That means “American conditions” or “the American situation,” meaning really, really bad, of course, and is most often used when referring to crime and the use of guns there.

But then there’s this homeowner guy in Hamburg. I don’t know what the hell he was thinking but when two thieves forced their way into his house he pulled out a gun and shot one of them. At this point the thieves decided to leave. The guy that got shot, however, only made it about two hundred meters down the road before dropping dead. A very similar incident also happened recently in Hanover, by the way.

Shocking, isn’t it? Talk about your amerkikanische Verhältnisse. But even more shocking, I find, is how these news items are quietly being ignored and how you will be hard-pressed to find anyone here in Germany who doesn’t think this guy was right in protecting himself and his property. After all, this isn’t Wild West US-Amerika we’re talking about here, folks.

Einer der Männer soll dann bis in den Hausflur eingedrungen sein. Daraufhin gab der Hauseigentümer einen Schuss auf den Täter ab.