1. Introduction
Welcome to this episode of the Better German Podcast. It is Episode number 10, and it’s the second part, or the part two of greeting and introducing. So, if you haven’t listened to the last episode, I highly recommend listening to this one first, particularly if you’re a beginner. Because in that episode, we basically cover all the words used in this episode, the German words used, and in this episode, I’m going through a couple of phrases, but I’m not going into the meanings of the individual words anymore.
2. Get the PDF & Show Notes
[00:00:56] So greeting and introducing, obviously, is an important thing.
[00:00:59] If you haven’t already, definitely download the PDF with all the words used and, the sentences, and the translations of the sentences. You will find the link in the show notes.
[00:01:13] If you can’t find the show notes, right where you’re listening to the podcast, you can find them at bettergerman.info/10. So bettergerman.info is my homepage. bettergerman.info/10 will bring you to the show notes of this podcast episode, and there, you will also find the link to the downloadable PDF. Definitely go and get it because it will help you practice these words and sentences.
3. Practicing German Phrases
[00:01:47] So here are the sentences.
[00:02:00] First, I’m always saying the German sentence and then I’ll say the English Sentence, and for some of them I’m going to give you some additional information.
“Mein Name ist Susi.”
“My name is Susi.”
“Mein Name ist Susanne Schilk-Blümel.”
“My name is Susanne Schilk-Blümel.”
“Ich heiße Susi.”
That is just another way of saying the same thing. Literally means “I’m called Susi.” It’s probably a little less formal than mine and therefore more used when you speak.
“Ich bin 40 Jahre alt.”
“I am 40 years old.”
“Ich bin aus Wien.”
“I am from Vienna.”
“Ich bin aus Österreich.”
“I am from Austria.”
“Ich lebe in Wien.”
“I live in Vienna.”
“Wie ist dein Name?”
“What is your name?”
“Wie ist Ihr Name?”
“What is your name?” [formal]
“Wie heißt du?”
[00:03:17] “What is your name?” Or “What are you called?” So that’s the same thing as above. We have these two versions of how we can say somebody’s name. We can either say, “Mein Name ist,” “My name is..” or “I’m called,” and these are the two versions. So we have them both in the statement and also in the questions, of course.
“Wie heißen Sie?”
“What is your name?” [formal] or “What are you called?” (formal)
“Schön, dich kennenzulernen.”
“Nice to meet you.”
“Schön, Sie kennenzulernen.”
“Nice to meet you.” [formal].
“Freut mich, dich kennenzulernen.”
“I am happy to meet you.”
“Freut mich, Sie kennenzulernen.”
“I am happy to meet you.” [formal]
“Freut mich!”
[00:04:30] “I am happy [ to meet you].”
So here, instead of saying the whole sentence, which would be, “I’m happy to meet you,” we just leave the second part out, and we basically would just say, “I’m happy,” and we mean “I’m happy to meet you.”
4. Common German Greetings
[00:04:52] “Guten Morgen.”
“Good Morning!”
“Guten Tag.”
Greeting for pretty much any time during the day.
“Guten Abend.”
“Good Evening.”
“Gute Nacht.”
“Good Night.”
[00:05:12] So instead of all of the last three, basically “Good morning, Good evening, Good night.” We can just leave the first word out so we can just instead of “good morning” in German, just say “morning.” I think, I think we can do that in English as well. “Evening. Night.” That’s quite usual, actually. So if you just hear “Morgen”, then it means “Good morning.”
5. German Cultural Greetings & Farewells
[00:05:44] “Mahlzeit.”
“Bon Appétit” is a greeting used around lunchtime. So this one’s kind of funny because first of all, maybe you’re not familiar with the phrase “Bon Appétit,” because it’s actually a French phrase, and it’s a greeting, you sit down to eat, and you wish somebody a good meal. It’s like “Have a good meal”. I haven’t found one word in English that means the same thing, which I think is very interesting.
So I’ve heard many people actually use “Bon Appétit”, which is the same thing in French. It means “Good appetite” in French. So, we use “Mahlzeit.” “Mahlzeit” literally is a meal. So when we sit down, we have a thing that we say, and that is “Mahlzeit.” And that means literally “meal,” but it really means “have a good meal” or “may this food taste you well” or something like that. And also, we have expanded this to not just use it when we sit down, but to use it for a general greeting around noon. So if you meet someone at noon, at 12 o’clock, it is very usual to greet or be greeted with “Mahlzeit.” And in that case, it doesn’t have anything to do with eating,
It’s just a greeting that we use around that time of day. So it’s not an invitation for you to eat, it’s just the greeting that we say around that time, like we say, “Good evening,” in the evening.
