Languages can be tricky! Especially, when two words look and sound the same and you think "Oh hey, I know that word!" but then it doesn't mean that AT ALL. So in this video, I put together a list of misleading words in German and English (false friends) that I found to be relevant, interesting, or that I have personally struggled with before. I hope you guys like it and find it helpful!
@@unsignedmusic My first English teacher in German school taught us the difference with the example of asking a waiter "when will I become the steak I ordered?".
Daß es zwei verschiedene Wörter sind merkt man, wenn man sagt "Um (gut) zu fahren muß man lernen das Auto zu bewegen ohne Schilder umzufahren." btw zu 13: die Rente _von Beamten_ in Deutschland heißt *Pension,* und sie "gehen nicht in Rente", sondern werden "pensioniert" (=retire). Eine *Pension* ist außerdem auch noch so etwas wie ein kleines privates Hotel in einer großen Wohnung (=guesthouse/boardinghouse).
Je nachdem, ob man die erste oder zweite Silbe betont... Gibt aber noch mehr Wörter, die das Gegenteil von sich selbst sind. Wir hatten da vor langer Zeit mal eine Liste gemacht. Gibt es im Englischen aber auch: inflammable means flammable?
As a Dutch guy I like the way you explain things on your chanell. This proves that when things are not properly explained it could lead to great misunderstandings and people could feel offended by it. So...., Dear Feli, Thank you for your education techniques between the Old world and the New World. 🙏❤
@@hydrolito Schnitzel is a cutlet (usually veal or pork, sometimes chicken) and Wiener means Vienna style. Note Wien (Vienna) is spelled ie, not ei. Wein with the ei spelling is wine in English) is
Fun fact, "sensible" did used to mean sensitive in English too. Not sure when it changed, but this was as back in Regency times in England. That's why Jane Austen's book is called Sense and Sensibility. "Sense" represents the practical Elinor and "Sensibility" represents the sensitive Marianne.
That is not only a matter of language but of using the "long scale" or "short scale". Great Britain used the long scale and then switched over to the short scale in the 20th century. Brazil uses the short scale but Portugal uses the long scale but both are Portuguese speaking. Life could be easier if the USA just switched to the metric system and the long scale already.
@@bambino9235 Amelie misspelled it because she spelled it as it was pronounced by her aunt. Her aunt said the word "maize" meaning corn, but pronounced it "mice" with her German accent.
Live Wire yes i understand that, but adolfo said it was correct but misspelled. It's not correct in english to pronounce maize that way (it must be an "ay" and "z" sound, not "eye" and "s") that's all I meant. Normally I wouldn't correct somebody when it's obvious what they mean, but given the context of the video & wider conversation about being accurate in german-english translation, it seemed right to do so on this occasion
It's "szimpatikus" (pronounced something like "sim-pah-tee-coosh", but with short vowels and the stress on the first syllable) in Hungarian, with the same meaning as in German/Spanish (and most continental languages). It's interesting that Hungarian has borrowed the full Latin form ending in -us, athough the pronunciation is different.
I once attended a meeting between a German and an American, and at the end the German handed a bunch of documents to the American and asked if he wanted a map. Which of course confused the American. "Mappe" in German is more of a portfolio or protective folder, made of leather or plastic.
That's a nice one and brings back some memories about a conversation in a pub in Ireland. I was there with some friends and we talked to some Irish guys. The Irish guys asked one of my friends where our Hostel was. My friend wanted to show it on a map, but had no map and asked the Irish guy 'Do you have a plan of the city?'. I have never seen so many question marks in someones eyes before. The translation for the german word 'Plan' or 'Stadtplan' is 'map' and not 'plan'.
@@felixklusener5530 I mean he's not wrong considering that most early maps were plans of the city. The Irish guy was probably too drunk to catch on, though.
Da fehlt eins ;) Bekommen - become. Eine Klassenkameradin berichtete mal von ihren Sommerferien und sagte den legendären Satz „...and then I became a hotdog!“ 😂
My Swiss friends laughed when I mentioned that I didn't like all the "preservatives" in our foods. Then again, I laughed when one friend said she wanted to take a quick "douche"! 🙂
The German word "Brand" and the English word "brand" actually are very closely related. The Germanic meaning is the one still preseved in German while the English meaning is derived from marks left by branding irons, e.g. on horses or leather.
Another archaic English meaning of "brand" is a burning stick, often used as a torch. Also I suspect that the verb "brandish", i.e. waving something like a sword or burning stick, is related.
When I was an exchange student in Germany back in the day, I had been traveling for a long time and my new German family thought I looked tired. They were trying to ask if I wanted a chance to freshen up with a “shower”. They were trying out their English and asked me if I wanted to “douche”.... They saw the look of terror on my 15 year old male face and ran for the German/English dictionary. After a little embarrassment we had a really good laugh.
When my family and I went to America when I was about 14 or 15 as well, one of the warnings my father gave me and my sister was to never say 'douche' instead of shower. He also explained what a 'douche' was in English, so I never made that mistake xD
This is the same in French, and if I'm not mistaken I believe the Germans actually borrowed the word "douche" from the French. Equally amusing is the French word "blanquette" which is a type of veal stew, but obviously sounds just like "blanket" in English. I made that mistake a few times before my French friends reminded me that the correct word is "couverture".
That sort of misunderstanding can happen even between English speakers. I'm Australian of UK heritage. Years ago I was visiting family who live in the USA. I had purchase a new pair of jeans and wore them to a social event at the home of a friend of one of my relatives. At one point the friend noticed i had a sticker stuck on my jeans and said "Oh (my name), you've got something stuck on your fanny." To which I replied rather shocked "On my where???" And that was the day I learned that "fanny" in the USA means your butt. In Australia and the UK, your fanny is ...er ... your lady privates.
Lol, I live in the US, (Nebraska) I don't know that I've ever heard someone use the word fanny without "pack" after it Those are worn on the front so it's an odd name.
Great video! Other "false friends" that are encountered very early in the study of German are (with the German given first): (a) "will" (first person singular of the verb "wollen"), which does not mean "will," but rather "want"; (b) "also", which does not mean "also," but rather one meaning of "so," as in, "Also, was machen wir heute Abend?" (So, what are we doing this evening?); (c) "wer" means "who," not "where" and "wo" means "where," not "who; (d) "wen" means "whom," not "when"; (e) "denn" means "than" and "dann" means "then"; (f) Oh, and the one that really drives me crazy, “auf” does not mean “off” but “on”!!! 😊
The wer-wo-where-who thing had confused me for very long. But the same with den-then and dann-than I didn't realized until now. But you're totally right. Thanks for that. 🤓 I'm wondering, when and why this happened 🤔?
Will in English also means to want/desire in a very strong way, but nowadays it is mainly used in fixed expressions e.g. "If you will", "Do what you will" or "Will you marry me?". The noun will is also cognate with the original meaning of the verb, as in "His last will".
The first time I went back to Germany to visit my grandparents, I had an experience that pointed out what you were illustrating. My brothers and sister and went for a Spaziergang (walk) with our grandfather through some woods when he suddenly said, „Look there’s an Igel (hedgehog) but we all looked up thinking that he meant eagle (Adler). Boy he was confused about why we were looking up while the Igel was right at our feet.
This may be apocryphal, but our German teacher was from Austria, and told us a story about first meeting her host family in America back in the 1950s. She was just a teenager, and spoke no English, so when she saw a package with a note that read, "gift for the German family" she was horrified. She knew "for" "German" and "family," but the word "gift" wasn't something she could figure out. And, of course, she was afraid it meant something entirely different! LOL! (Her mother soon set her mind at ease, thankfully.)
I had once a misunderstanding with the word “dick”. It was super confusing and awkward at first but once we (german boyfriend and I) realized were talking about something completely different we couldn’t stop laughing. Languages are fun indeed.
In the 1950s "dick" was a slang for detective. This is frequently used in Rex Stout's novels, it gets even better when a person is referred to as a "female dick" (i.e. one of the rare female private investigators).
My German professor showed us a video of a small child in Germany saying that he did not want to get fat, and she warned us ahead of time that it was going to sound like the boy was saying something rude in English. That still did not prepare us for what sounded like the child didn't want penis. Fun was had by all.
"Gift" in German originally meant the result of "geben" (to give), compare "sehen / die Sicht", "schreiben / die Schrift", hence "geben / die Gift". It came out of use and was replaced by "Gabe" but survived in the composite word "Mitgift" (dowry).
Fisch vs. fish is also a fine example of the p > f/v shift that many words underwent when borrowed from Greek/Latin into the Germanic languages: pisces > fish / Fisch / fisk / vis pater > father / Vater / fader / vader pes/pdes > foot / Fuss / fot / fod / voet
if you're german and learning English or if you're speaking english and learning german doesn't make a difference here. everyone had to suffer on that one I still remember when I was in 5th grade xD
The Dutch have a simular problem when learning German: wie (de) = hoe (nl) = how (en) wer (de) = wie (nl) = who (en) To add to the confusion: who (en) and hoe (nl) share the same pronunciation. Also, in Dutch we have the pair waar? - daar! (wo? da! / where? there!), which sometimes leads to the false sentence: Wo ist der Bahnhof? Do ist der Bahnhof!
I am Greek and I laughed a lot at the "Gymnasium" part (since it is a greek word). Both interpretations are correct according to ancient Greeks. Because Gymnastics were considered a strong part of the education at the higher level (higher education). However, nowadays we use Gymnasium the same way the Germans do (or the other way around, it doesn't matter).
In germany its still the name for an higher education school. but that was invented during the industrial revolution to keep the workers class out of it. still not so much changed. You got money, you spend a lot of it to get your dumb child onto level for "Gymnasium" . As long you cant afford that extra, you just hope your kid is smart enough...
7:19 I would say "finally" is more commonly used, at least in my experience, for something that is planned or has already happened but was overdue, like "I'm finally getting a haircut next week", but "eventually" I'd more use for "I'll get 'round to it at some point, eventually" so like "I'll cut my hair eventually, when it gets bad enough/when I get 'round to it/when I have the money/time/et cetera, you get the point. Some undetermined time in the future, likely not soon, but it will happen at some point; it will happen eventually.
You’ll love this. While stationed in Wiesbaden, I lived just North in Wiesbaden-Auringen. My friend and fellow trombonist in the Wiesbaden-Auringen Sports Stadt Kappelle was a boy in Berlein at the end of WWII. He told me about American planes flying over and dropping boxes Hersey chocolate bars with little parachutes. The boxes were labeled “gifts for children, from America!” He said that caused quite an uproar!
The people in your class must have had a similar maturity level to the ones in my class who couldn't stop laughing about the fact that "divorced" sounds similar to "die Wurst".
