Is there still a German Thread?

[BeatrixBurgund]

We've moved back to Germany after 8 years in Switzerland and Scotland, and with the kids in school, I just know I'm going to have lots of questions about the Bavarian education system.

And I'd love to catch up with all the folk I used to chat with (even if I can't remember their usernames!). I'm on a namechange - it's MmeLindor here!

Hi everyone, thought I'd butt in to get the Austrian numbers up!

I'm in Vienna, been here over 20 years and feeling quite institutionalised

Don't get me started on those backpacks 5more! The are brilliantly reflective, but make kids look like little turtles the French have those ergonomic back packs too, do the Dutch? Why haven't they caught on in the UK? Gaaaaa! On second thoughts maybe it's better if they stay firmly on the continent.

Welcome naservus, grüß dich

I like the backpacks... Don't like buying all the stationery though due to the absolute hassle and fussyness of it as much as the expense. How do teachers take themselves seriously getting so obsessed with the tiny details of their pupils' pencils, sharpeners, plastic exercise book covers and the blimin thousand different slight variations of exercise book...

Just also waving as DP wants us to move to Germany part time at some point if not full time. We were there a few weeks ago and I've been satisfying myself with looking at house prices where we would potentially like to live... (Niedersachsen). Ironically my German is better than his. We would both like to do the B1; I did an online test that said I was already B1 level which I think is optimistic yet a bit encouraging as clearly I can't be that terrible!

The main things I'm interested in knowing is about working out there and also having children. We have none yet but how does the maternity system work out there?

With Brexit it might all be a pipe dream but we've both got internationally transferable skills so hopefully not.

I've been enjoying reading everyone's experiences. Bloody love Germany, even though I'm a proper home bird and never thought I'd contemplate moving away I could see myself there for extended periods of time somehow.

Hi, hope it's OK if I post in here? I'm not in Germany but DH is German and we go to Hamburg to stay with family, once or twice a year.

My question is - is lemon curd a thing in Germany? As in, can you buy it easily in the shops there, is it well known? I ask because I like to take my MIL small gifts, usually foodie things, perhaps some home made cake or biscuits that I think will survive the journey. I was eating lemon curd today and thought it was just the kind of thing that MIL would love. I though I could buy a nice jar of posh lemon curd to take over, but it might look weird if it's an everyday item in the supermarket! To me, it's quite a 'British' thing, but no idea if I'm right or not.

Apologies for the odd question- I asked DH but he hasn't a clue as he's not lived there for 34 years!

Roy you certainly can't normally buy lemon curd in my area of Bavaria (Aldi or Lidl once had it for British week) but things can be regional so I'd hesitate to answer for Hanover.

Thanks for the reply! Sounds like it is definitely seen as a British thing (and I had no idea Lidl did a British week in Germany), so I think I will buy some (PILs love getting 'British' gifts) and make some shortbread. Thanks again.

hi curiousOwl - I looked up that B1 test and did it (with some assistance from DS2 - A level German) and got 12 out of 20, 60%. The final answer, though, I think is wrong;

our answer: A - (Mit großer Interesse habe ich
ihre Anzeige in der Zeitung gelesen.)
Wrong!
The right answer is: B (Mit großem Interesse habe ich
Ihre Anzeige in der Zeitung gelesen.)

we chose 'Mit großer Interesse' as Interesse would be feminine, therefore taking Dativ - Der. The ending Dem would suppose Interesse to be Masc or Neuter.

Wouldn't it?

In fact, a lot of the 'pick the right answer' questions I think could actually have 2 or 3 'right answers', depending on future or present tense.

this is the one I did.

Hello all,

It's been ages since I posted - just wanted to wave back to AuldHeathen if you're still lurking!

ptumbi It's actually das Interesse (Interesse is one of the few nouns ending in -e that isn't feminine), which is why it should be "Mit großem Interesse". I'd be surprised if a question could have two or three right answers but haven't looked at the one you did, so am willing to be corrected.

