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PZ Myers is a biologist and associate professor at the University of Minnesota, Morris.
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« Charles Darwin vs. a giant squid | Main | Everybody must say "Happy Birthday" to Patricia, OM! »

My inner German awakens!

Category: Personal
Posted on: July 4, 2009 2:45 PM, by PZ Myers

Gruss Gott! Schweinebraten mit hausgemachten Spätzle, und zwei Leibinger hefeweizen dunkel. Ausgezeichnet!

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Comments

Posted by: eNeMeE | July 4, 2009 2:51 PM

So, you're actually a robot operated by German midget who's been asleep?

...maybe I should consult a fish.

Posted by: Chris Davis | July 4, 2009 2:56 PM

Yes, I used to think that, too. But Ray Comfort set me straight.

Posted by: Mike | July 4, 2009 2:58 PM

OT: I came across this via http://cad-comic.com and thought the horde might like to send a muscular dystrophy afflictee to a beach house.

http://blog.homeaway.com/node/534

Costs but a click.

Posted by: blf | July 4, 2009 2:58 PM

Damnit Pee Zed, now I'm hungry.

Posted by: Pat | July 4, 2009 3:00 PM

Sounds delicious. Especially the Dunkel.

Posted by: Michael | July 4, 2009 3:00 PM

I studied german, I should know what the hell that means....but I don't...

ahh the joys of ever-pressing age, the memory is the first thing to go you know?

And I'm only 28...:p

Posted by: Savonarola | July 4, 2009 3:05 PM

Wow, PZ, that must have been the biggest sneeze ever. Gesundheit!

Posted by: Dustin | July 4, 2009 3:06 PM

Well, I know that the ale sounds pretty good. I'm going to guess that the rest is a pork dinner?

Posted by: Kawa | July 4, 2009 3:06 PM

"Gruss Gott"? Who are you and what've you done to Doc?

#10

Posted by: Brian | July 4, 2009 3:09 PM

Zwei? Drei, bitte; ein für mich!

#11

Posted by: Otto | July 4, 2009 3:09 PM

Grüß Gott!
Proper reply:
Wenn du ihn siehst

#12

Posted by: Kawa | July 4, 2009 3:11 PM

#11: Proper reply indeed, if I read that correctly.

#13

Posted by: 'Tis Himself | July 4, 2009 3:11 PM

Your hovercraft is full of what?

#14

Posted by: Otto | July 4, 2009 3:13 PM

Kawa, you seem to read it right.

#15

Posted by: Canuck | July 4, 2009 3:13 PM

I had a longer comment, but it got deleted by accident. I'd change the choice from pork to venison. The venison is excellent. I had a meal of Spätzle with venison and a sour cherry sauce in Germany that was one of the most memorable meals in my 52 year old brain. The hefeweizen dunkel is also good, but your capitalization is messed up. I know they changed the standards since I lived there, but you capitalized the adjective, and have the word order wrong. The Hefeweizen is the thing that needs the capital letter. Dunkel is the adjective "dark" that goes in front of it. Seems like you were getting some kind of influence from French.

In any case, I'm glad you liked the cuisine. I have such memories of the two years I spent there.

#16

Posted by: Monika | July 4, 2009 3:13 PM

*dipping cursor in red ink* It's Hefeweizen.

Oh and I'm not sure if you want to use "Grüß Gott" as a salutation, PZ ;-)
Perhaps you should visit northern Germany and not just the southern parts. You can use "Moin" as a greeting in Norddeutschland at any time of the day.

#17

Posted by: Wildflower | July 4, 2009 3:18 PM

@PZ

Haha, enjoy your meal. It's yummy indeed.

@Monika

Moin moin! Well, I guess it might not be appropriate in southern Germany (to those that don't know: there are ~ 1000 German dialects :P) but "Servus" should be just fine.

#18

Posted by: Chris Shea | July 4, 2009 3:19 PM

babelfish translator says:

greeting God! Pig roast with house-made Spätzle, and two Leibinger yeast wheat darkly. Distinguished!

#19

Posted by: (((Billy))) The Atheist | July 4, 2009 3:21 PM

Bise mich!

#20

Posted by: Kawa | July 4, 2009 3:21 PM

#18: Y'see? That's not something you'd expect PZ to say!

#21

Posted by: Otto | July 4, 2009 3:22 PM

Hefeweizen Dunkel is quite proper:
http://www.beerpal.com/Paulaner-Hefeweizen-Dunkel-Beer/4129/

#22

Posted by: blf | July 4, 2009 3:24 PM

Damnit Pee Zed, now I'm hungry.

Ok, fixed, at least for the moment. Some gratin dauphinoise and red wine, albeit no bacon.

#23

Posted by: The Tim Channel | July 4, 2009 3:24 PM

I will be making a permanent move to Germany in about seven weeks. Good to know it's PZ approved.

Enjoy.

#24

Posted by: Naked Bunny with a Whip | July 4, 2009 3:26 PM

So no rabbit? Good.

#25

Posted by: Patricia, OM | July 4, 2009 3:32 PM

Waah, it's my birthday and all I'm having is BBQ and a cherry tart.
Enjoy your dinner PZ!

#26

Posted by: halcy | July 4, 2009 3:33 PM

JAWOLL!