Our Australian exchange student came back home after her first week of school and was very confused why her classmates say "Frosch" (=frog) when they raise their hand during class. I've been very confused and only understood what happened there when she started mimicking it. "Frog" is dialect for Frage (=question) in the region. We still laugh about this 10+ years later 😂
da gabs doch mal die diskussion um das eine bier... n helles bier aus einem ort namens Fucking. der name war des biers war, und ist immernoch, Fucking Hell
The way that Hell is referring to light in German/English makes sense when you look at mythology and that the name Lucifer means light bringer in Latin.
the indoeruopean root means clear/transparent/invisible. Hades, the greek good, literally means ''the translucid'' and his realm recived the same name, the only difference was the pronoun before the word.
Well, I‘d rather suspect that English "hell" has the same origin as it‘s German translation "Hölle" - and that said origin would have been somthing like "hole" or "Höhle" (German for "cave"). It is supposed to be a pit of fire after all.
My 8 year old Grandson doesn't like it when I say, Meine lampe ist hell. He says hell is a bad word in English and doesn't believe me when I say it means bright.
@@fri5728 You've just presented another false friend: the engl. "hole" isn't the german "Höhle", it's "Loch" - Like we know it from astronomy: black hole = Schwarzes Loch. "Höhle" in engl. would be "cave".
@@Ronin_666_ You're right "Höhle" isn't really the literal translation of "hole". I guess I must have thought about the more loosely shared meaning when I wrote that comment. What is a cave after all, if not a hole in the earth or something like that?
Sensible in English originally meant the same as in German. The English novel Sense and Sensibility from around 1800, would now be written as Sensible and Sensitive. In the novel one sister is sensible and the other sensitive or sentimental.
"Pension" is also a German word. It is the pension for public servants, while "Rente" refers to all other. Weirdly enough, "Pension" also means "small hotel" in German.
I wonder if it was called that because that's where pensioners would be living sort of like in the UK with their pensioner housing, this would have course been in the era where the elderly stopped living with their families like the times of old.
By the way, in Austria there is no difference between 'Rente' and 'Pension' and 'Rentner' are called 'Pensionisten' there. What do we learn? German is not the same in every country or region and even the 'official german' used by governments is different in every country. More examples for differences in official language: (D) Fahrerlaubnis= Lenkberechtigung (A); (D) Ordnungswidrigkeit = Verwaltungsübertretung (A); (D) Ministerpräsident = Landeshauptmann (A); (D) Parlamentsfraktion = Parlamentsklub (A)
What both 'Rente' and 'rent' have in common is that they are monthly reoccurring, equal payments. The former from the government - the latter from a tenant.
Similar in Czech language :-D pension (pronounced penzion - something like hotel but mostly cheaper and smaller) and penze which means rent. Penzista is also person with rent, but Czech equivalents for that words are more common today.
When I worked for a German company, we were invited to tour the facilities. Entrance and Exit are Eingang and Ausgang, no problem, but there is a real difference between Notausgang and Kein Ausgang. That difference was very important in an emergency. ‘Not’ is the false friend.
Then you get Dutch, where Nood is used. Not so much a false friend as a source of amusement, unless someone actually things that in an emergency you have to evacuate in the nude.
One of my favorite but lesser known false friends is: berate ≠ beraten. "to berate someone" is correctly translated into German as "jemanden beschimpfen" or "jemanden schelten". "jemanden beraten" is correctly translated into English as "to counsel someone" or "to provide advise" So while a "Berater" (consultant) in the German-speaking world is a highly paid expert in the field of politics and business, in the English-speaking world he would probably end up as a defendant in court sooner or later.
I once wanted to say "Ich habe meine Haare im Flur getrocknet." (in a hostel, the hairdryer was in the hallway) ... what I actually said was "I dried my hair on the floor." My friend was cracking up laughing.
PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE continue giving us lists of these "False Friend" words. It's really interesting, and you do a GREAT job with your examples!!!!!!
My relatives in Croatia also use the 'champagne' for just about any sparkling wine and I always thought that's just a 'them thing', not knowing it's so international. Loved the 'die in hell' joke. Hadn't seen that before! 😅
Here in New Orleans we have Chef Monteur Highway a.k.a. "Chef Highway," which was not named for any chef de cuisine but, according to stories, may refer to a former governor or else to a certain chief of the local indigenous peoples tribe.
"Chef de cuisine" is "head of the kitchen". The word "cuisine" in French is a false friend in itself! It has both meanings but the primary one is "a room where food is cooked/prepared". When the French talk about a corpus of food culture, they say "gastronomie".
Yes, so in English it does or should mean boss, the same as chief. Interesting how they look like almost the same word... It's just that most Americans (at least) have only the slightest familiarity with the word. We're just ignorant on this point.
Love this video. When I moved to Germany from Canada my better half, a German, and I got into a "discussion". In the heat of said discussion he said that I was very sensible. Hahahaha. You can imagine how we took turns being taken aback by the other's reaction - I agreed with him and he looked dumbfounded. I still chuckle at the thought.
In the UK, and especially in Scotland 'lemonade' used to refer to any carbonated soft drink. So when you were asked 'do you want some lemonade', it was quite normal to say 'yes, what flavours do you have?'
As an American living in Germany the past 10 years teaching English, can confirm all of this. After awhile the incorrect usage doesn't sound so wrong anymore. The most common one I run into is probably aktuell/actual(ly).
In her autobiography, Maria von Trapp talked about her difficulty with false friends when learning English, having once told a grocer “Behold your cauliflower. I can become one across the street for less.”
I understood that the French government had succeeded in getting the word "Champaign" to only refer to the wine produced from grapes grown in the Champaign district, worldwide. Certainly, here in Australia, which has a huge wine industry, we no longer call sparkling wines "Champaign".
Yes this is true. I worked at a winery that produced an almond sparking wine that got pretty popular in our state for a while. They were forced to change it from calling to almond champagne to calling it an almond sparking wine. Same for things like cognac too. There’s an exception though, some brands have gotten grandfathered such as Hennessy which has it’s roots in Ireland but can still call itself a cognac despite not being from Cognac.
Many years ago... Imagine a church group of many young German people. The pastor's wife is natural born American. One morning before breakfast I see her putting a glass of peanut butter on the table and apparently I look a little bit disgusted. So in front of the whole crowd she loudly proclaims: "Die ist total gesund und da sind auch keine Präservative drin!" Took some time until everybody calmed down again. Best false friend ever.
We have been on a schooltrip to London when I was about sixteen. And as everyone can imagine, if a bunch of german teens who were semi talented in the english language, walks around London there happens one or fifty "false friends"! But my alltime favorit happens to one of us ( I swear it wasn't me) at Burger King: My friend ordert: "I become a cheesburger, please!" A second later he was very confused about the answer: "Oh I'd like to see!" I laughed so hard! But want went wrong? In German *bekommen* means "to get something". While the English *become* means "etwas werden" like in: I become rich. So what he truly meant was: "I'd like to get a cheeseburger."
I surprised myself by suddenly almost killing myself with laughter about the cheeseburger order: I could just vividly imagine the person behind the counter folding-up with hilarity in the first instance. Not meaning badly in any way whatsoever, of course.
I am Hungarian and I remember while I was learning the two languages on the same day. Sometimes German lesson followed the English lesson and I got pretty confused so many times. 😀 (and today I live in Munich) your video made me laugh a lot because I hear the same “mistakes” a lot during my work. 😀
Fun fact for #7: There's an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, "Remember Me" (German: "Das Experiment"), where in one scene Beverly Crusher enters the bridge and only sees some sort of fog on the monitor. She then asks "What's that mist I'm seeing there?" -- which in German was dubbed to "Was ist das für ein Mist, den ich da sehe?" 😀
In Matrix one person talks about the taste of that disgusting slime, wich they eat. It could taste like tasty weat (leckeres Gras/Joints). In german he says, it taste like sexcrispies.
American lemonade would most likely be called traditional, cloudy or homemade lemonade. That's the flat stuff in the UK. If you ask for lemonade, you'll get something fizzy. Some people don't class sprite or 7up as they're lemon and lime, but many still class it as lemonade. Beer and lemonade is a shandy in the UK. That's if it's a pretty even split between the 2 drinks. There's also something called a lager top that just has a dash of lemonade (again, the fizzy kind) added to the top of the lager. I've heard of a lager top, but haven't ever seen or heard anyone order it. Shandy is more common for if someone is driving, on a hot day etc. Also there's a very lemonade heavy soft drink version of shandy which comes in a can. It's got such a low amount of alcohol it's classed as a soft drink and is commonly sold in chip shops to drink when you get fish and chips.
@@purplephoenix4969 In different regions of the UK you get different coloured lemonades, and you get clear and cloudy. The clear looks like soda water and the cloudy is usually murky yellow.
That's the one I use when I teach Nachhilfe. I think it's the most commonly abused false friend so if the kids can just remember that one, they're good: )
I’ve definitely messed up die Limonade and lemonade, but the one I’m struggling with is a little more complicated to explain. In English, we use the word will to mean “I will do something/I am going to do something”. In German, will is a conjugation of wollen “Ich will, du willst, er/sie/es will, etc.,” and it means “I want, you want, we want, etc.” Every now and then, I’ll read a sentence like “Ich will nach Hause gehen”(I want to go home) and I’ll translate it to, “I will go home.” Very frustrating, I must say. I also don’t know if that made sense, sorry if it didn’t.
It can be used like that in English too, though. Not always, but considering that it originally has the same meaning as the German word, it's not too far off.
I really love speaking English with non-native speakers, as there is so much great information about how their language relates to ours, and I frequently find that when I'm surprised by their uncommon usage of a word, I can look it up and ultimately learn something new about my own language. For instance, just to make things even more complicated, "sensible" actually _can_ mean "perceptive" or "sensitive" in English; it's just that nobody ever uses it that way. It can also mean "perceptible", as in "There was a sensible smell in the air." But nobody uses or knows about that usage either. Either one is likely to get you a frown, but that doesn't actually mean that you're wrong. :)
One example of Germans learning English in school: a classmate of mine once wanted to say, that someday when she'll be pregnant....and said " when I become a baby..." To become is very near to "bekommen" ( to get)😂
You mentioned Fanta when you spoke about Limo.....fun fact the Germans created Fanta in WW2 as they couldn't get/didn't want Coca Cola so they created their own carbonated drink! 😊
I heared that the Germans actually (another false friend, BTW) tried to imitate Coke but those who tried it first said it takes a lot of _phantasy_ to mistake this for Coke. Hence the name "Fanta".
The original Fanta - made during WW2 as a substitute for Coca-Cola, since the original Coke syrup was impossible to get - has very little with the products now sold as 'Fanta'. The youtuber 'My name is Andong' has told the whole Fanta story in an interesting video, where he also tries to recreate the original Fanta.
