Schwitzerdütsch is a funny thing

[wiseheart]

For those not in the know: Schwitzerdütsch is the peculiar dialect of German spoken in Switzerland. It really can hardly be called German anymore. I'm reasonably good at understanding dialects (though not even the Germans themselves understand each other sometimes), and we spoke a kind of German in the family that is closer to the kind spoken in Austria than what you can learn in language courses, but Schwitzerdütsch is a language of its own.

A few days ago, I watched a few interviews Urs Bühler, the amazing tenor from Il Divo, and I laughed myself silly, because of the 7+ minutes interview I only understood a few words, the dialect equivalents of natürlich (naturally), selbtsverständlich (of course) and so on. And even those just barely. He was funny and charming and all that, but I understood more thanks to the Spanish subtitles than from listening to what was spoken. And I only learned Spanish for half a year when I was 17!!!

Clearly, Schwitzerdütsch could be used as a secret code. ;)

Comments

[lhun-dweller.livejournal.com]

[laughing with you]

Reminds me of a mix-up I once had back in college. I was learning German. One day after class, I was talking with my professor and a student more advanced than I. I was strumbling along in my limited German telling the prof about something I'd recently done. He asked, "Fun?" I responded in English, "Yes, it was fun." The more advanced student burst out laughing, then explained that we'd had a miscommunication. The prof had actually asked, "Von?" in German, meaning "From where?" and I, thinking he'd said, in English, "Fun?" replied in English. We all had a good laugh.

[wiseheart.livejournal.com]

Haha, yes, don't remind you the embarrassing case when I've mixed up Nachteil (=disadvantage) with Hinterteil (=someone's backside). Languages are fun! *g*

[lhun-dweller.livejournal.com]

Yeah, baby! Macht Spass!

I confess that I think I have one advantage: because I'm American, no one expects me to be able to speak another language, so they are more forgiving of my mistakes than they would be for fellow Europeans. Would you agree?