"I am very, very strict"
We meet in the office of her agent in Cologne. Anke Engelke, 48, sits in front of a large window overlooking the city: short and wiry, in black sneakers, black trousers and a plain white T-shirt, with ballerina bun on her head and black glasses on her nose.
ChroniquesDuVasteMonde: You originally wanted to be a teacher. What would you be for today?
ANKE ANGELKE: I'm interested in either the first classes, where you can be a bit of a guide and the school can miss a good image, but also the puberty. I suppose I would be guided by teachers I myself had, who inspired me.
Which subjects would you teach?
I studied education and languages, unfortunately because of the job only until the intermediate exam. That would have interested me: literature.
Would your lessons be funny?
Yes, but that does not get you very far.
So would you rather be strict?
Extremely strict, yes. Very, very, very, very strict. Is always about discipline in me.
What you notice very quickly: The "Ladykracher" -ank, the Thank-Anke, the funniest woman in Germany understands no fun when it comes to things that are close to her heart. Education is such a topic. There she has mission awareness.
Is it true that you talk to teens in the suburban train to correct them?
I do not just do it that way. But if someone is rude or harasses someone, I'll say something. Sometimes it's good when someone comes and says that's impossible, the way you've been behaving here. A stranger is treated differently than, for example, a parent. If in doubt, the children and adolescents know me too. They have to deal with the fact that this was the woman from the television, which she has just mentioned. Maybe something will hang. I think I have an assignment there.
Now one would like to ask her how she is raising her own three children (18, 9 and 5 years). But her private life protects her, she does not talk about her family. So also in this conversation is the agreement.
You do not want to talk about your own children, which I accept. Can you still explain why?
Because I do not want my kids to deal with my celebrity. They did not choose my job.
Children and career - no problem for you?
No problem.
Does that apply to every woman?
No. For God's sake, no, no. That would be grotesque to say so. It's not a problem for me, and I see in my circle of friends that it's not a problem, because of course, these are people who have good jobs or good partners and, if they are single parents, a good network. Of course I can not say all inclusive, it is possible for everyone. It is not so. There is no support, and you do not know where to start with the criticism. I do not want to be the minister of the family.
Measures such as the introduction of parental allowance and the extension of kindergarten have already brought about a change, especially among the fathers.
But I do not know if politics ever caused this change. That must always come from society. The question is: does one have to regulate this privately? The answer is yes! I do not care about anyone I choose if I have a care problem - Wednesdays at five-thirty.
What do you do then?
Parents have to say, watch out, you always have Mondays, Tuesdays, and so on. I am a big friend of networks. My clothes packages, prams, cradle and so on wander through our circle of friends. One of my best friends often plays with the children when we have a bottleneck and is considered an aunt. But she is not an aunt at all. So what? Parents need to create networks within kindergarten, class, household or street. Anyone who tells me I'm overwhelmed, that I have such a tough job - he may not have taken the ten minutes that it takes to organize. In the job that works well, because you are also punctual and has the right shoes. If you have children, you should be aware of your responsibility. Of course I'm superprivileged because I have a great job. But I hope I talk like that when things are not going so well.
Anke Engelke is accustomed to success, but has also learned how quickly the tide can turn, succeeding Harald Schmidt. "Ankes Late Night" was set despite three-year contract after five months.
Failure at work - how to deal with it privately? And how do you keep that away from your family?
Not at all. That would be extremely wrong. Then you do not have the right to know what is going on around your children.
So always be honest?
You can not demand anything from your children that you do not give yourself. Parents should never be a mystery to their children.The thing we ask children to do is always to seek an answer to a question. Mom is weird - maybe because I did not clean my room? They seek the blame. We also know this from separation psychology.
Is the essence of education a good bond?
I would rather replace bonding with trust. Bonding is problematic, because some may not feel it as voluntary, but as a duty.
So trust, openness?
Of course, openness is also to be discussed. There are age phases of young adults, as expressed closeness over distance. You may send a 15-year-old away for a year. Then not the parents shit, but the educators. I'm afraid love only works through this freedom.
