Downside #14

You're constantly exposed to terrible TV

You know things are bad when you find yourself anticipating German satellite TV as a great treat. It's a toss-up what's worse, trying to follow incomprehensible Bolivian sitcoms in the original language or watching the wretched dubbed remains of a US show you vaguely liked (although Buffy the Vampire Slayer is indisputably better acted in German). Worst of all, though, are those wretched tinpot countries that show American movies in the original, but with every line translated over the top by a single voice-over man who's either terminally depressed, totally disinterested, or exhausted from having to do this 24 hours a day. Even if you do understand the local patois you're eternally stuck in the semantic purgatory between two soundtracks, crying out for a linguistic coup de grace. And then you realise you're watching Sister Act 4, with Eric Roberts in the Whoopi Goldberg role and that guy from Police Academy. Foreign TV? Kill me now.