Grüß Gott!

[Wynfrith]

Wild Bill best way to learn is to keep quiet. That's what the old timers taught me anyway.

Hey Robert, it's good to be here.

Sona is right Black Dog that it is not the old high, which would be expected when I speak since Texas-German is old mixed with English for loan words. That is what makes it different from the Penn-Dutch. I could confuse an Amish speaker while we both confuse a German and everybody else would be scratching their heads.

I use moin on occasion myself. I always thought it was a Frysk word for morning. Good to learn something new, and least I never said good moin. Boy would I look stupid.

[Jazznow]

So after all I found a forum for leatherwork and linguistics.

Moin is indeed used in areas with frysk heritage and I think I read somewhere that the word has frysk roots. But I'm not sure what it's translation to high German is. I used it all day and night too when I still lived in northern Germany.

[Sona]

Hahaha, right you are Jazz XD

As the northern germany (so called "Schleswig-Holstein") is the on of the german "lands" (like state, just don´t kow, whether it´s really the correct word for it in english) with the most still spoken languages (! - not slangs) over time there might be a lot just mixed up. So there are frysk, danish, "platt"(-german), high german and romanes, which is like a language from roma and sinti, plus a lot of different slangs.
That might sound like a lot, but actually... even if they are still spoken, every single one might be used by just a minority and a lot of people wouldn´t understand it. But it mighth explain the origins of some words

[Black Dogg]

Oh wow.... did I ever open a can of worms here .

I apologize for hijacking your welcome thread, Wynfrith.

Sona, while I lived in Germany until I was 19, I never really travelled much farhter north than Stuttgart, so I guess I was kind of overgeneralizing.

I think it was Mark Twain who said "It's better to be quiet and have people assume you're a fool, than to open your mouth and assure them of it." That would apply to my post above. On the other hand I learned something new again , never too late for that!

[Sona]

No problem Black Dogg,
and I still don´t think of you as a fool, just because you don´t know everything of the german language ^^. I travelled south to bavaria when I was 22 and I have to admit, that I learned a lot about our language.... and about how you can "bend" it ^^.
If you never travelled farther north than stuttgart, than you´ve really been just in the south, but that´s no problem at all ^^.
I mean, I got two brothers, each of them speaks like... 5.6 languages and both have lived in america for one year (student exchange, one moved again to the USA and lives in washington D.C right now), but one lived in Texas and the other one in Maine. So tell me who might know more about "the americans" and who might be right about "the american way of life" and stuff? I am just happy that I am able to communicate in english on platforms like this (and I hope I don´t make to many mistakes *g*), And as nobody is argueing about this topic there isn´t any problem at all, maybe just interest ^^

[NVLeatherWorx]

Welcome aboard.

Regarding all of the German lessons going on here, I thought I had learned it all after being stationed there for over 14 years. We all learned the proper German versions but being stationed in Nuernberg (I don't give it the traditional American screw up of Nuremburg that everyone else does) we spent most of our time either using the Bayerisch (Bavarian) or Mittel Fraenkisch (Middle Franconia) slang as it sounded much better to us. Wish I could get back there because I miss it so much.

This forum is a treasure trove of information so soak it all up and put it to good use.

[Jimbob]

OK, I wanna set this straight...Where I come from they say: Wia goats au...or Hanno, Griass de Goddle....gell !!

So, clearly this Gruess Gott must be somewhere far far away from all REAL German language...remember...If you are NOT from Stuttgart....you are just not a Schwoab !!

And yes, Hello to the Newbie and Greetings from SW Virginia....

As we would say over here...: How 'ya..

Ok, Now back to the leather stuff....

Jimbob

[Sona]

Yay, Jimbob you just made my day ^^.
All in all it´s very interesting, how many of you guys lived in germany for a while ^^.
But you might be just right:

back to the leather stuff (even if this topic is quite amusing ^^)

[Black Dogg]

Jimbob,

you must have lived really close to where I'm from. Around Ulm we used to say "Wia gad's dr?" or "Griass Godd".

And yes, Schwaebisch is the REAL German language!!

[Wynfrith]

As long as we are all learning.