The German word for the little figures in pedestrian crossing lights.

In Berlin, the Ampelmännchen come in two flavors: the old-skool men who wear brimmed hats in the East, and the boring modern figures in the West. There was a controversy in the city not long ago, after German reunification, over whether to homogenize the Ampelmännchen, using only the Western figures. Thankfully, the nifty East-side figures survived and now can be found all over former East Berlin.