Keeping in touch with his children, accompanying them is the most demanding thing. Since we come to your favorite topic television: also not for lazy parents.
Oh, TV. Of course that's always a bit bigoted when I rant about television. I earn my money with it. But I believe that a TV that runs for five hours a day robs you of time and energy. He makes dull.
How should you watch TV with children?
Accompany the children, watch for ten or twenty minutes and then talk about it. Or in the ideal case, press the pause button - you do not have to look linear - and say, "Huh? I did not understand that now." Did you understand that? It is very important to know what the children are receiving.
Certainly synonymous for the Internet.
Internet? Not at all, right?
We have now set a code in the iPad so my son will not. , ,
How old is he?
Eight. He always types in words on Google and is looking for example animal films.
Why is he allowed to have your iPad?
Well, he should not really. It's just around us.
I have no understanding for that. Everything that stands around is naturally part of life for the child. So, if the parents like to drink a bottle of wine, then there's just a bottle of wine around, and that's part of the child's cosmos - even a small child. That's everyday. If the parents smoke, if they argue, if the iPad is lying around, everything is normal. Parents define the child's cosmos.
Anke Engelke herself has an age-old mobile phone with which she does not like to make phone calls. She prefers to send text messages, and her mails check them only once in the evening.
Are not you a little too strict? The iPad also makes everyday life easier for us, so we check when the next train arrives or what we cook.
What a pity. I would always question that. After all, it's your life, so you have to look carefully, what is coming in and what goes without saying. I find it questionable, because it also shows the inertia of the guardians.
But to keep the children completely away from digital media is something that is alien to reality in the long term.
No one wants to bring back the Stone Age. But it's easy to say, that's part of it. The dictates of no alternatives. But I can set the standards myself. So why is not it standard to cook together on Sundays? Why is not it standard to always clear your plate? Of course, you have to offer the children what you want for a good life: friendly cooperation, trust, responsibility. The children take over everything. But you can not ask them to be better, more correct, or more consistent than you are. My intermediate exam theme was "The Moral Feeling" of Jean Piaget, the god of morality in child and youth development.
Anke Engelke regrets that she has not completed her studies. Today she teaches as a professor of comedy at the Cologne Academy of Media Arts and leads children through the Kunsthalle in Bonn.
The children who guide you through the museum in Bonn know that Anke Engelke is just around the corner?
They booked that, yes. I also like to take some heavy trainers. And then there are always a few, the stalk directly, the film on the phone and so on. Since I am then - hopefully - funny way directly nasty. I'll test who can contraindicate? Who has entertainer qualities? I am very happy. And if we split up an hour and a half later, then something happened. Then they talk differently. Because they were taken seriously for the hour and a half.
To be honest, to be serious, to address children directly, you have done the same thing in your ARD-Themenwochen-series on the subject of luck. At the Kinderkrebsstation in Essen you told a boy in the face that he would die soon.
Well, of course, because he knows it too. If the kids are sick, why talk around it? Children have totally good sensors, which can be used when someone is slimy or spiteful.
Anke Engelke sang as a child with Heino and Udo Jürgens and moderated from 1979 to 1986 the daily children's program on the ZDF holiday program. At age 14, Anke Engelke once interviewed Astrid Lindgren. What she remembered most about it: The Swede took her seriously.
Is based on what you think about education today, even on what you have experienced as a child?
My parents have forbidden me many things. At some point, I think I was 14, there was also the question of dropping out of school and going to America. This ran in parallel with Désirée Nosbusch, with whom I moderated in 1979 at the radio exhibition. Of course that was not up for debate with us. Such a ban is rather an expression of freedom, of independence, in the sense of: Be first a child.
So your parents did everything right?
If I ask my parents, why did not you force me to keep playing the piano, they say, because it's no fun to force a child. Now I think: too bad.
So what is your advice to the parents of today?
I'm not really interested in the parents. I am interested in the children. Nevertheless, I always end up with the parents. You just have to make it clear: children are the better people. The lies are worse, they have not done anything wrong. But we adults already a lot.
