Hey everyone, Dana here! This video will be in German but I made English subtitles for
the video too, and you can turn them on, or the German subtitles, I made German subtitles
as well. You can turn them on using the CC function. And now also a quick reminder
It's easier to say (in German) "don't forget." Please don't forget I'll be
having a book reading event here in Munich on July 18 in Hugendubel am Stachus.
I made a video about that, and I'll put a link to the video and all the details in the video description.
July 18, 2019, from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m., Hugendubel am Stachus in Munich. The book reading will be in
German. My book is in German. And I have picked out a few funny parts from
my book...I picked out a few funny parts from my book that I'd like to read.
And, yeah, I'm looking forward to seeing you there! And now to the video.
Definitely don't say these things in English! Warning, warning, these things that I say
are not correct in English. But then, why do I say them? Now that I've lived about
9 years in Germany and at this point speak so much German, a few parts of
my English have, I'd say, become a little Germanized.
I'm not talking about Denglish here, which I love to speak. I love Denglish
so much. I don't know where I would be without Denglish. I love Denglish. It brings the best
parts of English and German together. But this in video I'm talking about my totally normal
English. It just sounds weird and more than anything sometimes now wrong because I
either translate something directly from German into English, or I try to somehow
squeeze my English words through the German grammar. So yeah, believe me, it gets weird.
But now you can learn from my mistakes. So definitely don't say these things in English.
Oh my God, how I love ending sentences with "or" now. In German
that's totally normal. "Wir treffen uns heute Abend, oder? Du hast schon was gegessen, oder? Das
wetter ist super scheiße, oder?" In English: we’re meeting up this evening, or?
You've already eaten something, or? The weather is super shitty, or?
No! No, no, no, no, no. No.
In English you should end these sentences differently. Not with "or." For example,
"aren't we," or "right," or even just the grunt, “huh." But never “or."
We're meeting up this evening, aren’t we? You’ve already eaten something, right? The weather
is super shitty, huh? All correct. But not just "or." For an English
speaker then the question here would be: or what? Or what?
In German you often talk about what you're planning to do with the present tense. "Ich gehe
einkaufen. Ich esse einen Burger. Ich rufe dich später an." In English this would literally be:
“I go shopping. I eat a burger." Und "I call you later." But that is not
correct in English. That is not right. And that sounds totally weird. A little,
I would say, like a robot perhaps. I call you later. Because in English we don't use
the present tense to talk about something that we're going to do. In English
you could say, for example: "I’m going shopping" or "I’m going
to go shopping," it depends. "I’ll eat a burger. I’ll call you later." Yeah, that could
be correct. But just "I call you later," no. That is not right.
But I have noticed, especially recently I think, that I sometimes use this
"I go shopping,” “I eat a burger” phrasing. Not often, but it does happen.
For example, I noticed that the other day I said to Stefan: "I call my parents now"
instead of the correct phrasing, “I’m going to call my parents now” or
"I'm calling my parents now." No, I said: I call my parents now.
I call my parents now is not correct in English (I made a German mistake here). No, it's not correct English.
And that was also not correct German. Great. I can't speak anything correctly. Okay, continue.
And the last example for this video is: I have noticed that sometimes I now
say the time a little weirdly. So apparently now because of German
and English, I'm confused by the time. Which is not good. Because I often say the time.
What time is it? And when should we meet? Yeah. Not good.
Okay first of all, for me, saying the time in German, just saying it in German
is a totally complicated thing. That's why I wrote a whole chapter about it in my book.
In the USA we use the 12-hour clock and AM
and PM. But not in Germany. Here we use the 24-hour clock. And as I explain in my
book, even after all these years, that's still confusing for me. When, for
example, a friend says "let's meet at 13:00 o'clock, okay?" I think: 13?
Oh no! What's going on? Are we in another dimension? Is this here the place
where time and space collide? In what magical world is it 13 o'clock?
So yeah, 13. Times are still hard for me in German.
But now I've also somehow brought that into English. Yeah. I've noticed that sometimes
when I'm thinking about a time in English, I mix up everything and I then have
the Frankenstein combination from German and English 17 hour, like 17 Uhr. Or 17 o'clock.
Or just 17. Let’s meet at 17. 17 what? The 17th of the month? 17th street? What are
you talking about, Dana? What do you mean with "let's meet at 17?" 5 p.m. In English it's 5 p.m.
Not 17. Not 17 hour. 5 p.m.
So my question for you is: have you ever said these funny things in English?
What other mistakes could someone make in English because of German? Which mistakes
have you made? Please let me know in the comments below.
Thanks for watching! It's be great if you subscribed to my channel. There are
new videos every Monday and Thursday. My videos on YouTube are normally
in English, but I do my Instagram stories in German. Or Denglish. Yeah, I
would say Denglish. Until next time, auf Wiedersehen!