Favorite words

This post was posible thanks to the inspiration found in another blog (lilith), where the author mentions her favorite word, at the end she asks which would be our favorite words, here I answer that question, my favorite German words.

First I would like to make clear that, I came to Germany just to make more money once I get back to Mexico, but anyway I like German language, cause it is in some way very different to Spanish or English.

German is flexible, as I saw in one class, we can “invent” words, and the best is, that they make sense! z.B. “Buchdeckel” will be in English “cover book”, or “book cover” but never “bookcover” or “coverbook”, that makes no sense. This is a silly example, there is more complex words of course. Anyway I think German words are shorter (some), save time and people understand what you say!

German is exact... if someone is not your friend, you call him/her exactly what he/she is to you. Let me explain this, in Mexican culture when you introduce someone, usually we say he/she is our “friend” and you don even know the name, cause you are together in one lecture, and you don’t see him/her in a month. Well, this embarrassing situation in Germany is completely different. you can say he/she is “ein Bekannte/in” which means “I have seen this guy/girl once, but we are not friends” the same applys to Kommilitione “fellow student”; Praktikant, “Intern”; Mitschüler, “fellow student”; Mitarbeiter, “work fellow”; Mitbewohner “roommate” and so on... as you can see German solves the conflict of human relations, defining the exact word for anyone without hurting anyone’s feelings.

Well, thinking in favorite words, maybe will be one that i think i’ll never forget, cause it was repeated like 30 thousand times in a internship interview “(die) Rückverfolgbarkeit”, it was until I went home and look in the dict.leo.com that I was able to understand the meaning, “traceability”. In spanish will be “Rastreabilidad”.

Other one, the ubiquitous (sometimes not so ubiquitous) “bitte”=please, you can fix almost every question in order to avoid any misunderstanding, just if you put a “bitte” at the end. Bitte do it.

“Doch”… that has a special place in my Hearth … usually one can use this word to answer positively a negative question.

“Genau”, the translation is EXACTLY! But if you said the word at loud sounds like it is suppose to sound or not??? GENAU you got it!

“Ach so”, Germans love this pair of words it is useful to express that you have (or pretend that you have) understood some concept or the point of view of other person. But you have to say it with style… something like “Ajjjj sooooo”

I have no more words, I think… and I have a lot to do… see you!

Mit ostberlinischen Gruessen!
Mac... wordy