Sunday 26 May 2013

Guten Tag

I was smiling to my self when I clicked on a German website and saw "Learn German Greetings". LOL It reminds me of that one particular German class I was in, over in  California, more than 34 years ago. I can't converse in German anymore nor on the phone but I can recall bits of the language.

I was looking at Hitler's photo today and Achtung! resounded. I smiled because it was my elder sister's favourite word even when we were growing up. I can put together a few lines like these: Guten tag, Frauhlein. Wie geht es Ihnen? Wie bitte? Danke shon. Auf wiedersehen. That's all.

It takes a throaty sound to make these German greetings and words sound right. But it is fun to pratise when Germans are around. I haven't seen the Germans since Grandma Maria Tze von Caramon died, maybe 30 years ago. I miss her. But I have included her name in my books.

Herr                          (Sir/Mr)
Frauhlein                   (Miss)
Guten Tag.                (Hello/Good Day.)
Wie geht es Ihnen?   (How are you?)
Es geht mir gut.        (I'm fine)
Wie bitte?                (Pardon me?)
Sehr erfreut.             (Nice to meet you)
Danke                       (Thank you)
Mach's gut                (Take care)
Auf Wiedersehen.     (Bye)

http://german.about.com/od/vocabularytips/a/Learn-German-Greetings.htm

I was reading about Germany to find out if I want Xlibris to launch my book there. Why Germany? This is what I read at Wikipedia:
The second largest religion is Islam with an estimated 3.8 to 4.3 million adherents (4.6% to 5.2%),followed by Buddhism with 250,000 and Judaism with around 200,000 adherents (0.3%); Hinduism has some 90,000 adherents (0.1%). All other religious communities in Germany have fewer than 50,000 adherents. Of the roughly 4 million Muslims, most are Sunnis and Alevites from Turkey, but there are a small number of Shi'ites and other denominations. German Muslims, a large portion of whom are of Turkish origin, lack full official state recognition of their religious community. Germany has Europe's third largest Jewish population (after France and the United Kingdom). Approximately 50% of the Buddhists in Germany are Asian immigrants. Germans with no stated religious adherence make up 34.1% of the population and are concentrated in the former East Germany and major metropolitan areas. German reunification in 1990 greatly increased the country's non-religious population, a legacy of the state atheism of the previously Soviet-controlled East. Christian church membership has decreased in recent decades, particularly among Protestants. - Wikipedia.  Permalink
Will my book survive in Germany? I won't know till I try.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wikipedia is a "living" encyclopedia. Its contents changes from time to time. What's mentioned in the article today may not be there tomorrow for many reasons (updates, invalid information, unsourced information, etc).

It's best to use the permalink when citing a Wikipedia article. The permalink is the link to the particular version of the article that you are citing.

You wouldn't know which version you are citing if you use the link in the URL. It could be today's version just as it could be the version from 5 years ago.

The permalink is in the left-hand side column under Toolbox. Its labeled as "Permanent link". Click that link and you'll have the name of the editor to that version as well.

Good luck!

Faridah said...

Just like Permalink, it is better not to use Anonymous. TQ for the tip.