I’ve been to Switzerland a couple times now, so I thought: how about trying out a
little Swiss German?!
Hey everyone! I’m Dana and you’re watching Wanted Adventure Living Abroad.
Within Germany itself there are lots of different regional kinds of German that are spoken and
it’s been super interesting getting to learn about the regional differences living here.
Last year I made a video trying to speak Plattdeutsch, which is spoken by some people in parts of
northern Germany, and now today I’m going to give Swiss German a go.
Stefan and I recently spent a little time in Basel as well as Zurich and yeah; wow, we really
noticed a difference in the German spoken there. For example, we would be listening
to the radio and the main news broadcasters would be speaking standard German and we could
understand everything that they said no problem. But then the local broadcasters would come
on and it was really like going from understanding 100% to understanding 10% in a single second.
And that 10% of understanding, by the way, came entirely from Mr. German Man.
I was getting none of it. Nothing.
But that really only made me all the more interested to learn more about Swiss German
and get my own personal experience trying it out. So I’ve got a few phrases that I'd
like to try today, and I’m going to say the English first, then the phrase in standard
German, and then my best attempt at the Swiss German.
One of the first interesting things that I noticed is that when looking these Swiss German
phrases up, sometimes I saw them spelled in a couple different ways in different places,
so if you speak Swiss German and I spell a word differently than you would spell it,
please let me know down in the comments, thank you! And also please let me know if you agree
with the German and the English translations for the phrases that I went with here.
First one: English -- How are you? Standard German -- Wie geht’s? And Swiss German is
Wie goots? I believe. Wie goots? Does that sound right, Stefan? He has no idea. Of course.
How would he?
Hallo, wie goots? If "wie goots" is "wie geht's," is "wie goot es Ihnen," "wie geht es Ihnen?"
Please let me know, thank you. Okay, the next one.
Good bye. Auf wiedersehen. Uf Widerluege.
I feel like that's really wrong. I don't think it's "Widerluege." Luege? I think that's it.
In two seconds I'm like, I think that's wrong. No I think that's it. Uf Widerluege. Uf Widerluege.
I'm going to go with "Uf Widerluege," final answer.
This was actually one of the first German differences that I noticed in Switzerland.
I noticed signs saying "Uf Widerluege" instead of "Auf Wiedersehen."
Next we've got: Hello to both of you, which we don’t actually really say in English.
Yes, it makes sense, but if I wanted to say hi to two people I would probably just say
"Hi." Not hello to both of you. In standard German: Hallo ihr zwei. And in Swiss German
that would be: Grüezi mit...mitenand. Grüezi mitenand. Took a moment but I think I got it.
I've never seen that with the Ü and then an E after it. Because the U with the umlaut
is actually UE. So this word is G-R-U-E-E-Z-I. That's interesting. U-E-E. I don't think I've
ever seen that before. A U with an umlaut followed by an E. Then if you don't want a
lot you can have: a little. Ein bisschen. Or: es bitzeli. No I definitely didn't get
that right. Yes I did. Es bitzeli. Es bitzeli. I would like es bitzeli. I guess I should
say the first part in Germany. Ich hätte gern es bitzeli.
How would you say that, Stefan? Es bitzeli. Or just es bitzeli?
Es bitzeli. - Es bitzeli. Okay. A little. Ein bisschen. And: es bitzeli. Stefan's still
making this face like, I don't know! And now, I'm getting hungry.
So you sit down for a meal and in English, what can you say before eating? You can say
bon appétit. Yes, we use bon appétit in English. Or have a nice meal. Although, as
I said also in the Plattdeutsch video, this is not a mandatory thing before starting to
eat in English. But okay, in standard German: Guten Appetit. And in Swiss German, even shorter
than Guten Appetit, it is: en guete.
That was a lovely meal! In English: Thank you very much. In standard German: Vielen
Dank. And in Swiss German: Merci vielmal. So you see that merci, French influence in
this one. Merci vielmal.
And lastly, a good thing to wrap the video up with. In English: See you later. In standard
German: Bis später. And in Swiss German: Bis...oh that's hard for me to say.
Because I really want to say "bis später." It looks like "bis später," but instead of an A with
an umlaut, it's an O with an umlaut, which I also struggle to say. So, let me try again.
Bis spöter. What do you think, Stefan? Say the O with an umlaut for my ear please.
Ö. - "Ö." No. - Ö. - "Ö."
Bis spöter. He gave me a "that was kind of, sort of it maybe" face.
But I don't know if the word is right, but your Ö was pretty good. - Yes! I think we're
just going to end it with that. I think I've said the best that I can.
So my question for you is: how did I do? I hope not too bad, I tried my best with it.
I would love to learn some more Swiss German phrases. And what are some phrases that you
find interesting in a language or a dialect that is not your mother tongue? Please let
me know in the comments below.
Thanks so much for watching. As I mentioned in the video on Wednesday, please don’t
forget to leave your questions for me down in the comments with the hashtag #AskDana.
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a link to that down in the description box below. Until next time, auf Wiedersehen!
To try the Swisssssss Gerrrrrmannnnn. I'm hoping Mr. German Man will help me a little
bit, but I actually don't know how much help he's going to be with this. He's making a
face like I'm a little scared.