Transferred this from the Survival Forum as this post drifts too far off thread to be "survival-related". Was in response to kevral's information in his thread "Re: Kit review: The Mountain Tarp ("Fjellduken")."

Thanks.

My father was an English teacher who spoke French, German and Italian with a fair degree of fluency (which turned out to be quite useful when he was on the run from the Nazis in wartime Italy, I'm told <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> ) and I learned growing up that you can often get a fair idea of what's been written in a language if you can relate it to words in other languages. But my younger brother, who teaches English as a Second Language in Germany, told me to watch out for what linguists call "false friends" - words that look like a familiar word but actually mean something quite different, like the German "bekommen" which means "to get" and not "to become".

His favourite example was the time he went to Italy and (not speaking any Italian) ordered a latte. He says he should have clued in when the waiter asked if he wanted it hot or cold; he said "hot" and was surprised when the waiter brought him a glass of warm milk. Only then did he clue in that "latte" is actually the Italian word - for milk! <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

about translations. A friend of mine, an opthomologist (bad spelling for eye doc.) was donating an eye examination device to a clinic in a spanish speaking country. Not speaking spanish, he used a software translator. The chair was not special and shipping charges would add significant cost so he wrote "Do to excessive shipping costs I will not include the stool You can easily provide your own". He later found out that the translator program had used the medical meaning for stool.

Our own language is full of it's own pitfalls. A Coast Guard cutter's corpsman and the ship's storekeeper requisitioned several thousand cotton swabs. Several thousand cotton MOPS were delivered. All subsequent forms have clarified the difference.

Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha!!!!!! <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />!!! Now there's some Real & Funny Humor There!

Many Other "False Friends" or "False Cognates" Examples Abound! In and Between World Languages. But Don't Go Too Far Off into that Direction either. As Aardwolfe said, -Many Linguistic "True Blue Friends" Exist too! [color:"black"] [/color] [email]Nomad[/email]

I still remember taking more than three years in German class, trying to dig up the proper way of saying "I don't remember".

But you don't get into the real funny stuff until you try translating NAMES.
"Odd Frogh" is a genuine Norwegian name, and the poor guy actually went to the States to work. On the flip side, an American name showed up in a chain letter in Norway. This guy actually worked with a friend of mine for Amoco in Denver, though, so I thought it particularly funny. His name was Steve Pick, which pretty much means....well, "stiv" (which sounds just like "Steve") means "hard", and "pikk" is a dirty word for a certain male body part.....

We once had a (southeast Asian) woman working for our company whose given name was "Mi" - pronounced "me". Her colleagues couldn't get used to saying things like "Hey, Mi" or "Is Mi there?" so they referred to her by her full name - which of course drove her nuts.

There's a Chinese restaurant in Calgary that takes clever advantage of the "confusing sounding foreign names syndrome", though - it's called "U and Mi" <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> I don't think it's the same woman running it, though.

Ich errinen mich nicht ... IIRC <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

David

I guess you get it almost right ..... The verb is "errinern".
So I would say "Ich errinere mich nicht ....", if I could only remember german conjugation ... <img src="/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />
MAX, please, give us the correct translation .... You ought to know ! <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Ohhhh...I see. As in 'swab the decks ye mateys!Arrrr!'

<img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Alain--

My best friend & I both studied German in college (I wound up with it as one of my Minors). Our conversational practice was with a Teaching Assistant (TA) student who'd grown up in Germany, the child of American missionaries, & who spoke fluent Deutsch.

When asked to translate these common phrases (with apologies for no umlauts!):
I am very tired = Ich bin sehr muede
I am very angry! = Ich bin sehr boese!
my friend replied in his best attempt at proper German, but heavily laced with a strong Southern accent:
Ick bin sair moody, and Ick bin sair bosey!

Our TA decided that conversational German was not his best subject. While it's not as funny in print, at the time, I was ROFLMAO, and still go into giggle fits 20-odd years later at the recollection.

David

Yes, pronunciation is quite different according to the region, in Germany.

For instance, the final "ig" (like in "he is bold = er ist mutig") can give an "ish" sound (with a sh like in shame) or a "ik", depending on the area of origin of the speaker.

Sometime late in the third year of German class, I found the answer hidden deep in the non-required parts of the grammar book -- dunno about the States, but in Norway, if it's not required it's not touched.
Apparently it was "ich erinnere mich nicht daran".

We had this scary old teacher, who would consistently ask really hard questions from the homework. Everytime someone tried to say he/she didn't remember, the teacher said "Nein, das ist falsch" (that is wrong).
When I finally managed to cough up "ich erinnere mich nicht daran" our teacher took a moment to comment, and then he said "das ist eine gute antwort" (that is a good answer). <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Used that one repeatedly....