Es macht viel Sinn Dir zuzuhören. Es is 50 Jahre her das ich in der Schulen glitsche gelernt habe. Darum ist es wirklich sehr erfrischend die Unterschiede zu wiederholen. Vielen Dank dafür
I remember one time long ago when a German said to a British guy, "You know, you'll get crabs if you keep smoking so much." "I've never heard THAT before," replied the incredulous smoker :-)
@@Hand-in-Shot_Productions Yes, exactly. That's the whole joke. The German didn't want to alert the Brit to the risk of an STI, but actually meant "cancer" (Krebs can mean crab or cancer).
@@choedzin remembers a bit to "der See / die See" "the Lake / the Sea" ;-)"Krabben" are not really the same as a "Krebs", but they biological are relatives ;-)
Its funny that you can buy in Germany a "Muffin hell". ("light Muffin") In Germany here is "Rente", but also "Pension". "Pension" can mean the "Rente" of a public servant, or it can be some sort of smaller hotel. Another false friend is "also". The english "also" is "auch" in german. The german "also" means "so/thus" and can also be filler word.
Moin, Ich, als Deutscher muss sagen, dir hört man unwahrscheinlich gerne zu. Deine Englische Aussprache ist sehr klar und verständlich. Ich habe sehr große Probleme mit Englisch bzw mit der Aussprache anderer und dessen Verstehen. Aber bei dir kann ich gut zuhören und auch erkennen was du meinst. Ich hoffe das wird mir etwas helfen besser Englisch zu verstehen :)
aktuell / actual - I've been getting weekly emails starting with "This is the list of actual software bugs for this week" from a German person for years. This extends to people using "actualize" when they *actually* mean "update".
A memorable Simpsons episode with Sideshow Bob: "DIE BART, DIE!!" ... -"Oh no, Your Honor, you´ve got it all wrong. That´s actually German..." -"Oh, well, i guess it´s okay then...."
"Sideshow Bob" is called "TingelTangel Bob" in german Simpson series. A friend told me, as a Simpson fan, he named his messenger nic name "TTBob", which became funny when he later met a (native english speaking) girl more often and they came closerer each other. He was totally glueless, what she meant as she whispered to him "Lets come to your nic name!" (TTBOB=time to bend over b*tch) 😅
I was in Germany for two years. A companion of mine and I, who both spoke German, visited an American military family. They had a dog name Misty. He'd step out and shout "Misty!" to call the dog without a clue what the German meaning of Mist was. My companion and I were rolling on the floor laughing when we heard it.
Frenemies aren't similar at all. They're enemies that are also friends (our vice versa). False friends are NOT your friends at all, they just pretend to be. Hence the linguistic concept of a word that LOOKS helpful, though it is everything but.
Thanks for all "false friends". A Swedish brewery once made a German style light beer, naturally called Hell. It became popular so they also made a dark beer named Heaven. I don't think those beers are manufactured any more, because I haven't seen them for several years. Btw, I liked Heaven very much, more than Hell. :-)
Eventually - when I looked up the dictionary in Google, it gives Oxford's. It is to express something happenED AFTER a long time, effort or problems. Maybe it is one of those American "how are you" and "football"? It makes the video even more interesting and educational! 😊 Now I understand why in the business meeting with the Dutch, Swedes, German, French, British, Irish and American, the word "eventually" causes confusion....
I enjoyed this video. I'm Dutch and our language has a lot of similarities and false friends with both German and English. In a couple of your examples the Dutch word has the same meaning as the German word. Like Sympathiek-Sympatisch, Champagne, Gymnasium and Eventueel-Eventuell. But the Dutch word Hel has the same meaning as the English Hell. A special case is Rente-Rente-Rent. In Dutch it means interest, in German pension and in English what you pay your landlord every month. So it's a three way false friend between Dutch, German and English.
@@suzan6254 lol. Huren is written the same, but pronounced differently. In German it's pronounced similar to the Dutch hoer, which also means whore :-)
I'd guess "brand" has the same heritage in English. Remember that cows got their "branding" by using a fire steel sign marker. So the "Brand-Stelle an der Kuh" was the branding of the owner . OK, you also find that on wooden covers of any product back then, and still today.
In Britain, champagne is exactly the same as Germany. Prosecco is cheaper, or sparkling wine could be causally referred to as “fizz”. Lemonade is the same as the German in UK, beer and lemonade is called Shandy (mixed together)
My favorite is: fast (engl) -> schnell (dt) & fast(dt) -> nearly(engl). When I was a child the song "Eye of Tiger" was very popular, but it took me years to figure out that it doesnt mean "Ei des Tigers"
Fast in German is closer to the English verb to fasten where fast as an adjective has evolved quite a way from the original meaning of fixed, secure, firm, constant, steadfast, etc... To fast also comes from this root where when one fasts they must be steadfast and firm in their behavior.
In my dialect of German we don't have the word schnell and instead say schwind for fast, which is quite different in Hochdeutsch. If I said, "Hee es sea schwind," that would sound quite weird to a Hochdeutsch speaker I assume. I believe it comes from the idea that when something moves very quickly it vanishes from one's sight. Similar to the evolution of the English Warp from Old English Weorpan - to throw, where when an object moves quickly after being launched it appears warped to the human eye.
When I was first learning German, I couldn't get it out of my head that a Speisekart was a cart with spices on it that was wheeled around in restaurants, kind of like a mobile condiment station.
Another one of the classics: A friend of mine, also Austrian, was out with friends from the UK when her battery died and she asked one of them: "Can you give me your handy"? And he looked at her, confused, and hesitantly reached his hand out to her... ;)
That English "brand" is actually not that far from German meaning. The word originally referred to the brand mark on the cattle. "Who's brand is that on that cow?"
And in English I have heard of a fire brand, which I think means torch. So, the origin of the word brand seems to involve fire and in English that meaning became obscured while it was kept in German. There are so many words like that. It feels like we once all had the same language and then we were split up and confused. I think that kind of is the case and also it's just the constant mixing and spreading that is human language.
I didn't even know I was using the word decent wrong until I watched this video. :D Due to Number 16 I remembered an other false friend which also might be a bit confusing to others when using it wrong: cause in German it's totally common to ask something that would literally translated like "do you have fire" or "could you please give me fire" if you want to ask for a lighter.
I've actually heard about how the word "pepperoni" is different over in Europe. I forgot who told me about that one, but I remember learning that someone got peppers on their pizza in Italy when they ordered a "pepperoni" pizza. As for the other ones, I haven't heard of those yet. The company I currently work for is headquartered in Stuttgart, so I should probably be careful if I happen to give them a present. I probably shouldn't use the word "gift" just to be safe, lol! I really like the skits you did for a lot of the words in this one! The "gift" one is my favorite one, lol! Awesome video!
The Word 'gift' is Low saxon of 'Gabe', it's from 'geben' - Niederdeutsch 'geven'... 'Gift' is in the old German Word 'Mitgift' ... A present for the bride.
When I was on a hiking trip some years ago, I didn't know the word for "Isomatte" (which I think translates to sleeping pad in english). A girl that went hiking as well (we met at a motel) wanted to sleep in her tent because the thought that the motel was a bit sketchy. Since I didn't need my sleeping pad, I wanted to give her mine. But, as I said, I didn't know what the english word "Isomatte" was so I tried "isolation matt". I can't tell you how weirded out and kinda disgusted she looked at me. To this day, I don't know what she thought I wanted to do to her but I guess I came off pretty weird? And my "Isomatte" was stuck in my backpack so I stood there, trying to get this thing out of my backpack. Eventually (ha, I used that word correctly, right?) I was able to get that thing out to show her what I meant. She seemed so exited when she finally understood that I wanted go give her my sleeping pad. Fast forward, till today I never forgot the english word for "Isomatte" though I never used it again. Also, it became (ha, also a popular false friend) on of my favourite stories from that trip. Edit: sorry, I know my grammar is pretty shitty sometimes. I just write the way it feels right xD
I really don't know what she may have thought. There's nothing springs to mind when I think of the words isolation mat. I would be confused, but not scared by that. Maybe it did mean something years ago, or maybe she'd had some interesting life experiences that I haven't. Camping mat or sleeping pad both work. Don't worry about your grammar, it's very good :-)
What's even more common for me than "eventually" is the wrong use of "actual(ly)" (German: tatsächlich). The German word "aktuell" means current/latest. I lost count of how many times a coworker asked for the "actual version" of some document
@@TJStellmach Lol this is soo true I once saw in a train a screen that gave an english translation that said: "actualy speed: 100km/h". I was like what do they mean actual speed? Is there a fake speed?? But they meant current speed lol
Tolle Idee Felicitas, solch ähnlich klingenden Vokabeln mit völlig anderer Bedeutung einmal aufzugreifen, worauf man sonst im Unterricht, oder im Lehrbuch kaum hingewiesen wird und deshalb damit ganz schön auf die Nase fallen kann! Du würdest sicherlich eine super gute Lehrerin für Fremdsprachen abgeben, denn Du bringst die Dinge immer wieder gut verständlich und super charmant auf den richtigen Punkt!
Sehr nette und gute Beispiele und sehr gut und interessant präsentiert! Danke! Hier ein paar Gedanken und Ergänzungen: Gerade das amerikanische Englisch sehe ich nicht nur als Sprache mit germanischen Wurzeln, sondern hinsichtlich des Vokabulars zur anderen Hälfte mit lateinischen Wurzeln, in einem viel weiteren Umfang, als die deutsche Sprache lateinische Ausdrücke übernommen hat: lateinisches Vokabular ohne lateinische Grammatik. Wenn man gut Latein kann, dann hat man es auch mit dem amerikanischen Englisch sehr leicht. In europäischen Schulen lernt man aber mehr britisches Englisch, das mehr auf die germanischen als auf die lateinischen Wurzeln zurückgreift (z.B. necessary vs. required, search vs. query). "False friends" gibt es nicht nur zwischen deutscher und englischer Sprache. Auch zwischen deutschem Deutsch und österreichischem Deutsch gibt es sog. "false friends", bei denen man sehr aufpassen muß, z.B.: a) Stuhl: in Deutschland etwas, das man in Österreich einen Sessel nennt; ein Stuhl in Österreich ist etwas, nach dem der Arzt bei Untersuchungen fragt und dessen man sich üblicherweise an gewissen, kleinen Örtchen entledigt b) Brötchen: in Deutschland etwas, das man in Österreich Semmel nennt; Brötchen in Österreich sind belegte Brötchen, d.h. kleine Brotscheiben z.B. mit Salami, Streichkäse etc. belegt Champagner in Europa hat meines Erachtens etwas mit Markenrechten zu tun. Anderer Schaumwein heißt daher bei uns Sekt. In der Sowjetunion hat der Krimsekt aber auch Шампанское Вино geheißen, ähnlich wie offenbar in den USA. Heute sagt man in Rußland dazu, soweit ich informiert bin, wie bei uns in Europa Игристое Вино.
