#71 – So ähnlich sind sich Deutsch und Englisch – mit Feli from Germany

Flemming:
Before we get started and I start our conversation with Feli, a little note on my own behalf. Registration for my language garden for fluent German starts on September 20th. It runs from September 20th to 27th. And your advantages are very clear here: you gain methodical knowledge through the video course. This means you will learn how to learn a language effectively and improve as much as possible, even at a high level. You will receive structure and system through exercise plans and challenges. This means that you know every day which material you should use for your challenges and which exercises you should do. You have a clear system. You will also receive exchange, feedback and motivation in our exclusive language garden community. This means that you will receive answers to your questions from my team and I at any time. And you always have access to the interesting, entertaining learning material available in this language garden. In the past you have received some beautiful short stories and dialogues here in this podcast. That was a little foretaste of what is waiting for you in the language garden. Many more such stories, such dialogues and such learning materials. You’ll get all of these things and overall this will help you just become more confident when speaking. Recognizing your mistakes and eliminating your mistakes and overall simply taking your German to the next level, regardless of whether you are now B1 or even further along at B2 or C1. You should definitely think carefully about whether you want to be there. It starts on September 20th. Then registration starts and is open for seven days. I would be happy. You get access to all modules, challenges, materials and everything included in this language garden for one year. And I will continue to expand this content regularly. So it won’t just stay where it is right now, but it will also continue to grow, like a real garden. Yes, so think about whether you’re there. You will receive the link on September 20th via Instagram, via the newsletter and via this podcast. So if you follow one of these three channels, then you are on the safe side. I would be happy if you would soon be part of the Natural Fluent German language garden. And now I hope you enjoy the episode with Feli.

You also made a video, I think it was called 10 reasons why Germany is not worth living in, although I think it was about another YouTuber who gave these 10 reasons. You’ve cleared up these reasons a bit and looked at the whole thing from your perspective. And I think a bit of what you just said comes into play here. Well, I haven’t seen the whole video, but I think the bottom line was that Germany is actually very worth living in, right?

Feli:
Yes, now specifically with the video, he said things like crime is so high in Germany. He simply said false facts or somehow said that in winter it is always minus 20 degrees in Germany. So just things like that that just aren’t statistically true. But of course, from a purely objective point of view, it is perhaps not necessarily so wise that I live in the USA, in terms of simply the quality of life. So I think the quality of life for me personally, as I’ve built it up here, is very high in the USA, but it’s not the case for everyone. So if you’re unemployed, if you’re a single parent, if you’re a pregnant woman. So there are so many circumstances where the American system pretty much sucks and pretty much leaves you hanging. That’s why in Germany you obviously have all these advantages. Labor law, i.e. protection against dismissal and things like that, simply doesn’t exist in the USA. Well, it’s usually normal, but it’s not legally stipulated, that you have a two-week notice period. But theoretically, you as the employer or the employee could simply terminate your employment without notice. And yes, of course the same thing with health insurance, the education system. Of course it’s all incredibly expensive and yes, everything is designed in such a way that people actually end up digging their own grave. So if you put it quite dramatically now. So of course people are encouraged to study, for example, because otherwise you wouldn’t have as many career options later on. But you’ll then have to take on at least $100,000 in debt for college. And then you end up stuck in a vicious circle where you end up constantly paying off all your interest and end up in a mountain of debt. And all of these systems, all the banks and what not, all ultimately benefit from you and your suffering.

Flemming:
You could say that everything is based on that.

Feli:
Yes, the whole debt system, I’ll call it the debt system now, the whole thing about taking on debt for everything, that’s really present here. Well, I think I know almost no American who doesn’t have any debt. Even if it’s just when you buy a car. So there is simply this inhibition threshold to finance it directly, even if you could perhaps even afford it. Yes, they finance it directly and then pay for it over I know how many years. And in the end, of course, it’s much more expensive and crappy for them because they then constantly pay interest. Same with credit card debt too. These are all rather unnecessary things that people simply do because they are tricked into doing it because they see it as normal. So of course no one has to… well, some people have to take on credit card debt, but a lot of people just take on credit card debt because they just want to live this luxurious American life.

Flemming:
That’s crazy, because if you think about it, in Germany, before someone takes out a loan here, I don’t know, hell must freeze over, that’s how it feels. So that’s an incredible difference.

Feli:
Yes, that’s a huge difference. And that’s why when I came here, everyone always said that you have to build up a credit score so that you can take out a loan later. So it’s kind of like Schufa information, only it works the other way around in the USA. You simply have no score to begin with, and the more debt you take on, the better that score gets. So it’s actually completely illogical, but I always said, huh, what kind of loan? I’m not taking out a loan, where do you live? Well, at least I don’t plan to. Sure, if something goes wrong in life, but of course I never intended that. Whereas for most Americans, by the time they’re in their early 20s they’re already incredibly deeply in debt, because simply because of university, if they’ve got a bachelor’s degree, then you simply have, most, most people then have student loans, i.e. tuition fees, debt and then there are medical costs, credit card debt, car payments, house payments.

