Favourite German words

I have a confession to make. I learnt Frech in school. I mean French. And I thought it was shite. I always had a secret yearning from about 14 on to learn German and learn the Language Of Command. The language of putting Tommies to death in random Stalags. Before Lotus Notes and Office. But I always had a favourite makey-up German word which was "Geschniegelspeizeinschneidergunther". Peeps thought it sounded authentic and Germans were often pointed in my direction but I feigned ignorance, preferring to take the other side in Verdun and talk to the Spanish exchange students. Possibly by virtue of the one "German" word I cultivated in my head, with no Victor or Battle references, or perhaps entirely because of them. Then I ended up here with the German woman, acquired through a similar random vector of bullshit.

Ach, the point of this post is "Learn Spanish". And that my favourite German word is "Heilscheinig". It's beautiful yet absurd and illustrates for me the Lego nature of this mad language we have to learn in this crazy, comfortably angry and perpetually embarassed country we live in.

As my Prof would say German is full of "Fill Words" that mean nothing in essence, doch means at most in this sense just "on the contrary"

wouldn't that be scheinheilig?

great word as is genau , can't name a fave though as I tend to speak a mix with my girlfriend and have to concentrate at times when speaking English, as those single words that are a whole sentence in English can be done so well in one German compound.

It should be "er hat eine an der Waffe" no waffels anywhere

Well, it isn't. Live with it.
Redensarten, search for Waffel

I see, the Bavarians strike again, put it like this I don't hear people use that variation (here) up north but it's no doubt the same as when southern Germans use sein wrongly, like ich bin im Stadion gesessen, Normal High German is of course ich habe im Stadion gesessen.

But there "I've learned to live with it"

Schlampe is a great word, and also part of this:

What do you call a bathroom light?
DuSchlampe.

My favorite is "egal". I end up using it in English conversations too.

Gschaftlhuaba. Beautiful word for control freak.

Mine would have to be:-

Hubschrauber- I love it but think it had more to do with my teacher emphasizing the 'oop' at the beginning
Eichhörnchen- cos its just a bit random and
bequem- like the sound of it and have found I can apply it to describe most things in one way or antoher- even if they sound a bit odd!

Eichhörnchen (squirrel). Its just so weird to pronounce.

Thats why i like it- sounds cute plus it matches pretty well to squirrel- it being an equally odd word

Reinheitsgebot has a special place in my heart.

much prefer the word squirrel myself

especially as the word refers to the acorn and has not really anything to do with describing the animal (unusual for German)

Arschgesicht is a good one if you like being offensive or Fut which is Austrian and means... well guess...

so far with what the smattering of deutsch that i have, my fav usage is "keine ahnung"..! :-) whenever people ask me something, i go .."keine ahnung"..LOL..so easy to shrug it off...! :-) My buds used to joke on me that at work if my boss asks me ..."whats the update on that thing?"...and i go "keine ahnung.."..LOL

a good one that is not rude, verwindungssteif : torsion/twist resistant

No, Futt is a common word everywhere in Germany and means Spalte or Pflaume. But what's so embarrasing about that? It's just rocks and fruit?

I'll just say Brötchen to that if you know what I mean

I guess it's Schrippe in Berlin. "Darf ich meinen Spatz in deine Schrippe stecken?"

STOP IT NOW

loewenzahn because the first time i heard it i thought my friend was talkin about lions teeth...shame on me...

mine have already been said.

Eichhörnchen : Squirrel

Auspuff : exhaust of a car

(first time I heard someone say 'auspuff' I creased over laughing ... of course then - I was very, very drunk ...)

I don't think my favorite has been mentioned yet:
das Aha-Erlebnis

One of my favourite words at the moment is "Käseigel". Next week I'll be doing a podcast on it.

Funny, I just met with my new German flatmates tonight. One of them asked me to say "Eichhörnchen." Twice. Then he corrected me, less phlegm, bitte. By the third time I was a pro.

My word of the day is schwül. When one agonizes over the umlaut, it perfectly describes the weather.

Cool idea for a web site, gtappened.

