title: DateFormat format.parse parse exception: Unparseable date
body: <p>I am developing an android application and in one of the activities I am sorting a list of objects based on their date.</p>
  
  <p>The problem I encounter is that the list of objects is being sorted in descending order for the German locale.</p>
  
  <ul>
  <li>if the locale is set to English(UK), the list is being sorted in an ascending order.</li>
  <li>if the locale is set German(Deutschland), the list is being sorted in a descending order.</li>
  </ul>
  
  <p>In order to sort the list I am using the following:</p>
  
  <pre><code>           Collections.sort(list, new Comparator&lt;Object&gt;() {
                  @Override
                  public int compare(MyPOJO obj1, MyPOJO obj2) {
                      DateFormat format = new SimpleDateFormat("EE MMM dd HH:mm:ss z yyyy");
                      Date date1, date2;
  
                      try {
                          date1 = format.parse(obj1.getPubDate());
                          date2 = format.parse(obj2.getPubDate());
  
                          return date1.compareTo(date2);
                      } catch (ParseException e) {
                          e.printStackTrace();
                      }
  
                      return 0;
                  }
              });  
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>For English, for an object I have the following date format:
  Thu Aug 13 14:50:02 EEST 2015</p>
  
  <p>and for German, the following:
  Thu Aug 13 14:50:02 OESZ 2015</p>
  
  <p>Do you know what might be the root cause of this behavior, and maybe a way to fix this?</p>