Hello NaServus - there are hardly any posters in Austria on the thread, and then two who've been in Vienna for around 20 years come along at once (OK, within a few months of each other )! Am assuming you're quite settled here, then?

We've just got back from a few days away in Prague - driven to desperate measures by the M&S stores in Bratislava closing. I think the Czech Republic is one of the few countries outside the UK where M&S is staying open; unfortunately, it's just a little too far for a day trip... it was a lovely short break, though.

Hi Linzer - I assumed Interesse was feminine because of the -e, and when I GoogleTranslated it, it came up with DIE Interesse. As a neuter noun it makes sense to use the dem/grossem. Thanks.
The question with a few answers - things like 'he has left the car in the auto repairers' or 'he had left the car in the auto repairers' - type of thing. Which is correct? Both of them...I think anyway.

I love Prague! My bestfriend is Czech and I've stayed in some lovely places in CZ. Shame M&S is closing - can you get stuff sent online?

Ah, Google Translate's grammar isn't always perfect (to put it mildly!) - it should definitely be das Interesse. I've just done the test, anyway; as far as I could tell, only one answer was ever correct but there were a couple where you could get away with an alternative (I would always say Nachdem er geduscht hatte or Weil sie ihre Arbeit erledigt hatte, for example, but according to DH you could use hat instead of hatte "umgangssprachlich"). With the Werkstatt question, however, hat sein Auto reparieren lassen is the only correct answer.

We can only buy clothes from M&S online but hardly ever do so as DH is the usually only one who buys clothes from there and prefers to see what he's buying in "real life". A big new M&S has just opened where my parents live but I'll probably still stock up on food at one of the cheaper supermarkets there. We still have a Tesco within driving distance but they don't have very much in the way of British food - and never anything I actually want.

Oh, and with question 3 as well, du brauchst ... zu .... is correct but you very often hear people (at least in Austria) drop the zu, i.e. they'd say du brauchst mir das Buch nicht zurückgeben. Bräuchte, würde etc. seem to be used more here than in Germany (or maybe I just didn't notice them being used in Germany) - it's quite common here to say ich bräuchte, for example; ich brauche sounds a little too direct. But I won't go off on an Austrian vs. German German tangent.

Thanks Linzer - the werkstatt one was only that I could remember for example, not that that particular question was wrong, IYSWIM. Anyway, I think I'll have to muddle along - I'm hoping I will still be understood if I say Ich gab ihm es rather than Ich gab es Ihm (or whatever)
So did you get 100%??

Not wanting to boast or anything, but yes, I did. But I do have a degree in German, work with languages and have spent many more years of my adult life in German-speaking countries than in English-speaking ones, so don't have much of an excuse for making mistakes.

I can't imagine anyone not understanding ich gab ihm es - most mistakes won't affect meaning and you just have to remember that most people are trying to understand you rather than listening out for mistakes. One mistake I do hear myself making fairly often is using "es" for anything that I would call "it" in English, even if it's a masculine or feminine noun in German - it's a habit I can't seem to get out of, especially when I'm speaking to DH (who I make less of an effort with ).

I think I'd probably do the same Linzer - use es for almost everything!

I think it would take me ages to learn which nouns are masc/fem anyway; there doesn't seem to be a logical reason why a microwave is (err) neuter. Who decides? And why?

I'm sure there's a historical reason for it ptumbi, but I couldn't tell you what it is. I read somewhere that 70% of nouns are masculine, so unless it's obviously a feminine noun (e.g. ending in -ung, -heit, -keit, etc.), it's safest to guess masculine. Or just mumble/speak very quickly. My other standby, if DH corrects me, is to tell him that that's how it's said in Germany - das Teller and der Butter sound completely wrong to me, for example, but are used here.

