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This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 14th, 2009 at 6:30 pm and is filed under Intermediate Season 2 . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
16 Responses to “Intermediate Lesson S2 #32 - Don’t Fall Victim to the German Bureaucracy!”
Wednesday at 3:51 am
Can you imagine living in Germany, Austria or Switzerland? Where would you go and what would you do?
Wednesday at 6:30 pm
Thursday at 5:13 am
The need for a Visa also applies for people coming from within the European Community ?
Why does A says: ich hab den Job gekriegt!. Should’nt it be “Ich habe den Job…” ?
Thanks
Thursday at 7:07 am
@Matteo
hab is colloquial for habe. e is left out. you find that often. Ich wink instead of Ich winke, ich ess instead of ich esse, ich geh instead of ich gehe. Sometimes in writing you put a ‘ at the end you show that it isshortent like ich geh’ zum Ausländeramt.
Friday at 2:48 pm
Ich hab eine frage um eine wort im dialog: Die wort “uberhaupt” is benutzt (?) zehr oft … kann irgendjemand die bedeutung erklaeren und beispiele geben?
(In addition to answering my question, please feel free to correct my grammar in the question — I’m trying to write what I can in German!)
Many thanks!
Friday at 11:40 pm
@Karen
first to your question. überhaupt put emphasis on something like “at all” “even” “actually” in english
For example:
“Ich habe ÜBERHAUPT keine Ahnung “(I don’t have a clue AT ALL)
“überhaupt kein Problem” (no problem whatsoever)
“Das steht doch überhaupt nicht zur Debatte.” (”That doesn’t even enter the equation.)
or you can use it in combination with wenn
wenn überhaupt -> (if any, if anything, if at all)
Second the corrections:
I am not sure about the preposition “um” so I leave it out. Somenody else might have better knowledge there. I don’t think it’s correct but I can’t say what you should put there instead.
“Ich hab eine frage um eine wort im dialog: Die wort “uberhaupt” is benutzt (?) zehr oft … kann irgendjemand die bedeutung erklaeren und beispiele geben?” -> Ich habe eine Frage. Im Dialog wird das Wort ‘überhaupt’ sehr oft benutzt. Kann mir (irgendjemand die Bedeutung erklären und Beispiele geben?”
1) I don’t know if you wrote everything in small letters on purpose or not, but for correct German you have to watch our for the nouns because they are capitalized.
2) Wort is neuter. Das Wort.
3) benutzt is always used with a form of wird. it is used => es wird benutzt. No to be!
4) sehr oft can’t stand at the end here because benutzt has to be last. (there is some grammatical explanation for this, but I can’t recall it right now). If you want to put sehr oft at the end you have to have a different word order.
Man benutzt dieses Wort sehr oft. (one uses this word very often) but with it is used (es wird benutzt) you put sehr oft between wird and benutzt.
5) “kann irgendjemand die bedeutung erklaeren” misses to whom it should be explained or what. Either “Kann mir irgendjemand die Bedeutung erklären” or “Kann das irgendjemand erklären” or you can put both together and say “Knan mir das irgendjemand erklären”
(bzw. you can leave of irgend- and just use jemand)
I hope that helps
Sunday at 5:03 am
Very helpful and thank you!! I’m taking some time to process what you wrote, but one thing stands out … I’ve heard “gar” kein Problem … doesn’t “gar” also mean “at all” in the same way “uberhaupt” does? Are those words sometime interchangeable?
Thanks again for your help!
Sunday at 6:14 am
Just ask if you have any problems/questions. I try to answer what and when I can
I would say gar and überhaupt are always interchangeable. But sometimes one is more common (also that probably depends where you are in Germany). For example “gar kein” is more common then “überhaupt kein”.
Maybe the emphasize can be a bit stronger with überhaupt because it’s such a long word that you really hear it when spoken not like gar which is easy for your ears and hardly noticed. But maybe that is just me.
Wednesday at 12:06 am
Ich könnte mir vorstellen, in Deutschland zu leben, wenn ich besser Deutsch spreche. Ich habe Familie da. Ich könnte mit ihnen bleiben, während ich meine Arbeitserlaubnis kriege. Beruflich bin ich Programmiererin, und man kann diesen Job überall machen. Meine Verwandten fahren Ski gerne in den Alpen, und es würde mich freuen, mit ihnen zu fahren.
Es ist jedoch nicht meine Absicht, jetzt umzuziehen. Ich habe viele Freunde hier, und keine dringinde Gründe, dieses Gebiet zu verlassen.
(I could imagine living in Germany if I spoke better German. I have family there. I could stay with them while I got my work permit. I am a programmer, and one can do that job anywhere. My relatives like to ski in the Alps, and I would be happy to ski with them.
It is not my intention to relocate now, however. I have many friends here, and no urgent need to leave this area.)
Wednesday at 4:02 pm
Vanessa your German is wonderful! I was just proud I could understand everything you wrote in German (without peeking at the translation). Would be nice to see your relatives too, I’m sure. Not sure where you’re coming from … the exchange rate isn’t so good right now and that’s unfortunate.