Flemming:
It’s crazy, it’s really a real luxury situation here, the study situation that we have in Germany, as you already said. So no tuition fees or only very, very low ones. That’s not even called tuition fees, it’s some kind of administration, processing fees, etc. Especially in the east of Germany, where I live, I think I paid 200 euros per semester at my university.

Feli:
Yes, yes, in Munich too. At some point in Bavaria we still had tuition fees of 500 euros per semester, but when I started, that was just abolished. So there were somehow 150 to 200 something like that per semester. So nothing at all. Here it is, depending on which university you go to, either tens of thousands of dollars or, yes, more like tens of thousands. So I don’t think there are hundreds of thousands per semester. But there are, so per year, depending on which university you go to, it can be over a hundred thousand per year. But at such a good private university, for example, 60,000 a year is standard. Now at a public university where I was, maybe it’s like, yeah, it depends on what course you’re studying. And then there are various requirements, but around 20,000 a year just for tuition fees. And then there are a lot of other costs on top of that. So of course just normal living costs, but books and materials here are also incredibly expensive. So, for example, you have a course like this and the professor says, yes, you need such and such a book. And the book costs $300. And that’s here, so that’s not regulated either. And that’s completely normal. So university books or sometimes, if you go to a private high school, you have to factor in a huge amount of money for these materials.

Flemming:
Yes, amazing.
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Okay, we’ve definitely identified a very big difference there. Or rather some differences between Germany and the USA as a whole. But since this is of course also a language learning podcast, I would like to talk about the topic of language again. And simply put this linguistic aspect in the foreground again. You also speak English fluently, no question after so many years. Of course you can also see this in your YouTube videos. And you also made a video about similarities between German and English. I really liked that too. So words that appear in English, German words that also appear in English. Do you have a few favorite words that you could pick out that we could perhaps discuss?

Feli:
Now I have to take a quick look at my list. I opened it specifically. So darlings. The first one, I would say, was “health,” because I actually didn’t know that was used here. So with some words, for example kindergarten, you somehow know that they are used in English. But health, I was so completely surprised because I had heard it often that in social situations, when someone sneezed, people simply said “health”. And at the beginning I always thought, oh, they’re doing this because of me. So because I’m here now and they think, „Ah, funny, the German, I’ll just say it in German now.“ No, that’s actually a thing here and I think it comes from some film or some series or something . I don’t really know anymore, but it’s somehow a pop culture thing that it has crept into language usage and that it’s perceived as a bit funny. So if you use „health“ instead of, so to speak Saying “Bless you” is a bit funny, but it happens a lot.

Flemming:
Great, but this is not only regional now, but is it really that widespread throughout the USA?

Feli:
I think so, yes. Well, I’ve seen it several times in some series or something. For example, the series Scrubs. I don’t know if you know them. I just recently saw another episode where he simply said “health” in the episode.

Flemming:
Ah, that’s cool. What else did we have? For example, I also found “Wanderlust” very interesting. The word “wanderlust”, so is that really used? So do you actively use this in everyday life or for any specific situations?

Feli:
Yes, that’s not really an everyday word, I would say. But that’s not an everyday word in German either. But that is a word that many people already know. I don’t want to speculate too much now, I don’t know exactly how it caught on. But I feel like a lot through social media too. So that people then say, “Ah, in German there is this beautiful word Wanderlust”. There are tiles with quotes or something like that. And then people talk about, “In German there is the concept of wanderlust. This is what I have.“ And then they make some nice collage of all their travel experiences or something. But you can definitely find the word in literature and so on. It’s not super common now. What, for example, super The most common word is “Dachshund,” or it is pronounced differently. I always have to concentrate myself. “Dachshund, Dachshund,” I think they say. So that’s a dachshund. And it’s really strange because they write it like Dachshund. Which is also another name for a dachshund in German. So I don’t know exactly where the term is used and whether it’s even used anymore. But it definitely comes from German too. But the way they say it is just really wild. Above all, I think it was just a situation where someone said that to me at the beginning. And I’m like, “Huh? I don’t know what you’re talking about.“ And the person was like, „I thought this is a German name. This is a German dog.“ And I said, „Huh, then spell it out.“ Because quite often people say some German words to me. And they said, „Huh, it’s so and so German Brand. Or such and such a German singer. Or such and such a German city.“ And I just didn’t understand anything. And then I always say, can you spell it briefly? Because they just pronounced it strangely so that I couldn’t remember it I figured out what kind of word that was supposed to be. And that’s how it was with “Dachshund”.

