Hi, Yazack, and welcome!
Regarding first question: It’s possibly same answer as in another thread. Plus you can switch-off all but “Local solr index” in “Search data sources” in /Settings_p.html?page=debug. I use, personally similar setup, prefering my local index instead of p2p one, but sharing my index with the network, at the same time.
Regarding second question, someone living in Germany should answer, I’ve no idea.