Berlin is generally a very open and tolerant place, where immigrants are welcomed and multiculturalism is celebrated. Germans and the city’s large Turkish community mix without major problems every day in districts such as Kreuzberg. However, in the more economically depressed parts of eastern Berlin and in the Brandenburg countryside, there have been incidents of skinheads and neo-Nazis carrying out racist attacks.

For the most part, this shouldn’t be a concern, as few new residents will care to spend much time in grim neighbourhoods dominated by concrete high-rise apartment buildings. It is worth bearing in mind that many average Germans do not have the same racial sensitivity as people coming from more multicultural societies such as the US or Britain. What might be considered offensive and politically incorrect elsewhere is often not even registered by otherwise open-minded and well-educated Germans.