|
 |
German diff between "fertig" and "bereit"? | ||
Tags: Meaning of words | German | ||
Share with:
| ||
 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| lingoleng Senior Member Germany Joined 5299 days ago 605 posts - 1290 votes  | Message 18 of 26 13 November 2010 at 11:42pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Well, "zu Bett" is more formal, maybe even a little obsolete. Normal colloquial style is "ins Bett". "um" is not necessary here. Actually "Ich bin so weit." would not take any further expansions, it is mainly used as a short phrase. "Bist du so weit?" "Ja, ich bin so weit." "Ich bin so weit, ins Bett zu gehen." is not really idiomatic in German, not wrong, but not good either. There are phrases like: "Nach all den Fortschritten, die ich in Deutsch im letzten Jahren gemacht habe, bin ich jetzt endlich so weit, dass meine Frau mich manchmal versteht." The meaning here is that you have finally reached a point now where something is possible. Or negative: "Nach all den Enttäuschungen, die mir Frauen mit ihrem Augenzwinkern bereitet haben, bin ich fast schon so weit, dass ich Haustiere vorziehe." No "um zu" here either. "Um zu" often replaces a sentence with "damit": Ich lerne Deutsch, damit ich meine Frau endlich verstehe." = "Ich lerne Deutsch, um meine Frau endlich zu verstehen." (The subject must be the same: "Ich ... damit ich ... ."; "Ich lerne Deutsch, damit meine Frau mich endlich versteht." -> no "um zu" in this case.) Another use: "Ich bin zu müde, um jetzt noch Deutsch zu lernen." = "Ich bin zu müde, als dass ich jetzt noch Deutsch lernen könnte." = "ich bin so müde, dass ich jetzt nicht mehr Deutsch lernen kann." Edit: I have corrected the following mistake:
Tractor is right, I was wrong. There is a rule which states: "Es steht in der Regel auch kein Apostroph bei Verschmelzungen aus Präposition und Artikel, die allgemein gebräuchlich sind. Präposition + das: ans, aufs, durchs, fürs, hinters, ins, übers, ums, unters, vors ... " (Duden "Die Deutsche Rechtschreibung", 21. Auflage 1996, R14, Seite 24). Most of these are colloquial style and I tend to avoid these contractions, but what I do does not matter. Maybe I should read some German Harry Potter for maintenance reasons ... :-) Edited by lingoleng on 14 November 2010 at 1:02pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| SamD Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 6660 days ago 823 posts - 987 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French Studies: Portuguese, Norwegian | Message 19 of 26 14 November 2010 at 1:57am | IP Logged | ||||||||
|
Some years ago I saw a multilingual corn flakes box in Europe. The box gave directions that told consumers to pour milk and sugar on the corn flakes, concluding by saying the corn flakes were ready. The box used the word "fertig" in the German part of the directions.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| tractor Tetraglot Senior Member Norway Joined 5454 days ago 1349 posts - 2292 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, Spanish, Catalan Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 21 of 26 14 November 2010 at 11:44am | IP Logged | ||||||||
It mustn't. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
 LauraM Pro Member United States Joined 5353 days ago 77 posts - 97 votes Studies: German Personal Language Map | Message 22 of 26 15 November 2010 at 9:01am | IP Logged | ||||||||
|
Okay, can I get greedy and ask ONE more question???? LOL
Okay, I've heard a certain phrase said two different ways. One was said by a non-native but it still sounded "right." I just thought there were hard and fast rules. So, here is the phrase. One person said, "Schluck nicht den Kaugummi." The other said, "Schluck den Kaugummi nicht." Soooooo.....can a native person tell me, are BOTH correct???? Or is one wrong? (You can probably tell I get to overhear a lot of German speakers talking to their kids....) Oh, wait! Sorry, I lied...just ONE more question...Versprochen! The same phrase, again 2 different ways: 1. Wohin gehst du? 2. Wo gehst du hin? I swear I get so confused hearing them change things up like this! LOL Edited by LauraM on 15 November 2010 at 9:04am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| William Camden Hexaglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6273 days ago 1936 posts - 2333 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Russian, Turkish, French | Message 23 of 26 15 November 2010 at 10:26am | IP Logged | ||||||||
|
Sometimes the language you hear in the appropriate country is not what they taught you.
Everybody who studies German is taught that "why" is warum. And it is. But Germans are almost as likely to say wieso to express the same meaning. Dumm is a German word that English speakers learn quite early on to express "stupid". Perhaps because it is probably a cognate of "dumb". But in practice, they are more likely to say blöd, in my experience. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| LauraM Pro Member United States Joined 5353 days ago 77 posts - 97 votes Studies: German Personal Language Map | Message 24 of 26 15 November 2010 at 4:28pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
|
I agree William. I notice those things too.
My confusion comes from the word order change, as I originally thought the rules were fairly hard and fast when it came to short/simple sentences...so hopefully a native can clear that up for me/us! 1 person has voted this message useful |
|  | 
Printable version
|
| Copyright 2024 FX Micheloud - All rights reserved No part of this website may be copied by any means without my written authorization. |