Flemming:
Dachshund. Really funny. I was completely unaware that there were so many words in total. Well, “kindergarten”, you know that. You’ve already heard that.

Feli:
We know that, yes.

Flemming:
Broken.

Feli:
What else, for example… Yes, exactly, broken…

Flemming:
What did you want to say?

Feli:
I wanted to say “football”. So “football”. “Foosball table” is “Let’s play some football”.

Flemming:
Ah, really? Yes. Wow, okay. I would have thought, „Soccer“ then. Normally they say „Soccer“ in the USA, right?

Feli:
Exactly, so “soccer” is football. But then the German word football pronounced in English is kicker, so a table football, table football. Exactly, so there’s really the S, but they write it differently. They write FOOS and then ball. But now they don’t write it with FU-sharp S, but FOOS. But that’s the official name for a table football, for a table football, is football. And I always found that really strange at the beginning, for example.

Flemming:
Yes, funny. And I also find “Schadenfreude” very interesting.

Feli:
Yes, I think that is a very popular word.

Flemming:
Really?

Feli:
Yes, yes, it’s kind of a thing. As I said, I don’t know how it got established, but somehow a lot of people just know that it’s this one word that is so typical of German culture and that doesn’t exist in English. And I’ve seen it often in talk shows, like late night shows or comedy specials or something like that, where it’s really just used in the monologue. So that doesn’t need to be explained too much, the word. So most people know it. I would say, certainly not everyone, but most people know this word and know roughly what it means.

Flemming:
Great, yes, so a quick explanation for the listeners here: “Schadenfreude”, yes, when you are happy that someone else has just experienced a misfortune or something bad. And exactly, that is very, very interesting. So there are many, many more words we could discuss here. This was definitely new for me. I actually find it all the more, all the more or all the more interesting that the reputation of the German language in the USA isn’t that great, right? Have I understood that correctly? Because you also made one or two videos about the fact that the German language in the USA is not perceived as being as beautiful or as sonorous.

Feli:
Yes, I would say that this is a cliché that not only exists in the USA, but also in the world in general. So of course, maybe when you go to Eastern Europe, you don’t think about it specifically, because the Eastern European languages are perhaps not that smooth. But of course, when you’re in the USA, even sometimes when I say I’m German, something like that sometimes comes back that someone somehow tries to say something in German or just imitate it. And then there’s usually a lot of screaming in a Hitler voice or some other Second World War film. For example, a word that a lot of people know from these films is “quick”. So simply “Do it quickly, do it quickly.” Or simply “quickly, quickly”. And then “yes, yes, yes. No no no no no“. So things like that are often said, for example. But wait, yeah, when people try to imitate the German language, they usually scream. Yes, which of course has a lot to do with Hitler and those World War II films and stuff. It’s partly funny, partly a bit annoying or something like that. And at the same time, German also has the reputation of being very difficult to learn and of course having all these strange sounds with -ch and -rr and that it’s just difficult to speak. So now, at least here in the area, there are a lot of people who had German in school or where it was at least offered, simply because Cincinnati has this German history. In the rest of the country it is now not common for German to even be an option. It’s usually just Spanish, maybe French as a foreign language. But some schools here also teach German. And yes, then people somehow had a year of German or something like that. So it’s usually not that long, but maybe a year or two at school. And then the only thing left is how complicated the articles are. And I mean, you all know that yourself, of course you know that yourself. And that’s just the cliché most of the time.

Flemming:
Exactly, yes, yes. Yes, of course, I think that is common knowledge. I think if you look at a lot of people who have been learning the German language for a long time, they also say, yes, of course, there are very, very difficult aspects that are simply comparatively more difficult than other languages or comparatively more difficult than other languages. Especially the topic of article declension and so on. On the other hand, many people also say that German is simply very logical. Once you understand it, a lot of things are very clearly structured and logical. That is of course also a point. But what about the other point…

Feli:
I wanted to say very briefly, the pronunciation in comparison to English, for example. So just the spelling, spelling. That once you can read German or simply know the pronunciation, then you can actually read anything, even if you don’t understand it. Whereas in English the spelling is of course so illogical. I also made a video about it. So anyone who has learned English probably knows it. But there are still sometimes new words that I’ve never heard before or something like that, where I first have to look, how do you pronounce that? Because you can’t figure it out intuitively. So there are three or four different ways you can probably pronounce it. But that’s a real advantage in German.

Flemming:
Yes, yes, okay. Yes exactly. True. This is also very logical in this respect. But what I also found quite interesting was to return to the topic briefly as a final point, I think. Exactly, the video you did with, what was the title? Something about, “How Hitler destroyed or ruined the reputation of the German language” or something like that.

