German Of The Day: Stinkefinger

August 28, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, High Art, Home Cooking, Humor Tags: Fake News, Fingers, German, Germans, Germany, Humor, Hype, Journalism, Language, Media, The Finger Leave a comment

That means stinky finger. You know, as in the finger?

SPD boss Sigmar Gabriel recently got some Sommerloch good press by doing what is generally considered to be a bad thing. Only he was flipping off neo-Nazis who were heckling him so that made it a good thing.

Getting in a little more mileage out of it, he has now said in an interview that his only regret is not having used two stinky fingers (no, not the peace sign, he means two hands).

“Ich habe nicht beide Hände benutzt.”

PS: A Sommerloch or summer hole is the “silly season” during summer vacation months typified by frivolous or unimportant news stories in the media.

173 Stations

August 24, 2016 By Hermann Observer in High Art, History, Home Cooking, Humor Tags: Berlin, DDR, GDR, German, Language, Photography, Subways 2 Comments

And 166 of them are ugly as sin. That’s Berlin’s subway system for you, folks.

But, hey. Beauty is in the eye of the Schwarzfahrer (“black rider” or fare dodger). So enjoy them already or something.

The city’s U-Bahn system also felt the impact of the Berlin Wall, which divided the city for nearly three decades. Many train lines pre-dated the Wall, so some of the West Berlin lines necessarily passed through East Berlin stations. These stations were closed and guarded, and became known as ghost stations. The guards were visible to the West Berlin passengers as the trains slowly moved through the dimly lit stations.

Ninjas Not Allowed In School

August 22, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Habeas Corpus, Higher Education, Home Cooking, Humor Tags: German, Germans, Germany, Integration, Islam, Language, Law, Migrants, Muslims, Niqab, Religion 3 Comments

I meant niqabs, of course (I always mix those two up for some reason).

A Muslim woman who had been accepted to night school in Osnabrück showed up for class wearing a niqab. When asked to remove it she refused and was subsequently expelled. She then went to court to fight the decision but didn’t bother to show up for a court appointment set to help clarify the matter. The court has now decided in favor of the school.

The whole thing is very schleierhaft, if you ask me. You know, “veiled in mystery?”

Eine Muslima, die an einem Osnabrücker Abendgymnasium mit einem Gesichtsschleier am Unterricht teilnehmen wollte, ist vor Gericht gescheitert.

PS: In a related story, you can now pick up pepper spray at one of Germany’s popular drugstore chains. Supply and demand and the invisible hand. Capitalism is a wonderful thing, folks.

Germans Pissed Off At Smiling Olympic Athletes

August 17, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Helplessness, Home Cooking, Humor Tags: Anna Hahner, Competition, German, Germans, Germany, Language, Lisa Hahner, Marathon, Olympia 2016, Olympics, Sports, Twins 3 Comments

Who lose, I mean.

The nerve or something. “The Hahner twins Lisa and Anna ended their Olympic marathon race more than 21 minutes behind the winner and more than 15 minutes on their best performance, in position 81 and 82. It looked as though they completed a fun run and not an Olympic race.”

You’re supposed to win, verdammt (dammit)! Stomp the opponent under your Nikes or whatever Olympic athletes wear at a time like this and NOT come across the finish line holding hands and, well, smiling. It’s attitudes like these that make the Olympics seem as if it were supposed to be some kind of an uplifting experience, symbolizing the joy of participating and sharing, a rare occasion when all of humanity comes together as one. You know, fantasy stuff like that.

You want some German of the day, ladies? How about Sieg? You make us Sieg to our stomachs just looking at you. Losers!

“Number 81 and 82 was definitely not what we had hoped for. Whether we are satisfied? No. But crossing the finish line was nevertheless one of our greatest sporting moments.”

German Of The Day: Dirndl

August 16, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Helplessness, Home Cooking Tags: Burqa, Clothing, Dirndl, German, Germans, Germany, Language, Traditional Dress Leave a comment

A dirndl (German: [ˈdɪʁndl̩] ( listen)) is a type of traditional dress worn in Austria, South Tyrol and Bavaria. It is based on the traditional clothing of Alps peasants. Dresses that are loosely based on the dirndl are known as Landhausmode (“country-inspired fashion”).

This down here is not one of them.

Ein Gespenst geht um in Deutschland. Es trägt ein langes dunkles Gewand, das nur die Augen ausspart.

Would Kilgore Trout Tell A Lie?