We ordered pepperoni on our pizza in Germany. We realized something was different when reading the menu. With one person saying I don't think pepperoni is pepperoni. Another person insisting pepperoni is pepperoni. And others not caring, they would eat whatever came, it's an adventure. It just adds another story to tell others about our vacation in Germany.
Vor fast 30 Jahren hatten wir einen Schüleraustausch mit einer Highschool nahe Detroit. Anfangs stellten wir uns alle vor und als ich dran kam, wollte ich abschließend mein Sternzeichen nennen. Mit stolz geschwellter Brust sagte ich: "... and I´m a virgin!" Die Lacher gingen auf mich, aber das Eis war gebrochen...
I've studied both English and German as foreign languages and I totally relate to all these examples :) My favourite is Gift/gift :) I can say that even after so many years of speaking both languages, I still think twice before using it, wondering: did it mean present or poison? :) We have some of the words in Bulgarian too and they are in the same meaning as in German, for example when we say "simpatichen", this means the same as "sympathisch" in German, not "sympathetic". :)
An American told me a story when she was visiting Germany and she was looking at marlwladwnin the shop and she shouted to her German friends: "Oh schau, ohne Präservative." Maybe you want to include this one in the next installation . ;)
I've been having a binge of this channel over the last few days. Mostly because as a British person it's amazing how British English sits right between American and German. Even culturally the UK is much closer to Germany (probably why I found it weirder going to the US than I did Germany...). Some stuff we've nabbed from the US meanings like pepperoni but particularly the US meanings of lemonade and champagne make no sense to anyone here either. For most of the others the British use at least has a more obvious connection to the German use of the word even if we actually use it like in the video.
This is one of the reasons I have been watching too. We definitely have far more in common with Germany than the US. Both myself and my son were very at home when we visited Germany. When I've visited the US in the past, for all we supposedly speak the same language, there was a language barrier there and the culture seemed very foreign. I've definitely noticed things gradually getting more Americanized in the UK over the last few years, but we have far more in common with Germany than the US.
@@purplephoenix4969 It's true that American culture is becoming more prevalent in the UK. It wasn't until I started working for a global company (most of my team is in the US but time zones mean in the mornings I work more with our European teams) that I realised how different the US and UK are still. As a pedantic introvert I definitely prefer the northern European way of doing things! Also hadn't realised how far north the UK is until people in the eastern US were saying "good morning" to me when it was already dark here! Only 1 US state is on the same latitude as any part of mainland UK- Alaska. Useful pub quiz fact for you there ☺
The word "Gift" actually has the original meaning as "something you give". In this meaning, "poison", came about as a calque of Latin "dosis". Fun fact: In Swedish, it means both "poison" and "married" depending on context. All meanings can be traced to "something you give".
For me as a Dutchman this video is kind of funny to watch. Nearly all these words exist in Dutch, too (sometimes spelled slightly differently). In about 2/3 of the cases the meaning in Dutch leans closer to the German one (though not always identical), in about 1/3rd of the cases closer to the English one. So I suppose our language really is in between both, (but closer to German) :)
False friends are a funny thing when you learn one foreign language, but they make it nearly impossible to learn two closely related languages like Italian and Spanish at the same time.
Pepperoni, pepper and paprika are words directly from hell. They always mean something slightly differnent, not just in German, English and Italian but also in Spanish but still very close to each other.
Felicia, I used to watch your channel a few years ago, but I lost touch. I'm glad to be back. Your American pronunciation has really gotten more natural. It used to be easy to hear that you were from Germany. Now, your accent is just a trace. And you still have your lovely lilt and great content!
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Languages can be tricky! Especially, when two words look and sound the same and you think "Oh hey, I know that word!" but then it doesn't mean that AT ALL. So in this video, I put together a list of misleading words in German and English (false friends) that I found to be relevant, interesting, or that I have personally struggled with before. I hope you guys like it and find it helpful!
lemonade is no false friend in english and german it is the same. rather in american and german, and english and american it is a false friend
question: what is it about abriviations: the medical file entrance "time of death" is abriviated as "t.o.d" -mic drop
7:06 your titles got screwed up
Fehler beim Einblenden ab @7:01 ^^
10:34 you misspelled 'gymnasium'
The first false friend for englisch beginners: to become = werden, bekommen = to get
In school i never wrapped my head around this
I hear German people say, “I’m going to become a baby”.
@@unsignedmusic My first English teacher in German school taught us the difference with the example of asking a waiter "when will I become the steak I ordered?".
@@SirCB85 We must have had the same teacher.
@@SirCB85 ,
"When will I become a steak?"
"I hope never, sir."
Deutsch ist schon eine schöne Sprache „Umfahren ist das Gegenteil von Umfahren“.
One of my favorites!
Haare wachsen lassen und Haare wachsen lassen
Daß es zwei verschiedene Wörter sind merkt man, wenn man sagt "Um (gut) zu fahren muß man lernen das Auto zu bewegen ohne Schilder umzufahren."
btw zu 13: die Rente _von Beamten_ in Deutschland heißt *Pension,* und sie "gehen nicht in Rente", sondern werden "pensioniert" (=retire). Eine *Pension* ist außerdem auch noch so etwas wie ein kleines privates Hotel in einer großen Wohnung (=guesthouse/boardinghouse).
Je nachdem, ob man die erste oder zweite Silbe betont...
Gibt aber noch mehr Wörter, die das Gegenteil von sich selbst sind. Wir hatten da vor langer Zeit mal eine Liste gemacht.
Gibt es im Englischen aber auch: inflammable means flammable?
@@Anson_AKB Es gibt auch private Arbeitgeber, die eine Pension zahlen. 😉
As a Dutch guy I like the way you explain things on your chanell. This proves that when things are not properly explained it could lead to great misunderstandings and people could feel offended by it. So...., Dear Feli, Thank you for your education techniques between the Old world and the New World. 🙏❤
My German class mate once said: "the sentence is short and pregnant". Prägnant is a German word for precise :D
Lol.
Not true
Lieder in Gebärdensprache Meine Chefin hat mal folgendes rausgehauen: „the value is not guilty“. Sowas nennt sich wohl „false friend“.
Yeah this happened to one of my classmates, too! She said: "We have to make it short and pregnant." Now this is quoted in our "Abibuch".
Pregananant?
The famous one out of school: Waitor, I become a Schnitzel.
I said moose instead of moss and corrected myself into mouse ... in my 12th year in school ...
Isn't weiner schnitchel some kind of sausage?
@@hydrolito No sausage but meat ( i think it is Cutler but Not sure)
@@hydrolito
Schnitzel is a cutlet (usually veal or pork, sometimes chicken) and Wiener means Vienna style. Note Wien (Vienna) is spelled ie, not ei. Wein with the ei spelling is wine in English) is
Es ist acht Uhr- it is eight watch.
Fun fact, "sensible" did used to mean sensitive in English too. Not sure when it changed, but this was as back in Regency times in England. That's why Jane Austen's book is called Sense and Sensibility. "Sense" represents the practical Elinor and "Sensibility" represents the sensitive Marianne.
Was going to say the exact same thing! Also lemonade in Britain is carbonated, or fizzy as we say in the UK...
Yes, came here to say this! The title and usage of "sensibility" is confusing to many students of literature.
SN: My avatar is a Regency Shiba Inu 😂
Millionen = million
Milliarde = billion
Billionen = trillion
Bleu de channel de parfum
Lol it's a ad
That is not only a matter of language but of using the "long scale" or "short scale". Great Britain used the long scale and then switched over to the short scale in the 20th century. Brazil uses the short scale but Portugal uses the long scale but both are Portuguese speaking.
Life could be easier if the USA just switched to the metric system and the long scale already.
@@georgtanner634 wow, that's very interesting, i didn't know that. Thanks!
There are two ways:
th-cam.com/video/C-52AI_ojyQ/w-d-xo.html
It used to be the same in English, but when a Brit says "Million" and "Milliard", they're almost identical.
My aunt once told her American friende: "I like salad with mice!", when she wanted to say that she likes salad with corn
It is correct though.
You just misspelled it.
Salad with maize
@@adolfoaldretesolares8851 all due respect, but it's not really a misspelling when mice and maize have completely different sounds and meanings
@@bambino9235 Amelie misspelled it because she spelled it as it was pronounced by her aunt. Her aunt said the word "maize" meaning corn, but pronounced it "mice" with her German accent.
Live Wire yes i understand that, but adolfo said it was correct but misspelled. It's not correct in english to pronounce maize that way (it must be an "ay" and "z" sound, not "eye" and "s") that's all I meant. Normally I wouldn't correct somebody when it's obvious what they mean, but given the context of the video & wider conversation about being accurate in german-english translation, it seemed right to do so on this occasion
@@bambino9235 Like I said, it was mispronounced by the aunt, who pronounced it with her German accent...
"Sympatisch" reminds me of "Simpático" in Spanish. That's awesome. ❤
I know both English and Spanish, and I was surprised at the number of cognates between Spanish and German that weren't the same in English!
It's "szimpatikus" (pronounced something like "sim-pah-tee-coosh", but with short vowels and the stress on the first syllable) in Hungarian, with the same meaning as in German/Spanish (and most continental languages). It's interesting that Hungarian has borrowed the full Latin form ending in -us, athough the pronunciation is different.
I once attended a meeting between a German and an American, and at the end the German handed a bunch of documents to the American and asked if he wanted a map. Which of course confused the American.
"Mappe" in German is more of a portfolio or protective folder, made of leather or plastic.
That's a good one!
That's a nice one and brings back some memories about a conversation in a pub in Ireland. I was there with some friends and we talked to some Irish guys. The Irish guys asked one of my friends where our Hostel was. My friend wanted to show it on a map, but had no map and asked the Irish guy 'Do you have a plan of the city?'. I have never seen so many question marks in someones eyes before. The translation for the german word 'Plan' or 'Stadtplan' is 'map' and not 'plan'.
Ha, while reading this, before you explained „Mappe, I thought he also offered a business card. Karte = Map
@@felixklusener5530 I mean he's not wrong considering that most early maps were plans of the city. The Irish guy was probably too drunk to catch on, though.
Da fehlt eins ;)
Bekommen - become. Eine Klassenkameradin berichtete mal von ihren Sommerferien und sagte den legendären Satz „...and then I became a hotdog!“ 😂
My Swiss friends laughed when I mentioned that I didn't like all the "preservatives" in our foods. Then again, I laughed when one friend said she wanted to take a quick "douche"! 🙂
So what does " douche" mean ?