In theory, you're supposed to learn the gender of nouns when you learn the noun itself but it doesn't always work out in practice - easy(ish) to do if you're learning a list of vocab, not quite as straightforward if you're picking up words outside a classroom environment.

Thanks Linzer.

Can I ask about the new Green Stickers' for cars? I looked into it before I drove over earlier, and found a site online which charges 30Euro to do it for you, which i thought a bit steep. However, my friend at work is driving through France in the holidays and has applied for their green emissions sticker (which she needs for Paris, Lyon and Grenoble) and she was charged about 4Euro. The sticker seems very similar to the German one; round, green, with the number plate through it. Except for it being in French, I couldn't see any difference to the German ones - so, if I had a French Grun Plackett', could I drive into German Cities? And if you have one for Germany, I assume you could take your car through Paris' congestion zone??

ptumbi my parents looked into that a lot as well as they needed one for their car and one for their motor home and ended up getting them from the Berlin Stadt website as they only cost €6, by far the cheapest offer!
Here is a link
www.berlin.de/labo/mobilitaet/kfz-zulassung/feinstaubplakette/shop.86595.en.php

Hope that helps!

Hi all!

Things not moving much at the moment with our move to Munich, waiting on a tax consultation but we will definitely be out there for the summer once we've signed on the dotted line.

Can I ask some boring household questions about renting and bills? We will soon know what our take home is but if you guys can help that would be great!

Do cold rents include water rates or is that separate? Is there some form of council tax like we pay in the UK?

What general monthly expenses are there to consider, gas / electricity, internet & phone? Do you need things like contents insurance - I've seen about personal liability insurances.

Cars - insurance and tax, is it similar cost to the UK?

I'm sure there are things that I've missed but any help anyone can give would be awesome!

Thanks 😀

Hi all!
I've considered starting a new thread before I came across this one. Hoping for some thoughts / success stories to help me decide.

We're in SouthLondon at the moment but discussing a job opportunity in Nurnberg where my husband is from.
We have 2 kids, the older one is due to start school in September.
I don't have much family in the UK, apart from my mum and a sibling, but I'm worried about uprooting the kids.but we are also quite concerned with Brexit and the quality of life here in the coming years.
I don't really speak German and being closest to 40 years old I worry that I won't be able to cope with everything. Part of me feels like just jumping in and giving it a go but I worry that's careless (somehow).

Any thoughts, advice much appreciated.

Schlobbob the cold rent is just the rent itself. All other charges you have to carry as a tenant are included in the Nebenkosten. These are estimated and fixed per month then once the landlord gets all the bills in and calculates how much you really owe over a twelve month period you either get a rebate from them or have to pay a bit extra. Things like water rates, ground tax, rubbish collection, cable, gardening costs, winter service for snow clearing etc, electricity in common areas are included in the Nebenkosten. Sometimes heating is included but sometimes you have to pay that direct to the gas/electric company. Electricity is generally not included.

I find electricity costs pretty high, we pay €60 a month although our usage is below average according to the calculator on the provider's website. We have a combined broadband, tv & landline package which is €40 per month and includes HD channels and some English language channels, international news channels etc. It's pretty easy to get a kodi box though and then you can use the film.on app to watch live British tv if you want.

I find car insurance quite high, but it depends on your no claims bonus which is a percentage over here. You should be able to transfer your no claims bonus from the uk over here though so it's worth looking into that.

Public liability insurance is really important and it's cheap enough, you can get a family package as well. We don't have contents insurance as it was really expensive when we looked into it, but it's on my to-do list to have another look at!

Hope that helps!

Thanks Welshcake! V helpful.

Hi Welshcake, thank you very much for that - incredibly helpful!

Grüss Euch, Tea and Linzer

Yes, married to a local with DC at Volksschule so firmly rooted and unlikely to be leaving any time soon! Like Linzer I've spent pretty much all my working life in German-speaking countries - Austria and Switzerland though, not Germany.

I can't seem to produce a scharfes 's', ho hum.