Feli:
Yes, yes.

Flemming:
Yes, exactly. And I find that so interesting because in the end, you explain it very, very well in the video. Why do we think or why do so many people think that German is so aggressive? Just because you have a lot of comparisons. There are these stupid videos where a lot of people simply pronounce words in German way too aggressively or too loudly, like you said. And you could say the same words very gently and lovingly. And then German would sound like a beautiful language. Just the same, maybe not quite, but almost as beautiful as Italian, I would say.

Feli:
Yes, of course it is simply not incredibly melodic by nature or not quite as melodic as Romance languages, for example. But exactly, it is not as aggressive as it is often seen. And I often have people, including my friend, for example, when he heard me on the phone for the first time, but also other friends, when they hear me speaking German, so really in the conversation, that then afterwards say, “Huh, that was German, it sounded really nice. “So that sounded completely harmless and very loving.” Yes, that they are really surprised afterwards.

Flemming:
Exactly, exactly, that’s why, that’s what I actually mean. That’s why this cliché is just a bit, yeah, just not, it’s just not true, it’s just not right.

Feli:
No, exactly. I also made a video about it, I don’t know if you’ve seen it, but there are these sketches where the Spanish word is said, the English word, the Italian word and then the German word is shouted like that. And I did the opposite once last year. And exactly, I just shouted the other languages or pronounced them ugly and then the German was very sweet.

Flemming:
Very good, I really, really liked it. Yes, exactly, so here’s another clear recommendation for your YouTube channel. So you can definitely learn a lot there. Even if you speak in English, it is still definitely interesting and relevant for every one of my listeners here because you simply learn a lot about German culture. Therefore, a clear recommendation from me.

Feli:
Thank you.

Flemming:
And yes, Feli, I would say, thank you very much, that was a really cool conversation with you. I really had a lot of fun. I learned something myself and I hope and think everyone else here does too. What’s next for you?

Feli:
Yes, thank you for letting me be there.

Flemming:
What’s next for you? What are you doing in the next few years? Are you planning to stay in the USA?

Feli:
Oh. Yes, that’s just the question. Let’s see. So my boyfriend and I would actually like to live in Germany for at least a year. Well, that was the same for him when he met me, that was the first thing. Like “Oh cool, you’re from Germany. Can we move to Europe, please?”

Flemming:
Ah cool, okay!

Feli:
And that’s another point that often Europe is simply perceived as one unit from the USA. Like, “Where are you from? Oh, you’re European, oh well.“ I never really saw myself as a European before. So of course, maybe as an EU citizen, in that sense, but now not culturally as a European. Because of course we know Germany and in Europe, how different Europe is. And that’s not such a cultural unity. From the American perspective, that’s often the case. But exactly, so yes, maybe we’ll do that at some point. But in the long term, as I said before, I have I didn’t really plan it. And I’ll just see where the path takes me, how much longer I want to be on YouTube and what life brings with it. I just wanted to say one more thing: I also have German-language videos my channel. So not many, but a few. So, for example, there’s a video where I talked to my very good friend Josh in English and German. I think that’s called „Our Bilingual Friendship.“ That’s an American , who speaks German completely fluently at a native speaker level. I also do my podcast with him. There’s something German, for example. A few years ago I made a complete video in German with a friend about her first impressions of the USA. So if you look really carefully, you might also find a few German videos for practicing.

Flemming:
Very good. Perfect, perfect. I’ll definitely link the channel in the show notes. Then you can all browse around and see what you find so interesting.

Feli:
Great, thank you.

Flemming:
Exactly, Feli, thank you very much for the conversation. Thank you for being there. And yes, all the best for the future.

Feli:
Thank you too. Thank you too.

Flemming:
Thank you.

Feli:
Bye.

Flemming:
Ciao.

Did you enjoy this episode of German Chatter? Then please help me with a review on Spotify, iTunes or your podcast platform. And of course you can also give it a like on YouTube, or you can also comment on the episode if you have any questions or comments on the topic. And I would be really very interested in what you say or think about this topic, about this comparison between Germany and the USA. It would definitely help me a lot if you rate and comment here. And above all, if you know someone who might be interested in this episode or the podcast, then you are welcome to recommend this podcast to others. Yes, people who are learning German and who are simply interested in topics like today or in language topics in general, please recommend my podcast. That would keep me moving forward. And otherwise, as always, thank you for listening and for tuning in. I hope you’ll join us again next week. Until then, definitely stay healthy. Enjoy life and be grateful for everything you have. See you soon. Take care. Ciao.

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Do you want to continue listening? Here are a few suggestions:

You can find Feli here:

https://www.youtube.com/@FelifromGermany
https://felifromgermany.com/
https://www.instagram.com/felifromgermany/?hl=de