Of hugely entertaining value to an English speaker living in Germany is the recent insistence by locals to spice up their vocabulary with modern English words and phrases — as if no equivalent or suitable German words were available.
While this linguistic invasion could in itself be discussed ad nauseam, it becomes particularly worrisome when one considers that it is not only the US-American pronunciation efforts but also the US spelling variations (color vs. colour) that seem to be accepted as the norm and indeed even deemed correct by those not in the know. Advertising agencies and the media are particularly guilty of this malpractice.
One wonders what flavour (not flavor) of English our children are being taught at school?
Things get all the more humorous when German words are directly substituted by their apparently more cool-sounding English counterparts whilst sentence structure and grammar remain intact.
In fact, with German language rules in place one could very well end up with products (real things you will find in a real store) named TEDDY SHIT — or so it seemed at first glance.
Yes, of course the product should, with the possessive apostrophe in place, be called TEDDY’S HIT. Since there is no such apostrophe in German, local punctuation rules will dictate that the snacks in question shall be named TEDDYS HIT. Add to that a poor choice of font, an unfortunate viewing angle, and you might just end up with ursid excrement, TEDDYSHIT — something even the logo unwittingly resembles.
Look, them krauts aren’t exactly a stupid breed. Sure, they may have picked two major wars to lose and, despite borrowing foreign words and phrases, continuously and badly dub foreign movies, being rabid fans of schranz, hip-hop (how they actually understand ebonics is beyond me) and second-rate rock music, the good Germans did invent the car, the rocket, the MP3 format, and the Autobahn. There are most certainly brilliant scientists, clever engineers, dedicated doctors, gifted designers, fine composers, selfless humanitarians, top exporters, frivolous holiday makers, and prolific porno producers amongst them.
Then there’s the rest. Cannon-fodder and tax-payers for the other half, they’re the Deutschland that’s constantly seeking the superstars that can fill their meaningless days with forgetful drivel kitsch songs and the ones that venture online to populate their beds and their dusty wombs with foreign sperm in an attempt to reverse a declining and aging hoi polloi that demands ever-decreasing working hours and more religious holidays. Despite the latter, they’re sexually quite liberal, and it’s therefore not uncommon to have to tolerate the neighbours tanning naked in their garden and in full view of everyone who happens to glance out their window. In some cases it’s actually a rather pleasant sight and “each to his own” for the rest, many of which should really not be seen (let alone photographed) in any state of undress.
One of these poor and horny souls is this lady who is desperately seeking Bruno.
Seems that these two met online but after some naughty conversations, the exchanging of pictures or even some horizontal activities Bruno suddenly went AWOL for reasons she hasn’t quite grasped (hint: mirror + scale).
Her message may be in German but the stupidity and embarrassment are universally understandable. Nice mop, too!
Image credits and edits: hmvh DOT net
