Germany

[Rikudou Sennin]

I hope so too.

I'm a fan of nearly every culture worldwide.

So many amazing idividuals.

Greetings

[damane08]

Germany FTW!! World Cup Winners, remember i said it.

[Roflkopt3r]

Anyone joining me in reviving this long dead thread? I love this subforums so I hope anyone notices

Writing so much english text currently in different forums sometimes reminds me of the advantages of my mother language german. There seem to be alot of things that don't have a unique name or are hard to express in english, while there often is one simple word for those in german.
Well known examples which were adapted into english language: "Kindergarten" and "Weltanschauung".
Last example: When I looked up an english word for "Gischt", which would be sea foam or spray. Everyone who doesn't know the german pronounciation would make something funny out of this word so here comes an explanation:
German "i" is rather like the english "e" like it's beeing pronounced in the alphabet. "Sch" in german is always like english "sh" but never like "sch" in "school." "i" before "sch" in this case usually means that the "i" is vocalized short and with few emphasis.
I think such things are almost impossible to pronounce for most people with different native languages but maybe some can imagine it

On the flipside I have to accept that most germans have a terrible terrible accent when speaking english.

Since the last topic was music, here comes the last music from german artists I heard or liked:
Peter Fox - Schwarz zu blau (Black to blue) from his very famous album Stadtaffe (City monkey). He has extraordinary good lyrics but I think he said it was the last album he will ever make.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7X4KaHYRmFo

Polarkreis 18 - Allein Allein (Polar Circle 18 - Allone Allone / Most of the text is english anyways if I remember correctly)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpWjOa-11qA

Frittenbude - Mindestens in 1000 Jahren (chip stand - at least in thousand years)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lz-alZxCJwQ

Zombie Nation - Forza (Doesn't have any text anyways. Most people will know Zombie Nation for "Kernkraft 400", if you don't check for it on Youtube since it's legendary)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8ZydY0rgV8

[k-dom]

Funny stuff of my german course yesterday:

Teacher : in german all alcohol names are masculine : der Wine, der Whisky, der Vodka
Student : but we said das Bier
Teacher : that's proof bier is no alcohol :-)

[Evil3ye]

germany won the eurovison song contest!!!

omg, yes! I can't wait until may, to head off to Düsseldorf and party hard super international again

I'm so happy it's not in Berlin this time, will save me a lot of money, which again could be spend in alcohol... or beer

[Roflkopt3r]

Funny stuff of my german course yesterday:

Teacher : in german all alcohol names are masculine : der Wine, der Whisky, der Vodka
Student : but we said das Bier
Teacher : that's proof bier is no alcohol :-)

Kölsch is none, that's for certain

[foobar]

There seem to be alot of things that don't have a unique name or are hard to express in english, while there often is one simple word for those in german.

... du hast meinen respekt verdient. ich kann englisch besser verstehen als deutsch und kann mich darin auch besser ausdrücken und das, obwohl ich hier geboren bin

[Evil3ye]

"Schadenfreude". Seems to be one of those typical German things. How sad

[Roflkopt3r]

... du hast meinen respekt verdient. ich kann englisch besser verstehen als deutsch und kann mich darin auch besser ausdrücken und das, obwohl ich hier geboren bin

Hm ich würde das für mich nicht so vergleichen, solange ich nen Wörterbuch hab bin ich mit Englisch gut dabei :xD
Eigentlich habe ich kein Problem mit meinem Vokabular, aber mir entfallen dauernd einzelne Wörter. Sowohl in Englisch als auch in Deutsch allerdings. Häufig entfällt mir ein Deutsches und ich weiß aber sofort welches es auf Englisch wäre

Ich finde einfach es gibt viele sehr prägnante deutsche Worte die in Englisch nur umschrieben werden können oder weniger schöne Begriffe haben, häufig aus Wortkombinationen. Finde "Gischt" zum Beispiel immernoch einen viel schöneren Begriff als "Sea Foam"

[k-dom]

It's also better in French écume ( sorry I switch back to English)
But that's a funny topic what German words are you proud of ?
Today, I was quite disapointed that our beautiful french coccinelle is called Marienkäfer
But I find that words like Heimat or Heimweh are really nice

[Roflkopt3r]

It's also better in French écume ( sorry I switch back to English)
But that's a funny topic what German words are you proud of ?
Today, I was quite disapointed that our beautiful french coccinelle is Marienkäfer
But I find that words like Heimat or Heimweh are really nice

Okay, there certainly are a lot of less beatiful words in Germany compared to French, Portugese and Spain.
A lot of words I like are from a military or naval background or in philosophy about Sehnsucht and such. Hm I'll think about it to define that a little closer and to find other semantic fields I'ld define as best in German x)
I still think that Germany might be the most precise language there is to describe things or to create proper names and terms.

I know there is some quote about what language is fit for what field. I think it was like English for diplomany, french for love, German for science or something like that (or German for diplomacy, I don't really remember). Gonna search for that one.

[k-dom]

What is the name of this german movie, the life of the others or something like that. It's about a guy from stasi who spies a couple of intelectuals in ex DDR. At one point in time he hear someone read a text in german ( some brecht I think ). When I watched it, i was thinking, german can really be beautiful sometime. I would like to hear it again to see if I would still feel the same way or if it is a memory aberation

[Roflkopt3r]

The movie you mean is "Das Leben der Anderen"
I don't remember it that well anymore, it was a brilliant movie though. Guess I'll rewatch it these days and check what you mean, too

Btw I heard (some years ago, dunno if it's still like that) in Japan German is the language of medicine (while we, like I guess most western countries, use Latin for that purpose).

[Crude]

Lately I've been very interested in learning the German language. It's always been at the top of my list of languages I want to learn (sharing a spot with Japanese and Italian). Maybe it's because I've rediscovered my love for Rammstein and their music . I've only learnt a bit (thanks to having a half-German friend ) but I think my pronunciation is pretty good. I heard that it's easier if you're Scottish due to a lot of sounds being similar to ones found in Scots (I'm half-Scottish by the way). This desire of mine to learn the language has also lead me to being very interested in Germanic culture and history. I dislike how some people say that the language is ugly and sounds harsh, I think that it's because they aren't exposed to more German media.

Anyway I have a small (and pretty stupid) question. How exactly do you pronounce "Ü"? And what abou "ie"? And when is "ch" like a "ck"?

[k-dom]

The ü is like a French u whereas the u is like the ou of you.
ie is a long i
ch is more like a r
ck is like k
If you go on http://dict.leo.org, there is some record that you can listen to