@@marcuspfister2047its probably french, as a german speaker idk
Take a shower that's what I ve researched
The German word "Brand" and the English word "brand" actually are very closely related. The Germanic meaning is the one still preseved in German while the English meaning is derived from marks left by branding irons, e.g. on horses or leather.
Brennen ,Brenner, Brandt are related as well
Another archaic English meaning of "brand" is a burning stick, often used as a torch.
Also I suspect that the verb "brandish", i.e. waving something like a sword or burning stick, is related.
Wow that brand is going to leave a mark! Ouch!!!!
Mann hab ich einen Brand. >>> Me being realy thirsty.
I'd still say they were all originally linked to fire though as in something you forge or heat up in a fire.
When I was an exchange student in Germany back in the day, I had been traveling for a long time and my new German family thought I looked tired. They were trying to ask if I wanted a chance to freshen up with a “shower”. They were trying out their English and asked me if I wanted to “douche”.... They saw the look of terror on my 15 year old male face and ran for the German/English dictionary. After a little embarrassment we had a really good laugh.
When my family and I went to America when I was about 14 or 15 as well, one of the warnings my father gave me and my sister was to never say 'douche' instead of shower. He also explained what a 'douche' was in English, so I never made that mistake xD
This is the same in French, and if I'm not mistaken I believe the Germans actually borrowed the word "douche" from the French. Equally amusing is the French word "blanquette" which is a type of veal stew, but obviously sounds just like "blanket" in English. I made that mistake a few times before my French friends reminded me that the correct word is "couverture".
That sort of misunderstanding can happen even between English speakers. I'm Australian of UK heritage. Years ago I was visiting family who live in the USA. I had purchase a new pair of jeans and wore them to a social event at the home of a friend of one of my relatives. At one point the friend noticed i had a sticker stuck on my jeans and said "Oh (my name), you've got something stuck on your fanny." To which I replied rather shocked "On my where???" And that was the day I learned that "fanny" in the USA means your butt. In Australia and the UK, your fanny is ...er ... your lady privates.
Lol, I live in the US, (Nebraska) I don't know that I've ever heard someone use the word fanny without "pack" after it Those are worn on the front so it's an odd name.
They meant shower, here in Norway we use the word *dusj* (pronounced 'doush') and means shower.
Great video! Other "false friends" that are encountered very early in the study of German are (with the German given first): (a) "will" (first person singular of the verb "wollen"), which does not mean "will," but rather "want"; (b) "also", which does not mean "also," but rather one meaning of "so," as in, "Also, was machen wir heute Abend?" (So, what are we doing this evening?); (c) "wer" means "who," not "where" and "wo" means "where," not "who; (d) "wen" means "whom," not "when"; (e) "denn" means "than" and "dann" means "then"; (f) Oh, and the one that really drives me crazy, “auf” does not mean “off” but “on”!!! 😊
Yes, those are good examples of how you get confused with the easy words!
“Will” killed me for WAY too long.😂😂
Auf also means up in german 😉
The wer-wo-where-who thing had confused me for very long. But the same with den-then and dann-than I didn't realized until now. But you're totally right. Thanks for that. 🤓
I'm wondering, when and why this happened 🤔?
Will in English also means to want/desire in a very strong way, but nowadays it is mainly used in fixed expressions e.g. "If you will", "Do what you will" or "Will you marry me?". The noun will is also cognate with the original meaning of the verb, as in "His last will".
The first time I went back to Germany to visit my grandparents, I had an experience that pointed out what you were illustrating. My brothers and sister and went for a Spaziergang (walk) with our grandfather through some woods when he suddenly said, „Look there’s an Igel (hedgehog) but we all looked up thinking that he meant eagle (Adler). Boy he was confused about why we were looking up while the Igel was right at our feet.
I gave my German friend a gift.
I miss him.
lachflash omg💀
RIP
😂
Feeling misty?
F lmao
This may be apocryphal, but our German teacher was from Austria, and told us a story about first meeting her host family in America back in the 1950s. She was just a teenager, and spoke no English, so when she saw a package with a note that read, "gift for the German family" she was horrified. She knew "for" "German" and "family," but the word "gift" wasn't something she could figure out. And, of course, she was afraid it meant something entirely different! LOL! (Her mother soon set her mind at ease, thankfully.)
Haha! "Oh no, they're planning to kill me!"
I had once a misunderstanding with the word “dick”.
It was super confusing and awkward at first but once we (german boyfriend and I) realized were talking about something completely different we couldn’t stop laughing. Languages are fun indeed.
@Cin Dy It can get even more confusing if there is a guy named Richard involved. :D
In the 1950s "dick" was a slang for detective. This is frequently used in Rex Stout's novels, it gets even better when a person is referred to as a "female dick" (i.e. one of the rare female private investigators).
@@bartolo498 We have a murder on our hands. Call a private dick to get on the case
One thinks of Nero Wolfe (played by Orson Welles), the dick (detective), der dick ist (who is 'thick') . . .
My German professor showed us a video of a small child in Germany saying that he did not want to get fat, and she warned us ahead of time that it was going to sound like the boy was saying something rude in English. That still did not prepare us for what sounded like the child didn't want penis. Fun was had by all.
"Gift" in German originally meant the result of "geben" (to give), compare "sehen / die Sicht", "schreiben / die Schrift", hence "geben / die Gift". It came out of use and was replaced by "Gabe" but survived in the composite word "Mitgift" (dowry).
Fisch vs. fish is also a fine example of the p > f/v shift that many words underwent when borrowed from Greek/Latin into the Germanic languages:
pisces > fish / Fisch / fisk / vis
pater > father / Vater / fader / vader
pes/pdes > foot / Fuss / fot / fod / voet
OH! Enlightenment! Darth Vader now makes sense.
The first false friends that we all had to learn: where means wo and who means wer...
Haha yeah
I'm an English speaker learning German and this one tricks me all the time!
if you're german and learning English or if you're speaking english and learning german doesn't make a difference here. everyone had to suffer on that one
I still remember when I was in 5th grade xD
The Dutch have a simular problem when learning German:
wie (de) = hoe (nl) = how (en)
wer (de) = wie (nl) = who (en)
To add to the confusion: who (en) and hoe (nl) share the same pronunciation.
Also, in Dutch we have the pair waar? - daar! (wo? da! / where? there!), which sometimes leads to the false sentence: Wo ist der Bahnhof? Do ist der Bahnhof!
I learnt it as wohin from the first line of the Smurf song, Wohin kommen sie aus hier?
I am Greek and I laughed a lot at the "Gymnasium" part (since it is a greek word). Both interpretations are correct according to ancient Greeks. Because Gymnastics were considered a strong part of the education at the higher level (higher education). However, nowadays we use Gymnasium the same way the Germans do (or the other way around, it doesn't matter).
Συμφονω
Training naked.
"gymnasio" = gr. nackt
You get the sense of nakedness in words like "gymnosperm - Nacktsamer (in German)"
In germany its still the name for an higher education school. but that was invented during the industrial revolution to keep the workers class out of it. still not so much changed. You got money, you spend a lot of it to get your dumb child onto level for "Gymnasium" . As long you cant afford that extra, you just hope your kid is smart enough...
7:19 I would say "finally" is more commonly used, at least in my experience, for something that is planned or has already happened but was overdue, like "I'm finally getting a haircut next week", but "eventually" I'd more use for "I'll get 'round to it at some point, eventually" so like "I'll cut my hair eventually, when it gets bad enough/when I get 'round to it/when I have the money/time/et cetera, you get the point. Some undetermined time in the future, likely not soon, but it will happen at some point; it will happen eventually.
You’ll love this. While stationed in Wiesbaden, I lived just North in Wiesbaden-Auringen. My friend and fellow trombonist in the Wiesbaden-Auringen Sports Stadt Kappelle was a boy in Berlein at the end of WWII. He told me about American planes flying over and dropping boxes Hersey chocolate bars with little parachutes. The boxes were labeled “gifts for children, from America!” He said that caused quite an uproar!
Im Form Wiesbaden
@@no-sf7mc das Gift war dann wohl nicht stark genug...
Hahaha, that's funny. Poison for children, I bet they were very confused.
Rosinenbomber
The French word for fish "poisson" looks very similar to the English meaning of das Gift. Scares the heck out of me in posh restaurants.
The one that always got giggles in my high school German class was "fahrt" vs "fart".
That's too funny!
Naja, ich mache heute eine Fahrt was very funny in high school German class!😁
Yeah that’s the one thing that cracks my English friend up all the time he visits me in Gernany :)
The people in your class must have had a similar maturity level to the ones in my class who couldn't stop laughing about the fact that "divorced" sounds similar to "die Wurst".
High school kids, for cryin' out loud, so juvenile. On the other hand... even Mark Twain joked about "damit".
Our Australian exchange student came back home after her first week of school and was very confused why her classmates say "Frosch" (=frog) when they raise their hand during class. I've been very confused and only understood what happened there when she started mimicking it. "Frog" is dialect for Frage (=question) in the region. We still laugh about this 10+ years later 😂
Sounds like bavarian or austrian dialect, in both an a is often pronounced as an o
@@Supersd_ Sache 10€ Wette
At Canadian Universities the freshman (first year) are often referred to as "frosh".
@@richardkirchknopf2215, this is true of high school and universities in the US, too.
Sure she didn't call you all 'bogans' , because if I were Austrian and you called me an Australian, I'd sure call you a bogan! 😂
"die in hell" hat mich wunderbar zum lachen gebracht. Manchmal kann es so einfach sein. :)
Sehr schönes Video
ich habs erst kapiert nach der deutschen aussprache :-)
@@lucky1uke007 Man ist wohl auch hier schon so im Kopf auf Englisch getrimmt, dass man manchmal die deutschen Bedeutungen übersieht. ;-)
Oder es lag daran, dass ich nicht so oft Schuhe kaufen geh, und dann die in schwarz. 😄
Schöner Spruch fürn T-Shirt.
da gabs doch mal die diskussion um das eine bier... n helles bier aus einem ort namens Fucking. der name war des biers war, und ist immernoch, Fucking Hell
The way that Hell is referring to light in German/English makes sense when you look at mythology and that the name Lucifer means light bringer in Latin.
the indoeruopean root means clear/transparent/invisible. Hades, the greek good, literally means ''the translucid'' and his realm recived the same name, the only difference was the pronoun before the word.
Well, I‘d rather suspect that English "hell" has the same origin as it‘s German translation "Hölle" - and that said origin would have been somthing like "hole" or "Höhle" (German for "cave"). It is supposed to be a pit of fire after all.