[00:07:33] “Grüß Gott.”
Literally “greet god“ – a greeting for any time of the day. So I think there’s a tendency for this greeting to become less used than it used to be, but it is still used very much. And it’s also a very general greeting that literally means “Greet God.” For most people, it’s not really a religious thing, it’s just a phrase that people use now, but obviously it has originally, a religious background
“Auf Wiedersehen.”
“Goodbye.”
So this one is a very general term that is used anywhere in Austria, Germany, and Switzerland, and it’s kind of like the standard German term for saying goodbye.
6. Austrian Farewell Phrases
[00:08:38] However, I am Austrian, so I do want to add two phrases that are really very, very Austrian, and the first one is
“Servus.”
“Bye-bye.”
So “Servus” or maybe even “Servas” is a very Austrian phrase. And it comes from Latin; however, interesting enough, “Servus” in Latin is “a slave.” And the idea is saying “I’m your slave,” which is a super friendly, originally, term of saying “I’m at your service.” And in that way, it’s probably more usual in English. “At your service.” So in Austrian German, it has become. very casual and very usual phrase.
And I’m sure even many Austrians don’t know, and certainly don’t think of where it actually originally comes from, and they will just say “Servus”, “Servas.” You can say it both for saying “hello” and saying “goodbye,” actually.
And the next one is,
“Baba”
“Bye-bye.”
This is a very, very typically Viennese one, “Baba,” and this is used only for saying goodbye. “Servus” can be used anywhere in Austria, pretty much.
“Tschüß.”
“Bye-bye.”
Now, “Tschüß” used to be considered a very German informal way of saying “bye-bye.” However, it is used more and more also in Austria. Some people will still think it’s more of a German way of saying goodbye.
7. Practice Session: Repeat After Me
[00:10:31] So now I’m going to see these phrases again, and I want you to repeat them for practice. So I’ll say the German Sentence first, and you repeat it. And then I’ll see the English translation, and you repeat it.
“Mein Name ist Susi.”
“My name is Susi.”
“Mein Name ist Susanne Schilk-Blümel.“
“My name is Susanne Schilk-Blümel.”
“Ich heiße Susi.”
“I’m called Susi.”
“Ich bin 40 Jahre alt.”
“I am 40 years old.”
“Ich bin aus Wien.”
“I am from Vienna.”
“Ich bin aus Österreich.“
“I am from Austria.”
“Ich lebe in Wien.”
“I live in Vienna.”
“Wie ist dein Name?”
“What is your name?”
“Wie ist Ihr Name?”
“What is your name?” [formal]
“Wie heißt du?”
“What is your name?” or “What are you called?”
“Wie heißen Sie?“
“What is your name?” [formal] or “What are you called?” (formal)
“Schön, dich kennenzulernen.”
“Nice to meet you.”
“Schön, Sie kennenzulernen.”
“Nice to meet you?” [ formal]
“Freut mich, dich kennenzulernen.”
“I am happy to meet you.”
“Freut mich, Sie kennenzulernen.”
“I am happy to meet you.” [formal]
“Freut mich!”
“I am happy.” [ to meet you]
“Guten Morgen.”
“Good Morning!”
“Guten Tag.”
Greeting for pretty much any time during the day.
“Guten Abend.”
“Good Evening.”
“Gute Nacht.”
“Good Night.”
“Mahlzeit.”
[00:14:06] “Bon appétit,” and a greeting used around lunchtime.
“Grüß Gott.”
Literally “Greet god“ – a greeting for any time of the day.
“Auf Wiedersehen.”
“Goodbye.”
“Servus.”
“Bye-bye.”
“Baba.“
“Bye-bye.”
“Tschüß.”
“Bye-bye.”
8. Conclusion and Further Learning Opportunities
[00:14:44] Thank you for listening to this episode. You can find a transcript of this episode at www.bettergerman.info/ and then the number of the episode. You can also sign up for a newsletter there, and then you will be informed when there is a new episode coming or any other important events going on, new articles, new freebies, or things like that.
If you liked it and it was helpful for you, please share it with other people and let them know that this exists. And if you are looking for a course and you want to learn German online, then you can, of course, find all the infos as well on www.bettergerman.info.
So, see you there and see you in the next episode.
Bye-bye!
