the two colours that made the original national flag: two horizontal stripes, blue and red. The flag was like this until 1937. In that year it changed because of a special reason.

In 1936 Liechtenstein was competing in the Olympic Games in Berlin. There, the athletes found out that Haiti was using exactly the same flag. To make a difference, the Prince decided to change the flag by adding the Royal crown to it. In 1937 the new flag officially had a yellow crown in its left upper corner. Yellow is the colour of the Royal Family.

In several places in the country you can also see a different flag with two horizontal stripes: yellow and red. The is the flag of the Royal Family. It is often used in governmental buildings.

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When I was in the little village of Steg, in the Liechtensteiner mountains, I was surprised to see this friendly old man dressed completely in the traditional clothes.

You do see people like this oon postcards and on TV, but I was happily surprised to see this man being dressed completely like that, in real life. His high socks, his blouse and especially his hat, suit very well with the environment I met him in: high mountains, with white peaks and wooden houses all around.

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