AmericanAnDerTU

For those of you that don’t speak German, you’ll probably enjoy this more than the Germans, Swiss and Austrians that will read this. I think the natives will perhaps be a bit insulted. Whatever.

German-speaking natives have done a wonderful job of taking English words and then butchering them and twisting them to fit the German language. Makes for a helluva time to learn the language since the English forms have replaced the original German. Sometimes you pronounce it like the original English, other times you pronounce it with the German pronunciation rules. It’s weird. So, here goes:

• The word “Handy” in German means “cell phone”. It doesn’t mean to be handy or useful for anything like in English. It’s the German word for a mobile. I think Fritz had a few too many beers when trying to figure out a catchy marketing word for a new bit of tech.
• “upgedatet”, “upgedated” or “geupdated” are the past-tense German forms (they all mean the same, but no one can decide on how to properly ruin the English form) of the English verb “to update”. There’s a German verb that’s perfectly fine, but you only ever see it in your computer operating system. Why they don’t use it is beyond me. 
• In the same vein as the previous word, there’s also this gem of linguistics: “downgeloadet” or “gedownloadet” (again, Fritz doesn’t have a clue what he’s doing here). My teeth grind when I hear either of these words. What’s worse is that it’s not just young people using them. You hear professors using them. Yea, people with doctorates and whatnot. Supposedly intelligent people. 
• “Oldtimer” is a funny word in German. In English, someone who is an old timer is a person of advanced age (we gotta stay PC, people). In German, however, it means a classic car. Imagine my surprise when I saw an ad in the newspaper for an “Oldtimer Show”…
• “Callboy” is a beautiful example. A call boy in English is (I had to look this one up to be sure) is a stagehand in theatre, whereas the German “Callboy” is a gigolo. So to all you call boys out there working Broadway, be sure make sure you get the right translation if you decide to move to a German-speaking country and you’re looking for a job. Don’t want people to think you were a rent-a-gay, do you?
• “Mobbing” is a German word that means “bullying”. In English it’s quite different. Certainly negative, but the school kids that are “mobbing” their classmates aren’t laundering money or running prostitution rings. I think this one is an invention of an Italian mobster turned German language teacher.
• “Beamer” is one that confuses the hell out of me. I guarantee this is the result of a beer-addled evening watches episodes of Star Trek in English and Fritz didn’t really get what was going on. A “Beamer” is simply a projector. Nothing more, nothing less.

Once my Australian friend gets back to Vienna later this year I am sure there will be more to follow. We made a list once that seems to have gone missing, which obviously now needs to be recreated.