Wednesday at 9:30 pm
Vielen Dank!
Ich wohne in den USA. Sie haben recht, das Dollar ist jetzt schwach. Schade. Wohnen Sie in Deutschland?
Wednesday at 10:07 pm
Some corrections for you, Vanessa
Ich könnte mir vorstellen, in Deutschland zu leben, wenn ich besser Deutsch spreche. -> Ich könnte mir vorstellen, in Deutschland zu leben, wenn ich besser Deutsch sprechen könnte.(coll.) / Ich könnte mir vorstellen, in Deutschland zu leben, wenn ich besser Deutsch spräche.
But I admit it’s a hard construct.
Ich könnte mit ihnen bleiben, während ich meine Arbeitserlaubnis kriege. -> Ich könnte bei ihnen bleiben, während ich meine Arbeitserlaubnis bekomme.
bleiben bei not bleiben mit. Maybe you can remember it with “stay at someone’s place” Germans stay at places not with people
kriegen is colloquial, also bekommen is more of a process then kriegen. kiregen sounds more immediate.
Beruflich bin ich Programmiererin, und man kann diesen Job überall machen -> Von Beruf bin ich Programmiererin und man kann diesen Job überall machen.
or if you really want to use beruflich you could say “beruflich arbeite ich als Programmiererin”
Meine Verwandten fahren Ski gerne in den Alpen, und es würde mich freuen, mit ihnen zu fahren. -> Meine Verwandten fahren gerne Ski in den Alpen und es würde mich freuen, wenn ich mit ihnen Ski fahren gehen könnte.
gerne has to be in front of Ski because it belongs to fahren.
Your sentence is a bit short at the end. German needs more information to work because it is not clear if you mean you want to go with them (to the Alps) or want to ski as well.
“Ich habe viele Freunde hier, und keine dringinde Gründe, dieses Gebiet zu verlassen.” just two minor things. 1) probably a typo but it’s dringende (and I really love that you used that word
) 2) I would use Ort instead of Gebiet. it is not wrong but Gebiet sounds so impersonal. Ort = place is more of a home then Gebiet and you are talking about your home/where you live.
btw. it’s der Dollar (male)
Wednesday at 10:37 pm
Vielen Dank!
Friday at 12:58 pm
Gern geschehen.
Friday at 2:41 pm
Hallo Vanessa! Ich wohne in Wiesbaden — mein Mann arbeitet by US Army Corps of Engineers (US Army Garrison Wiesbaden). Ich habe auch drei kinder. Leider, sprechen wir nur mit Amerikaner den ganzen Tag und es gibt wenig moglichkeit Deutch zu sprechen — und meistens meine Nachbarn sprechen Englische gerne. Wir sind hier noch drei jahre. Sind Sie noch nicht in Deutchland gewesen?
Hey Salivia … can’t wait to see all the mistakes you catch in my message! You’re very kind to take all the time to correct us!
Friday at 3:18 pm
hey Karen,
it’s no problem. I just wished that I were better with the grammar stuff. I never got that myself *g* So many rules! okay here are the correction.
mein Mann arbeitet by US Army Corps of Engineers -> Mein Mann arbeitet beim US Army Corps of Engineers. Das Corps -> bei dem Corps sein / arbeiten or für das Corps arbeiten (to work for the Corps)
Ich habe auch drei kinder -> Ich habe auch drei Kinder
die Kinder / das Kind in capital letter
Leider, sprechen wir nur mit Amerikaner den ganzen Tag und es gibt wenig moglichkeit Deutch zu sprechen -> Leider sprechen wir den ganzen Tag über nur mit Amerikanern und es gibt wenige Möglichkeiten Deutsch zu sprechen.
no comma after leider, den ganzen Tag über (or den ganzen Tag lang) after wir. You use den ganzen Tag über (through the day) or lang (all day long).
die Möglichkeit - capital letter
und meistens meine Nachbarn sprechen Englische gerne. -> und meistens sprechen meine Nachbarn gerne Englisch.
word order again. sorry no other explanation. And no e at the end of Englisch. it’s a noun here. if you use it ad adjective you add e (in cetain cases). the English Language = Die englische Sprache.
Wir sind hier noch drei jahre. -> Wir werden hier noch 3 Jahre bleiben. (we will stay 3 years)
Die Jahre => in capital letter
Colloquial you are correct, you would say it like that butI think in correct German you would have to use future tense.
Sind Sie noch nicht in Deutchland gewesen? -> Sind Sie schon in Deutschland gewesen? you use schon if you want to know whether or not the person has been to Germany. If you use noch nicht it is more a question you ask to confirm your suspicion that the person hasn’t. You expect the other person to have already been in Germany but she may have have hinted she hasn’t been there so you ask with noch nicht. You expect her to not have been in Germany yet.
hui that was quite long, I thought “hey that’s good, not much to correct” and yet it’s bee so long again. I am probably too hard on you.
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