German has some great words that don’t translate directly into English. What are your favorite words? Mine is a three way tie between schadenfreude, fremdschamen, and kummerspeck. (I can never remember where to put my umlauts, say sorry 
)
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Sadly, no. But if I make it to New Zealand (iirc) or if you make it to New York we can definitely sort out some decadent eats. I’m all about that food, no workouts.
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Just some more: Kindergarten, Wunderkind, Blitzkrieg, Bratwurst, Doppelgänger, Ersatz, Flak, Hinterland, Lederhosen, Realpolitik…
And by the way, I’m horrible remembering names, but I have a near endless capacity for random and/or obscure facts and music I like…
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i like those 3 words you favor^^
hm … vesper (kind of tea time) . need more time to think about it.
i was more to say i near always use erudite language. i don’t know why.
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Some of those gloss pretty neatly. Kindergarten = children’s garden, wunderkind = wonder child, blitzkrieg = lightning/blast war, lederhosen = leather pants. I’m talking about the ones that don’t translate directly. Fremdschamen is when you are embarrassed for someone, kummerspeck (literally “grief bacon”) is the weight you gain from emotional eating. There’s another cool one, I believe it’s Dutch, oudepils (maybe utepils?) =a beer you drink outside (which my wife and I use as a verb meaning “to drink (preferably beer, but we’re equal opportunity lushes 
)outside”).
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I think this word has Latin roots, as does käse (which means hard in latin). Just some etymology stuff I find nifty.
My friends say this about me. Or they would if they knew what erudite meant.
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Grief Bacon might be my new favourite thing to say.
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A couple more interesting words that don’t translate directly in English but would absolutely get used if people knew them…
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Vesper is latin for evening and the evening prayer in monasteries, in german it can also mean a meal and my uncle used “vespern” (to vesper) as a verb for eating.
I should add Poltergeist, Strudel and Zeitgeist…
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vesper is a sweet and unnecessary snack and will be ingested shortly after lunch.
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New to me, I know Vesper as a meal in the evening or at work (used in Franconia) or a snack in the afternoon (used in Thuringia), but not necessarily as sweet, but the usage changes with the region.
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I am familiar with those roots of vesper, if only because it was the name of the evening prayer said at dinner when I was in Boy Scout summer camp at TMR. This is in line with linguistic/etymological things seen in other languages, ie in Spanish cena is dinner and cenar is to eat dinner (this also works with breakfast and lunch as desayuno/desayunar almuerzo/almorzar). In English there is also the productive rule that nouns can be used as verbs and verbs as nouns. I suspect you knew that already.
I wasn’t actually talking about loan words, or words that are incorporated into other languages, but rather words that don’t translate directly or neatly.
Is that dialectical? I wonder if my cousins would use it that way.
Edit:
My question was answered in a most ninja-ljke way by @Curmudge0n. I don’t know the states of Germany well at all. Would either of those places be near Neufahrn?
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Neufahrn is about 200 miles from where I grew up, so yes, not too far away
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until this moment i was believing ‘vespern’ means only the saxony translation of it (i’m from brandenburg but i only heard about that form) and the only other people who even know this word are bavarians …
i love bavaria … and swabia … but not cologne, where i currently live
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I’ve recently been told that all of the German cuisine I grew up with is Bavarian by another forum member. Leberkase and wurstsalat are two of my favorite things to eat. I’ve not been to Germany since 2009, and while I was there only Munich, Neufahrn to see the farm, and Schonne-Brunne. The only thing I know about Cologne is that it’s where Kolsch style beer was born. What makes it not as good?
I’m sorry @Arsonist, I did it again. Can you ever forgive me? Maybe a mod will step in and move the derailing derailing posts to the thread derailment thread?
Just in case a mod doesn’t rescue this thread from my bad influence, I must brag that I infuriate phone scammers better than anyone I know. My record is keeping one on the line for about 35 minutes.
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Somehow, we persevere.
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I am also a class A apologist. Speaking of…
@Curmudge0n, I hope I did not offend upthread. My intention was solely to clarify what I was talking about, but on rereading the exchange I’m afraid it may have come off pedantic and condescending. If it did I’m sorry, and if it didn’t I’m sorry that I am such an insufferable nuisance issuing near constant apologies.
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The irony is if I point out that the entire point of this thread is to help people feel more self confident and cool with themselves, you’ll apologize.
You cool paulo. I digs you.
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I dunno. I’d say you’re a top notch sarcastic (I’ve just invented a new noun) and have a laser precision bullish!t meter.
And my contribution to difficult to translate German : umwelt
And apparently Ode to Joy (Beethoven).
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