Wednesday, April 4, 2012

New German Words

It seems the German language has a long word for just about anything, even complex ideas that we English-users would never have thought of. The classic example is "schadenfreude" (sp?) meaning "the pleasure taken from another's misfortune". Now, the Germans are known for one thing--efficiently invading other countries and brewing top notch beer. But they're also known for welcoming new words into their already complicated language. So I have proposed the following new German words:

1) "Rootencrappen": this is when you root for your favorite team to lose a lot so that tickets to their games don't get sold out too early.

2) "Sneezenwhatsis": the strange feeling of pain in your arms when you have a particularly violent sneeze.

3) "Overpreachinstein": the idea that if something is true, then it doesn't need to be said, such as "I'm a nice person" or "I'm speaking truth to power" or "I love my country".

4) "Puffenwistburg": that strange feeling of nostalgia you get for cigarette smoke at bars even though you never smoked in bars back when it was permissible.

5) "Thankengrumblering": when someone does you a favor, which you appreciate, but at the same time you wish they didn't do you the favor because the favor made things more difficult for you (such as picking you up at the airport, but being very late so you would have been better off grabbing a cab)

6) "Nonstalkenwalkerung": when you're following someone on the street going at the same pace and making the same turns, and they probably think you're stalking them even though you're just going in the same direction at the same speed.

7) "Pissinmacher": when you are at a public urinal, and a guy walks in and decides to use the one right next to yours even though there were others available, and it makes it hard for you to finish your business and you wonder if that makes you weird even though every other guy would have the same issue and why couldn't he just use one of the other urinals?

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