My 8 year old Grandson doesn't like it when I say, Meine lampe ist hell. He says hell is a bad word in English and doesn't believe me when I say it means bright.
@@fri5728 You've just presented another false friend: the engl. "hole" isn't the german "Höhle", it's "Loch" - Like we know it from astronomy: black hole = Schwarzes Loch. "Höhle" in engl. would be "cave".
@@Ronin_666_ You're right "Höhle" isn't really the literal translation of "hole". I guess I must have thought about the more loosely shared meaning when I wrote that comment. What is a cave after all, if not a hole in the earth or something like that?
I love the way you smile while you talk and how upbeat you are.
The flags were a really good idea. Great video.
"The list of false friends is endless."
Yes, I found that out the hard way in my life.
Same in Spanish: jamon/jabon; sopa/ropa;
But with real people, not words.
Sensible in English originally meant the same as in German. The English novel Sense and Sensibility from around 1800, would now be written as Sensible and Sensitive. In the novel one sister is sensible and the other sensitive or sentimental.
"Pension" is also a German word. It is the pension for public servants, while "Rente" refers to all other.
Weirdly enough, "Pension" also means "small hotel" in German.
I wonder if it was called that because that's where pensioners would be living sort of like in the UK with their pensioner housing, this would have course been in the era where the elderly stopped living with their families like the times of old.
By the way, in Austria there is no difference between 'Rente' and 'Pension' and 'Rentner' are called 'Pensionisten' there. What do we learn? German is not the same in every country or region and even the 'official german' used by governments is different in every country. More examples for differences in official language: (D) Fahrerlaubnis= Lenkberechtigung (A); (D) Ordnungswidrigkeit = Verwaltungsübertretung (A); (D) Ministerpräsident = Landeshauptmann (A); (D) Parlamentsfraktion = Parlamentsklub (A)
What both 'Rente' and 'rent' have in common is that they are monthly reoccurring, equal payments. The former from the government - the latter from a tenant.
Similar in Czech language :-D pension (pronounced penzion - something like hotel but mostly cheaper and smaller) and penze which means rent. Penzista is also person with rent, but Czech equivalents for that words are more common today.
In Austria we say Pension to both, Rente and a small Hotel
When I worked for a German company, we were invited to tour the facilities. Entrance and Exit are Eingang and Ausgang, no problem, but there is a real difference between Notausgang and Kein Ausgang. That difference was very important in an emergency. ‘Not’ is the false friend.
true :D
Then you get Dutch, where Nood is used. Not so much a false friend as a source of amusement, unless someone actually things that in an emergency you have to evacuate in the nude.
One of my favorite but lesser known false friends is: berate ≠ beraten.
"to berate someone" is correctly translated into German as "jemanden beschimpfen" or "jemanden schelten".
"jemanden beraten" is correctly translated into English as "to counsel someone" or "to provide advise"
So while a "Berater" (consultant) in the German-speaking world is a highly paid expert in the field of politics and business, in the English-speaking world he would probably end up as a defendant in court sooner or later.
nice one :)
I once wanted to say "Ich habe meine Haare im Flur getrocknet." (in a hostel, the hairdryer was in the hallway) ... what I actually said was "I dried my hair on the floor." My friend was cracking up laughing.
PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE continue giving us lists of these "False Friend" words. It's really interesting, and you do a GREAT job with your examples!!!!!!
My relatives in Croatia also use the 'champagne' for just about any sparkling wine and I always thought that's just a 'them thing', not knowing it's so international.
Loved the 'die in hell' joke. Hadn't seen that before! 😅
There are many weird phrases involving "die" like this since die is the plural article in german.
"Die Juden" means "the jews" not "die jews"
English "chef" for "expert cook" came from the French *chef de cuisine", which means sort of "boss of cooking".
Here in New Orleans we have Chef Monteur Highway a.k.a. "Chef Highway," which was not named for any chef de cuisine but, according to stories, may refer to a former governor or else to a certain chief of the local indigenous peoples tribe.
Portuguese- chefe= boss
And in Portuguese has "chefe de cozinha" - "boss of cooking". And is usual call Chefe!
"Chef de cuisine" is "head of the kitchen". The word "cuisine" in French is a false friend in itself! It has both meanings but the primary one is "a room where food is cooked/prepared". When the French talk about a corpus of food culture, they say "gastronomie".
Chef in French means leader, boss, manager. Not necessarily someone who cooks in a a restaurant
Yes, so in English it does or should mean boss, the same as chief. Interesting how they look like almost the same word... It's just that most Americans (at least) have only the slightest familiarity with the word. We're just ignorant on this point.
Love this video. When I moved to Germany from Canada my better half, a German, and I got into a "discussion". In the heat of said discussion he said that I was very sensible. Hahahaha. You can imagine how we took turns being taken aback by the other's reaction - I agreed with him and he looked dumbfounded. I still chuckle at the thought.
In the UK, and especially in Scotland 'lemonade' used to refer to any carbonated soft drink. So when you were asked 'do you want some lemonade', it was quite normal to say 'yes, what flavours do you have?'
So that s the true meaning. British english is the original english.
As an American living in Germany the past 10 years teaching English, can confirm all of this. After awhile the incorrect usage doesn't sound so wrong anymore. The most common one I run into is probably aktuell/actual(ly).
In her autobiography, Maria von Trapp talked about her difficulty with false friends when learning English, having once told a grocer “Behold your cauliflower. I can become one across the street for less.”
I understood that the French government had succeeded in getting the word "Champaign" to only refer to the wine produced from grapes grown in the Champaign district, worldwide. Certainly, here in Australia, which has a huge wine industry, we no longer call sparkling wines "Champaign".
Yes this is true. I worked at a winery that produced an almond sparking wine that got pretty popular in our state for a while. They were forced to change it from calling to almond champagne to calling it an almond sparking wine. Same for things like cognac too. There’s an exception though, some brands have gotten grandfathered such as Hennessy which has it’s roots in Ireland but can still call itself a cognac despite not being from Cognac.
Many years ago...
Imagine a church group of many young German people. The pastor's wife is natural born American.
One morning before breakfast I see her putting a glass of peanut butter on the table and apparently I look a little bit disgusted.
So in front of the whole crowd she loudly proclaims:
"Die ist total gesund und da sind auch keine Präservative drin!"
Took some time until everybody calmed down again.
Best false friend ever.
Obviously?
@@kentix417 thanks, corrected
@@user-uo1kp3uh1u Ahh, that makes more sense. As they say "Languages are hard". :)
We have been on a schooltrip to London when I was about sixteen. And as everyone can imagine, if a bunch of german teens who were semi talented in the english language, walks around London there happens one or fifty "false friends"! But my alltime favorit happens to one of us ( I swear it wasn't me) at Burger King: My friend ordert: "I become a cheesburger, please!" A second later he was very confused about the answer: "Oh I'd like to see!" I laughed so hard! But want went wrong? In German *bekommen* means "to get something". While the English *become* means "etwas werden" like in: I become rich. So what he truly meant was: "I'd like to get a cheeseburger."
I surprised myself by suddenly almost killing myself with laughter about the cheeseburger order: I could just vividly imagine the person behind the counter folding-up with hilarity in the first instance. Not meaning badly in any way whatsoever, of course.
Order in German, please.
In der Schweiz klingt "Ich bekomm xxx" eher unhöflich. Man sagt hier "Ich hätte gerne xxx" (ob Du's auch *bekommst*, sehen wir dann ;-)
I am Hungarian and I remember while I was learning the two languages on the same day. Sometimes German lesson followed the English lesson and I got pretty confused so many times. 😀 (and today I live in Munich) your video made me laugh a lot because I hear the same “mistakes” a lot during my work. 😀
Fun fact for #7: There's an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, "Remember Me" (German: "Das Experiment"), where in one scene Beverly Crusher enters the bridge and only sees some sort of fog on the monitor. She then asks "What's that mist I'm seeing there?" -- which in German was dubbed to "Was ist das für ein Mist, den ich da sehe?" 😀
the synchro has done their job
In Matrix one person talks about the taste of that disgusting slime, wich they eat. It could taste like tasty weat (leckeres Gras/Joints). In german he says, it taste like sexcrispies.
I still love this episode.
:D :D :D :D looool! didn´t know that ^^
the lemonade/limonade thing is only an american englsih problem, in british english we use lemonade in the same way limonade is used
I'd only use 'lemonade' for Sprite/Seven up/clear lemony-limey fizz though - never for a cola or orange flavoured.
I have Coca-Cola cans and bottles that have "limonade" written on the label.
Yes and beer mixed with lemonade we call shandy.
American lemonade would most likely be called traditional, cloudy or homemade lemonade. That's the flat stuff in the UK. If you ask for lemonade, you'll get something fizzy. Some people don't class sprite or 7up as they're lemon and lime, but many still class it as lemonade. Beer and lemonade is a shandy in the UK. That's if it's a pretty even split between the 2 drinks. There's also something called a lager top that just has a dash of lemonade (again, the fizzy kind) added to the top of the lager. I've heard of a lager top, but haven't ever seen or heard anyone order it. Shandy is more common for if someone is driving, on a hot day etc. Also there's a very lemonade heavy soft drink version of shandy which comes in a can. It's got such a low amount of alcohol it's classed as a soft drink and is commonly sold in chip shops to drink when you get fish and chips.
@@purplephoenix4969 In different regions of the UK you get different coloured lemonades, and you get clear and cloudy. The clear looks like soda water and the cloudy is usually murky yellow.
crazy how so many of those words have a false friend in italian which bears both the german and the english meaning!
become und bekommen ist auch so ein schönes Beispiel, mit dem man in der Schule immer viel Spaß hatte :D
That's the one I use when I teach Nachhilfe. I think it's the most commonly abused false friend so if the kids can just remember that one, they're good: )
"When will I become a bloody beef steak?" - "Oh, I hope never, sir."
You missed one that was even displayed in this video: "Limo" - An abbreviation in both languages for completely differnt words
Imagine an American telling a German about riding around in a stretch Limonade. **lol**
Actually I heard Limo in Germany used as an abbreviation to "Limousine".
@@SvEd76 Yeah. Limo also means Limousine. Never understand that, because its "Limoosine", not "Limosine".
I’ve definitely messed up die Limonade and lemonade, but the one I’m struggling with is a little more complicated to explain. In English, we use the word will to mean “I will do something/I am going to do something”. In German, will is a conjugation of wollen “Ich will, du willst, er/sie/es will, etc.,” and it means “I want, you want, we want, etc.” Every now and then, I’ll read a sentence like “Ich will nach Hause gehen”(I want to go home) and I’ll translate it to, “I will go home.” Very frustrating, I must say. I also don’t know if that made sense, sorry if it didn’t.