I find www.phrasen.com to be useful and entertaining as well.

My favorite words are:
Hackfresse (and its variants, Gesichtselfmeter, Gesichtsgrätsche)
and
Spaßkanone/Spaßbremse

I just think these are all so funny. I have a friend moving to Nürnberg next month, I will have to be sure to teach him to use these words right away.

My non-german speaking brother came to visit me in Germany from England, and while he was here, he decided that a good word was "Geschlepper". He used it umpteen times per day for the whole week usually to describe a rude, stupid or ignorant person... Or simply as a term or endearment for me...! Like "Come on then you Geschlepper, are we going?" So I kinda like this word now though I've no idea what it really means... I have a feeling it's something to do with having your car towed away...?

Also he learnt "Scheisse Egal" from somewhere and uses it all the time, to mean "whatever" like when I give him an option, do you want to do this or this, and the answer comes back "scheisse egal" and it's always in a very deep voice... Cute!!!

I'm sorry but I have to disappoint your brother. There is no such word in German. Just Schlepper= tractor.
May I suggest "Humananwärter" for a stupid person instead?

well i won't tell him if you won't! Still love the word. It's my fave word! I am going to use it to mean "cool" or "dude" As in
Yo! Geschlepper!
I think if I use it often enough, it could catch on. You never know, maybe this time next year it will be in Langenscheidt's new Worterbuch!!

My favourite would probably be "Schnapsidee"

In the (bad old?) days of the K&K Monarchie most people thought that the longest German word was "Donaudampfschiffahrtsgesellschadt", which was a steam ship company plying the Danube.
Of course they were not aware of the "Vierwaldstaedterseedampfschiffahrtsgesellschaft" in Switzerland...

Personally I love "Anti-baby Pille" even if they never say it. It just epitomizes the german straightfowardness..

I also love Eichhörnchen and Beschleunigung (Acceleration)

how about Ahörnchen und Behörnchen

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ah%C3%B6rnche...Beh%C3%B6rnchen

How about Schnapsleiche? :-)

genau...no other word in any other language comes off the tongue so well...perfect fit.

stimmt...another of the same camp.

Jammerlappen. hands down winner.

Dudelsack a close second.

But all of the foregoing favorites cannot offset what continues to be the most annoying German word of all time: Küchen (pronounced inevitably like a cow mooing ... enough to make one never want to eat cake or cake products even again). I can barely even acknowledge the existence of this word.

How about: Blätterteig, or jüngst, or rahmspinat, or erfüllungsmelancholie? or there is eruieren, papalapap, or streichholzschächtelchen?

concur ... far more annoying than its elegant English equivalent: kitchens

You know, I never looked it up before ... the way it always seems to come out, I was genuinely surprised to see it didn't have an uemlaut.

To get a full sense of my terrible associations with this word, you have to imagine a slightly out-of-breath, morbidly obese elderly neighbor who's closed all her windows and pulled all the drapes at 4:00 in the afternoon on a gorgeous summer Saturday afternoon. She then asks if you'd like some piping hot coffee and Kooooo(hock)en when you'd really rather be outside in the sunshine on a lounge chair with a book and an ice-cold beer!

I love Dudelsack I have a friend who is very proud to play one and he carries on about his middelalter dudelsacken.

etepetete (finnicky or hoity-toity)

I'm surprised nobody has come up with Brustwarzen = breast warts, ie nipples, that's my husband's favourite German word.

Zermürben is a great one.

Frauenzimmer...I call my friend this all the time.

Scogs was speaking to the neighbor today who was tearing plants out of our flowerbeds right and left and saying something he didn't understand. Of course, it was "Unkraut".
Now, you can say what you like about Germans and their language, but calling a weed "un-herb" is genius.
*Kraut = herb; Unkraut = weed*

Unkrautkunde = Herbologie

"irritiert"

Sie haben mich gerade etwas irritiert.

I thought it was another German way of being rude to tell me that I irritated them, but it just means I confounded them. I´m good at that.

Krautkunde = Hermanologie??

Rhabarbermarmelade