August 13, 2016 By Hermann Observer in High Art, Higher Education, Humor Tags: 99c, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Berlin, Book Sales, Deutsch, eBooks, German, iTunes, Jokes, Kilgore Trout, Language, Sales, Smashwords, Travel Leave a comment

It’s special ebook offer time again already, folks. Deal with it.

Dumb Deutsch: Absurd German Language Errors (auch für deutsche Leser geeignet)

Also at iTunes, Smashwords, Barnes & Noble, etc. For a limited time only or something.

“Very funny book, relating dumb things people say while trying out their high school German. Laughing so hard at my normally quiet workplace I had tears in my eyes, my boss walked by and asked if I was OK. Oh yeah! She has a great sense of humor with an eye toward languages. Buy this book and laugh yourself silly!”

–Kilgore Trout

German Of The Day: Butt and Fuchs

August 9, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Hard Facts, Helplessness, High Art, Higher Education, Humor Tags: German, Germans, Hockey, Language, Olympics, Twitter Leave a comment

Butt is a short form for halibut (although in this case it’s just somebody’s name). Fuchs means fox. Not like anybody cares here.

Linus Butt and Florian Fuchs were part of a German team that destroyed their Canadian opponents 6-2 in a group stage fixture on Saturday in Rio de Janeiro.

Footage shows the two men standing standing with their backs to the camera during the game with the surnames on their shirts side-by-side.

But Twitter immediately reacted with one user, Kris Kristensen, posting the image along with the caption: ‘This one’s for the 12 year old in all of us.’

Poor But Sexy, But Poor

August 8, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Home Cooking, Humor, Hurt Feelings Tags: Berlin, Cities, Employment, Finances, German, Germans, Germany, Language, Money, Poverty Leave a comment

Those were the days. Berlin used to be just (arm aber sexy) poor but sexy.

Now Berlin is poor but sexy, but poor. At least when it comes to trying to earn a living here.

The German capital pulls down the per capita income for the entire country. According to Eurostat (the European statistics office), Germany’s gross national product (with an emphasis on gross) would climb 0.2 percent if they could just find a way to factor out losers like us here in Berlin.

Poor? Yo capital is so poor it can’t afford to pay attention.

Die Hauptstadt drückt auf das Pro-Kopf-Einkommen der gesamten Bundesrepublik: Das Bruttoinlandsprodukt je Einwohner würde um 0,2 Prozent steigen, wenn man Berlin und seine Einwohner ausklammert, wie das Institut der deutschen Wirtschaft (IW) auf Basis von Daten des Europäischen Statistikamtes Eurostat errechnete.

German Of The Day: Bewaffnete Bürger

August 5, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Habeas Corpus, Hard Facts, Helplessness, Hideology, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy Tags: German, Germans, Germany, Gun control, Guns, Language, Self-Defense, Weapons 1 Comment

No, that doesn’t mean Waffle Burger (do you want fries with that?). It means armed citizens.

And yes, believe it or not, many Germans actually own so-called “guns.” Although a lot of them are just Schreckschusswaffen (alarm guns that fire blanks).

And word is out that the number of Germans wanting guns of any kind has increased dramatically the past year or two, for some inexplicable reason.

“As of June 2016, there were 402,301 small arms carry permits in the National Weapons Register,” the Interior Ministry said. The first half of 2015 recorded slightly less than 270,000 requests for permits – that’s an almost 50% jump in permit applications.

German Of The Day: Negerkuss

July 21, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Habeas Corpus, Hard Facts, Helplessness, Hideology, Higher Education, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy, Hysteria Tags: German, Germans, Germany, Language, Negerkuss, Political correctness Leave a comment

That means “negro kiss” and is a somewhat antiquated name for a popular chocolate covered marshmallow here.

And using this name can get you fired in this highly sensitive, politically correct day and age we are forced to live in, too. A manager who works at the tour operator Thomas Cook just found that out.

It didn’t matter that no offense was intended when he ordered one of these things at the company cafeteria – from a black employee to boot – the company acted as it was expected to act and fired this otherwise irreproachable employee of ten years without notice.

Den Thomas-Cook-Mitarbeiter jedenfalls hat die drastische Reaktion des Unternehmens auf den Eklat in der Kantine erschüttert. Er zog vors Frankfurter Arbeitsgericht – und bekam dort Recht. Da der unbescholtene Mann aus dem mittleren Management mehr als zehn Jahre ohne Beanstandungen gearbeitet habe, sei ohne vorherige Abmahnung weder eine außerordentliche fristlose noch eine ordentliche Kündigung gerechtfertigt, befand das Arbeitsgericht.

Observing Hermann

“Was interessiert mich mein Geschwätz von gestern?”

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