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Shaking every hand in the room
A German goodbye is individual. Where an English speaker might wave once at a room and leave, the German convention is to work around the group, shaking each person's hand or exchanging a word, and a group of eight can take ten minutes to disperse. Leaving without it — an Irish goodbye, as English calls it, or sich auf Französisch verabschieden, taking French leave, as German does — reads as rude rather than considerate. The same instinct runs through daily life: you greet a waiting room when you enter it, and you say goodbye when you leave a shop, even having bought nothing. Three phrases are worth stealing. Schönen Feierabend is said to someone finishing work and has no English equivalent at all, Feierabend being the part of the day that belongs to you rather than your employer. Guten Rutsch is what you say on New Year's Eve — a good slide into the coming year. And Alles Gute covers birthdays, departures, new jobs and anything else, which makes it the single most useful thing in this lesson.