And then you have the English noun "will" as in "my grandfather's last will".
It can be used like that in English too, though. Not always, but considering that it originally has the same meaning as the German word, it's not too far off.
BRATHERING is, in this case, a German word that equals the English term FRIED HERRING!! Einen GUTEN Sonntag, bitte!!
@@jacobhansen6450 Es ist Samstag.
Bei "Brand" hab' ich erst an den Durst gedacht, den man hat, wenn man durch Alkohol dehydriert wurde😅 Und ja, ich sollte mein Leben überdenken
Haha stimmt, gar nicht dran gedacht als ich das Video gemacht hab
Alkohol ist keine Lösung, sondern ein Lösungsmittel. Alcohol isn't a solution but a solvent.
@@Nikioko Alkohol ist keine Lösung, denn es ist ein Destillat 🤓
Wut
mir gefällt deine Einstellung. Prost!
I really love speaking English with non-native speakers, as there is so much great information about how their language relates to ours, and I frequently find that when I'm surprised by their uncommon usage of a word, I can look it up and ultimately learn something new about my own language.
For instance, just to make things even more complicated, "sensible" actually _can_ mean "perceptive" or "sensitive" in English; it's just that nobody ever uses it that way. It can also mean "perceptible", as in "There was a sensible smell in the air." But nobody uses or knows about that usage either. Either one is likely to get you a frown, but that doesn't actually mean that you're wrong. :)
One example of Germans learning English in school: a classmate of mine once wanted to say, that someday when she'll be pregnant....and said " when I become a baby..." To become is very near to "bekommen" ( to get)😂
You mentioned Fanta when you spoke about Limo.....fun fact the Germans created Fanta in WW2 as they couldn't get/didn't want Coca Cola so they created their own carbonated drink! 😊
I heared that the Germans actually (another false friend, BTW) tried to imitate Coke but those who tried it first said it takes a lot of _phantasy_ to mistake this for Coke. Hence the name "Fanta".
@@jensphiliphohmann1876FANTA => FANTAstisch (fantastic)
Fun fact, it was still Coca Cola who created it it was created by "Coca Cola Deutschland" managed by the german Max Keith
The original Fanta - made during WW2 as a substitute for Coca-Cola, since the original Coke syrup was impossible to get - has very little with the products now sold as 'Fanta'.
The youtuber 'My name is Andong' has told the whole Fanta story in an interesting video, where he also tries to recreate the original Fanta.
@@runeodin7237
I like to add I heared it was called Fanta because someone was like "it requires a lot of phantasy to recognise this as cola".
My high school German teacher once told us about a time he was staying in Germany and asked for another "Mätresse" instead of "Matratze"...
A mistress instead of a mattress? I wonder how confused the Germans there were?!
ooh my this one is too good! xD
Who the heck is disliking this video? Seems like there are people that intentionally set out just to dislike stuff, no matter what it is.
Or people who didnt like the video maybe? Lol
Jennifer Sheldon Just a lot of BULLSHIT.
Heck is also a false friend. The meaning of who the heck.. in german is wer zum Teufel. In german Heck means the rear of a car or ship.
Es macht viel Sinn Dir zuzuhören. Es is 50 Jahre her das ich in der Schulen glitsche gelernt habe. Darum ist es wirklich sehr erfrischend die Unterschiede zu wiederholen. Vielen Dank dafür
I remember one time long ago when a German said to a British guy, "You know, you'll get crabs if you keep smoking so much." "I've never heard THAT before," replied the incredulous smoker :-)
I am working off of a Google-powered guess here, but I think the German meant "krebs" instead of "crabs".
@@Hand-in-Shot_Productions Yes, exactly. That's the whole joke. The German didn't want to alert the Brit to the risk of an STI, but actually meant "cancer" (Krebs can mean crab or cancer).
@@choedzin remembers a bit to "der See / die See" "the Lake / the Sea" ;-)"Krabben" are not really the same as a "Krebs", but they biological are relatives ;-)
Its funny that you can buy in Germany a "Muffin hell". ("light Muffin")
In Germany here is "Rente", but also "Pension". "Pension" can mean the "Rente" of a public servant, or it can be some sort of smaller hotel.
Another false friend is "also". The english "also" is "auch" in german. The german "also" means "so/thus" and can also be filler word.
Pension = Altersbezüge
hell deutsch heisst bright englisch. wer will schon on the hell side of life marschieren? th-cam.com/video/SJUhlRoBL8M/w-d-xo.html
Bei mir war es eventuell. In Deutsch meint es vielleicht, in Englisch bedeutet eventuelly letztendlich. War manchmal verwirrend
Moin, Ich, als Deutscher muss sagen, dir hört man unwahrscheinlich gerne zu. Deine Englische Aussprache ist sehr klar und verständlich. Ich habe sehr große Probleme mit Englisch bzw mit der Aussprache anderer und dessen Verstehen. Aber bei dir kann ich gut zuhören und auch erkennen was du meinst.
Ich hoffe das wird mir etwas helfen besser Englisch zu verstehen :)
aktuell / actual - I've been getting weekly emails starting with "This is the list of actual software bugs for this week" from a German person for years. This extends to people using "actualize" when they *actually* mean "update".
I was expecting this one on the list.
To me it always was a similar struggle as with eventually/eventuell.
A memorable Simpsons episode with Sideshow Bob: "DIE BART, DIE!!" ...
-"Oh no, Your Honor, you´ve got it all wrong. That´s actually German..."
-"Oh, well, i guess it´s okay then...."
While it in real needed to be "Der Bart"... 😅
"Sideshow Bob" is called "TingelTangel Bob" in german Simpson series. A friend told me, as a Simpson fan, he named his messenger nic name "TTBob", which became funny when he later met a (native english speaking) girl more often and they came closerer each other. He was totally glueless, what she meant as she whispered to him "Lets come to your nic name!" (TTBOB=time to bend over b*tch) 😅
Being an American in Munich, I have made some of these same mistakes! Thank you for a great video!!
I was in Germany for two years. A companion of mine and I, who both spoke German, visited an American military family. They had a dog name Misty. He'd step out and shout "Misty!" to call the dog without a clue what the German meaning of Mist was. My companion and I were rolling on the floor laughing when we heard it.
I guess they don't sing the tune "Misty" in Germany, huh?
@@peterharrison5833 No, it would make them too misty-eyed.
@@DMichaelAtLarge LOL!
The German word miste pronounced as mister means crap.
@@DMichaelAtLarge what would be the German version of the "Misty" tune
"False friends"? My not-so-false-friend would call them "frenemies." 😀
Funny and interesting presentation, Feli! You got me at "die in hell." 😂
Frenemies aren't similar at all. They're enemies that are also friends (our vice versa). False friends are NOT your friends at all, they just pretend to be. Hence the linguistic concept of a word that LOOKS helpful, though it is everything but.
I'm a French speaker and English/German are my 2nd/3rd languages. You helped me today with each of them so thank you for that.
I got another:
Art - Kunst
Kind - Art
Children - Kind
You can be as kind as you want, but German children are always Kinder ;)
Children are Kinder 👁️👄👁️
Child - Kind - Art - Kunst ... i wonder if there is a longer chain possible
@ItzSkylerUwU. YT It is German (plural of child). It may be the same in Dutch, the languages have some common words.
@ItzSkylerUwU. YT Actually, wiktionary.org says at least 3 more languages have this word ;) but I guess it comes originally from German.
Thanks for all "false friends". A Swedish brewery once made a German style light beer, naturally called Hell. It became popular so they also made a dark beer named Heaven. I don't think those beers are manufactured any more, because I haven't seen them for several years. Btw, I liked Heaven very much, more than Hell. :-)
there is a place in Austria called Fucking (recently renamed to Fugging). Guess what they named their local brand of light beer.
Swedes drink "Öl" (=beer) which means "oil" in German
Eventually - when I looked up the dictionary in Google, it gives Oxford's. It is to express something happenED AFTER a long time, effort or problems. Maybe it is one of those American "how are you" and "football"?
It makes the video even more interesting and educational! 😊
Now I understand why in the business meeting with the Dutch, Swedes, German, French, British, Irish and American, the word "eventually" causes confusion....
I enjoyed this video. I'm Dutch and our language has a lot of similarities and false friends with both German and English. In a couple of your examples the Dutch word has the same meaning as the German word. Like Sympathiek-Sympatisch, Champagne, Gymnasium and Eventueel-Eventuell. But the Dutch word Hel has the same meaning as the English Hell.
A special case is Rente-Rente-Rent. In Dutch it means interest, in German pension and in English what you pay your landlord every month. So it's a three way false friend between Dutch, German and English.
But "hele" is related to "whole", I think? 🤔:
"Hele male, hele male,
neuike neuike, niet betale! "
Get's even funnier when you realize the dutch verb for "to rent" is "huren" which in German apparently means whores.
@@suzan6254 lol. Huren is written the same, but pronounced differently. In German it's pronounced similar to the Dutch hoer, which also means whore :-)
I'd guess "brand" has the same heritage in English. Remember that cows got their "branding" by using a fire steel sign marker. So the "Brand-Stelle an der Kuh" was the branding of the owner . OK, you also find that on wooden covers of any product back then, and still today.
In Britain, champagne is exactly the same as Germany. Prosecco is cheaper, or sparkling wine could be causally referred to as “fizz”.
Lemonade is the same as the German in UK, beer and lemonade is called Shandy (mixed together)
My favorite is: fast (engl) -> schnell (dt) & fast(dt) -> nearly(engl). When I was a child the song "Eye of Tiger" was very popular, but it took me years to figure out that it doesnt mean "Ei des Tigers"
Fast in German is closer to the English verb to fasten where fast as an adjective has evolved quite a way from the original meaning of fixed, secure, firm, constant, steadfast, etc... To fast also comes from this root where when one fasts they must be steadfast and firm in their behavior.
In my dialect of German we don't have the word schnell and instead say schwind for fast, which is quite different in Hochdeutsch. If I said, "Hee es sea schwind," that would sound quite weird to a Hochdeutsch speaker I assume. I believe it comes from the idea that when something moves very quickly it vanishes from one's sight. Similar to the evolution of the English Warp from Old English Weorpan - to throw, where when an object moves quickly after being launched it appears warped to the human eye.
My favorite is "Berater"! A "Kundenberater" is not berating customers. Well, he might...
Hartmut Bohn thats a really good one 👍🤣
als Kundenberater kann ich sagen, ich berate und berate
When I was first learning German, I couldn't get it out of my head that a Speisekart was a cart with spices on it that was wheeled around in restaurants, kind of like a mobile condiment station.
