Swiss German Learning

My roommate from stuttgart brought back a DVD of his from switzerland
called Strähl. They call it the pulp-fiction of switzerland, which if
true is sad for the state of movies in the country. What was fantastic
about it thought, was the movie was in Zürich and everyone spoke
Schwyzerdütsch to such an extent the movie has subtitles so german
viewers can understand. It was also about drugs so I learned how to
saw drug addict (der Fixer), stupid cow (blöde sau), and if you use
the informal 'you' with police officers they will probably beat you
with their sticks. I also have been able to practice my german with
him where our conversations are an awkward mix of german and english
since he wants to practice his english, but they are still greatly
beneficial and I feel my german coming along but it is still a bit
slower than I would like.
As for more social things I have done, monday night the residents of
BASF Guest House had a get together where someone cooked enchiladas
from food found at the US Army Base grocery store (they dont have
essentials like corn tortillas in germany) and another person made
pancakes that we ate with butter-like whipcream and fruit. It was
delicious, I will defintely need to improve my cooking skills beyond
sandwhich based food and pasta. All the people from america have been
really great to hang out with and one of the guys from new mexico not
only had seen my shoes before, but had a pair himself, so naturally we
will be doing everything together from now on. I cant emphasize enough
how much better everything is with other interns and english speakers
here. I'd almost have to say I am more social here than at school
because at school I had real responsibilities and such.
Last night, wednesday, was the weekly stamtisch (all the interns at
basf go to some place in ludwigshafen or mannheim). This is probably
my favorite event of the week because there are people at this event
from all over and only the people who want to meet other people show
up so it works out really nicely. I had a wonderful moment of
realization when the people on my left were speaking german, my right
were speaking french and the girl sitting across from me was
german/belgien but studied in scotland so spoke english in all
likelyhood better than myself. I also have to admit the french accent
is by far my favorite. 'ave uuh seen ze move with vill smish (have you
seen the movie with will smith) she had to say it twice and then say
men in black before my aha moment came. It is also fun explaining
where oregon is. They all seem to have heard of our state but believe
it is somewhere in the middle of the country, so I usually resort to
north of san francisco, to which one of the other iterns from socal
was like what the hell are you talking about north of sf, like way way
way north. I also had my first interaction with the french girls next
to me because I was explaining my favorite french city (ville) to
someone else. Moncul is the name of the city but Mon cu means my anus
in slightly more vile terms. One of the girls was from Lyon which is
right next to it so understood which is good so they dont think I am
just a dumb vile american.
I also learned europeans seem to be quite fond of facebook, but only
use MSN messenger.