Another one of the classics: A friend of mine, also Austrian, was out with friends from the UK when her battery died and she asked one of them: "Can you give me your handy"? And he looked at her, confused, and hesitantly reached his hand out to her... ;)
At least it wasn't a man and they didn't ask if someone could give them a handy. That can mean something very different in English.
That English "brand" is actually not that far from German meaning. The word originally referred to the brand mark on the cattle. "Who's brand is that on that cow?"
Correct, English is like brand (mark), German is the other part (Brand) Marke. Same origin, literal brand mark on animals.
And in English I have heard of a fire brand, which I think means torch. So, the origin of the word brand seems to involve fire and in English that meaning became obscured while it was kept in German. There are so many words like that. It feels like we once all had the same language and then we were split up and confused. I think that kind of is the case and also it's just the constant mixing and spreading that is human language.
@@NickRoman branding cattle With a burning iron, in german brand from brennen.
@@NickRoman torch=Fackel..... abgefackelt=completely burned down ;-)
@@NickRoman English is a Germanic language with French words and Latin grammar.
I didn't even know I was using the word decent wrong until I watched this video. :D
Due to Number 16 I remembered an other false friend which also might be a bit confusing to others when using it wrong: cause in German it's totally common to ask something that would literally translated like "do you have fire" or "could you please give me fire" if you want to ask for a lighter.
I've actually heard about how the word "pepperoni" is different over in Europe. I forgot who told me about that one, but I remember learning that someone got peppers on their pizza in Italy when they ordered a "pepperoni" pizza. As for the other ones, I haven't heard of those yet. The company I currently work for is headquartered in Stuttgart, so I should probably be careful if I happen to give them a present. I probably shouldn't use the word "gift" just to be safe, lol! I really like the skits you did for a lot of the words in this one! The "gift" one is my favorite one, lol! Awesome video!
The Word 'gift' is Low saxon of 'Gabe', it's from 'geben' - Niederdeutsch 'geven'... 'Gift' is in the old German Word 'Mitgift' ... A present for the bride.
You can say present instead of gift or do they have different meaning for that?
@@hydrolito Present is the way to go. "Präsent" is a true cognate, though it's used much less than "Geschenk".
When I was on a hiking trip some years ago, I didn't know the word for "Isomatte" (which I think translates to sleeping pad in english). A girl that went hiking as well (we met at a motel) wanted to sleep in her tent because the thought that the motel was a bit sketchy. Since I didn't need my sleeping pad, I wanted to give her mine. But, as I said, I didn't know what the english word "Isomatte" was so I tried "isolation matt". I can't tell you how weirded out and kinda disgusted she looked at me. To this day, I don't know what she thought I wanted to do to her but I guess I came off pretty weird? And my "Isomatte" was stuck in my backpack so I stood there, trying to get this thing out of my backpack. Eventually (ha, I used that word correctly, right?) I was able to get that thing out to show her what I meant. She seemed so exited when she finally understood that I wanted go give her my sleeping pad. Fast forward, till today I never forgot the english word for "Isomatte" though I never used it again. Also, it became (ha, also a popular false friend) on of my favourite stories from that trip.
Edit: sorry, I know my grammar is pretty shitty sometimes. I just write the way it feels right xD
I really don't know what she may have thought. There's nothing springs to mind when I think of the words isolation mat. I would be confused, but not scared by that. Maybe it did mean something years ago, or maybe she'd had some interesting life experiences that I haven't. Camping mat or sleeping pad both work. Don't worry about your grammar, it's very good :-)
Danke. Diesen Beitrag von Ihnen sollte man in allen Englisch-Klassen vorspielen. Sehr gut gemacht. Nochmals danke.
What's even more common for me than "eventually" is the wrong use of "actual(ly)" (German: tatsächlich). The German word "aktuell" means current/latest. I lost count of how many times a coworker asked for the "actual version" of some document
Quite a few languages have variations of the Latin "actualis," and it generally means the same thing (current) in all of them except English.
@@TJStellmach Lol this is soo true I once saw in a train a screen that gave an english translation that said: "actualy speed: 100km/h". I was like what do they mean actual speed? Is there a fake speed?? But they meant current speed lol
Tolle Idee Felicitas, solch ähnlich klingenden Vokabeln mit völlig anderer Bedeutung einmal aufzugreifen, worauf man sonst im Unterricht, oder im Lehrbuch kaum hingewiesen wird und deshalb damit ganz schön auf die Nase fallen kann!
Du würdest sicherlich eine super gute Lehrerin für Fremdsprachen abgeben, denn Du bringst die Dinge immer wieder gut verständlich und super charmant auf den richtigen Punkt!
Sehr nette und gute Beispiele und sehr gut und interessant präsentiert! Danke! Hier ein paar Gedanken und Ergänzungen:
Gerade das amerikanische Englisch sehe ich nicht nur als Sprache mit germanischen Wurzeln, sondern hinsichtlich des Vokabulars zur anderen Hälfte mit lateinischen Wurzeln, in einem viel weiteren Umfang, als die deutsche Sprache lateinische Ausdrücke übernommen hat: lateinisches Vokabular ohne lateinische Grammatik. Wenn man gut Latein kann, dann hat man es auch mit dem amerikanischen Englisch sehr leicht. In europäischen Schulen lernt man aber mehr britisches Englisch, das mehr auf die germanischen als auf die lateinischen Wurzeln zurückgreift (z.B. necessary vs. required, search vs. query).
"False friends" gibt es nicht nur zwischen deutscher und englischer Sprache. Auch zwischen deutschem Deutsch und österreichischem Deutsch gibt es sog. "false friends", bei denen man sehr aufpassen muß, z.B.:
a) Stuhl: in Deutschland etwas, das man in Österreich einen Sessel nennt; ein Stuhl in Österreich ist etwas, nach dem der Arzt bei Untersuchungen fragt und dessen man sich üblicherweise an gewissen, kleinen Örtchen entledigt
b) Brötchen: in Deutschland etwas, das man in Österreich Semmel nennt; Brötchen in Österreich sind belegte Brötchen, d.h. kleine Brotscheiben z.B. mit Salami, Streichkäse etc. belegt
Champagner in Europa hat meines Erachtens etwas mit Markenrechten zu tun. Anderer Schaumwein heißt daher bei uns Sekt. In der Sowjetunion hat der Krimsekt aber auch Шампанское Вино geheißen, ähnlich wie offenbar in den USA. Heute sagt man in Rußland dazu, soweit ich informiert bin, wie bei uns in Europa Игристое Вино.
We ordered pepperoni on our pizza in Germany. We realized something was different when reading the menu. With one person saying I don't think pepperoni is pepperoni. Another person insisting pepperoni is pepperoni. And others not caring, they would eat whatever came, it's an adventure. It just adds another story to tell others about our vacation in Germany.
Vor fast 30 Jahren hatten wir einen Schüleraustausch mit einer Highschool nahe Detroit. Anfangs stellten wir uns alle vor und als ich dran kam, wollte ich abschließend mein Sternzeichen nennen. Mit stolz geschwellter Brust sagte ich: "... and I´m a virgin!" Die Lacher gingen auf mich, aber das Eis war gebrochen...
I've studied both English and German as foreign languages and I totally relate to all these examples :) My favourite is Gift/gift :) I can say that even after so many years of speaking both languages, I still think twice before using it, wondering: did it mean present or poison? :) We have some of the words in Bulgarian too and they are in the same meaning as in German, for example when we say "simpatichen", this means the same as "sympathisch" in German, not "sympathetic". :)
I am a native german speaker and always struggled with "bekommen" and "become" totally different meaning but nearly the same word
An American told me a story when she was visiting Germany and she was looking at marlwladwnin the shop and she shouted to her German friends: "Oh schau, ohne Präservative." Maybe you want to include this one in the next installation . ;)
That's the German word for 'condom' I believe :)
@@kenkur27 It ism while 'Kondome' is more current now. the P-word sounds very old fashioned...
@@OliverGassner Maybe like 'prophylactic' in English.
I've been having a binge of this channel over the last few days. Mostly because as a British person it's amazing how British English sits right between American and German. Even culturally the UK is much closer to Germany (probably why I found it weirder going to the US than I did Germany...). Some stuff we've nabbed from the US meanings like pepperoni but particularly the US meanings of lemonade and champagne make no sense to anyone here either.
For most of the others the British use at least has a more obvious connection to the German use of the word even if we actually use it like in the video.
This is one of the reasons I have been watching too. We definitely have far more in common with Germany than the US. Both myself and my son were very at home when we visited Germany. When I've visited the US in the past, for all we supposedly speak the same language, there was a language barrier there and the culture seemed very foreign. I've definitely noticed things gradually getting more Americanized in the UK over the last few years, but we have far more in common with Germany than the US.
@@purplephoenix4969 It's true that American culture is becoming more prevalent in the UK. It wasn't until I started working for a global company (most of my team is in the US but time zones mean in the mornings I work more with our European teams) that I realised how different the US and UK are still. As a pedantic introvert I definitely prefer the northern European way of doing things!
Also hadn't realised how far north the UK is until people in the eastern US were saying "good morning" to me when it was already dark here! Only 1 US state is on the same latitude as any part of mainland UK- Alaska. Useful pub quiz fact for you there ☺
Sensible in Spanish also translates to Sensitive in English. In case anyone is wondering, sensible in English translates to sensato in Spanish.
The word "Gift" actually has the original meaning as "something you give". In this meaning, "poison", came about as a calque of Latin "dosis". Fun fact: In Swedish, it means both "poison" and "married" depending on context. All meanings can be traced to "something you give".
For me as a Dutchman this video is kind of funny to watch. Nearly all these words exist in Dutch, too (sometimes spelled slightly differently). In about 2/3 of the cases the meaning in Dutch leans closer to the German one (though not always identical), in about 1/3rd of the cases closer to the English one. So I suppose our language really is in between both, (but closer to German) :)
Angelsächsisch und Holländisch sind genau wie Deutsch germanische Sprachen und haben eine gemeinsame Herkunft aus dem Mittelalter.
I've lived almost 63 years, and I never heard the term "false friends" before. Thank you for expanding my linguistic horizon.
False friends are a funny thing when you learn one foreign language, but they make it nearly impossible to learn two closely related languages like Italian and Spanish at the same time.
Pepperoni, pepper and paprika are words directly from hell. They always mean something slightly differnent, not just in German, English and Italian but also in Spanish but still very close to each other.
Reminds me of a local brewery that makes beer out of old bread. On the bottle:
"Damn good bread beer" - "Hell" :D
Felicia, I used to watch your channel a few years ago, but I lost touch. I'm glad to be back. Your American pronunciation has really gotten more natural. It used to be easy to hear that you were from Germany. Now, your accent is just a trace. And you still have your lovely lilt and great content!