#27

Posted by: Otto | July 4, 2009 3:39 PM

Hello Bunny #24
http://recipes.epicurean.com/recipe/18731/hasenpfeffer-(german-rabbit-stew).html
It is delicious!

#28

Posted by: AlgaeGirl | July 4, 2009 3:39 PM

Replace that pork with something veggie friendly and it sounds delish! Especially the dark hefe (my fav!)!!!

#29

Posted by: blf | July 4, 2009 3:45 PM

So no rabbit? Good.

There was a tasty-looking lapin in the boucherie. It was not, however, singing, dancing, or using its whip. In fact, it looked a bit gutted.

#30

Posted by: Naked Bunny with a Whip | July 4, 2009 3:45 PM

@Otto: We live for the Stew, we die for the Stew.

#31

Posted by: AnneH | July 4, 2009 3:46 PM

I prefer Google's translator to Babelfish.
"Gruss Gott! Roast pork with homemade noodles, and two Leibinger Hefeweizen dark. Excellent!"

http://translate.google.com/translate_t?hl=en#

#32

Posted by: Naked Bunny with a Whip | July 4, 2009 3:55 PM

@blf: So more of a goth rabbit.

#33

Posted by: Wildflower | July 4, 2009 3:56 PM

@AlgaeGirl

Depending on the reason for being a vegetarian (is that called flexitarianism? If so, that's what I am.) pork might even be alright. The better restaurants still (luckily!) have their own animal husbandry here or get their meat from the local hunter. Got both farmers and one hunter in the family (uncles and aunts) where I get my meat from and I know that the animals did have a decent life... in which case I consider their suffering even less than if a wild wolf or so would've gotten them.

On the downside, the situation in regular grocery stores or chain-restaurants is pretty bad. I never buy meat products there.

#34

Posted by: Otto | July 4, 2009 4:03 PM

Bunny #30:
"We live for the Stew, we die for the Stew."

That's the spirit!

#35

Posted by: blf | July 4, 2009 4:05 PM

Goth rabbit? Possibly. But I thought even those still tend to have their insides, skin, and not lay around looking dead with a price tag tied around its neck.

Hum… No skin… Naked Bunny… were you in France yesterday evening?

#36

Posted by: Naked Bunny with a Whip | July 4, 2009 4:10 PM

@blf: Well, some goth bunnies overdo it, y'know?

No skin…

I try not to be that naked!

#37

Posted by: tony | July 4, 2009 4:12 PM

Ahh, lecker Schweinewasser

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAaaAVJr9zg

#38

Posted by: Canuck | July 4, 2009 4:16 PM

That Babelfish translation was really bad. Machine translation will never be as good as people. Even my mediocre German is better than the crap the computers serve up. Computers lack any sense of context, and since there's no such thing as verbatim translation, they fail. Learn a second language. Or third. It's fun.

Okay. Off to finish dinner preparations. The wife is due home in 45 minutes, and I'm nearly ready. She might not be happy that I drank all of the gin & tonic, but the food will be good. :-)

#39

Posted by: tony | July 4, 2009 4:17 PM

Ahh, lecker Schweinewasser

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAaaAVJr9zg

#40

Posted by: JSW | July 4, 2009 4:22 PM

Wenn ist das Nunstruck git und Slotermeyer? Ja!... Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput!

#41

Posted by: blf | July 4, 2009 4:24 PM

No skin…
I try not to be that naked!

There goes another erotic dream. Sigh. Back to the frothing monks and oversized gastropod.

#42

Posted by: Sili | July 4, 2009 4:25 PM

Prost!

(Møjn-møjn, Monika.)

#43

Posted by: James F | July 4, 2009 4:35 PM

Alles klar, Herr Kommissar?

#44

Posted by: Geoff | July 4, 2009 5:01 PM

Ah! So It Came from the Kitchen in German.

Cool. Hope you liked the recipes PZ. There's German in there somewhere.

#45

Posted by: Tom S. Fox | July 4, 2009 5:12 PM

@Canuck: Not quite. Since "Leibinger" is an adjective that is derived from a geographical name ending in -er, it gets capitalized. And "dunkel" in this case is an apposition and goes behind the noun. But you are right in that "Hefeweizen" should be capitalized, too.

#46

Posted by: Abbie | July 4, 2009 5:13 PM

That Babelfish translation was really bad. Machine translation will never be as good as people.

I'm of the opinion that machine translation is utterly impossible- until we create a full AI. (And then it wouldn't be machine translation, I guess.) Language is simply too context-dependent, and too intertwined with our general intelligence.

#47

Posted by: Tommy Traddles | July 4, 2009 5:17 PM

"Ausgezeichnet!"

OK, just as long as no one called you "fotzenleche"

#48

Posted by: Tommy Traddles | July 4, 2009 5:32 PM

"OK, just as long as no one called you "fotzenleche"

That may be a "k" not an "h".

I never saw it written down!

An old German chef I worked for used to call me that all the time. I thought it was a compliment. Maybe it is ;-)

#49

Posted by: catta | July 4, 2009 5:37 PM

As a German of the Prussian persuasion (i.e. non-Bavarian), I must say the best reply to "Grüß Gott" is: "Wenn ich ihn mal treffe". Bit difficult to translate, but it helps with making enemies all over Bavaria! (No offense, southern Germans: I still love you guys, honest!)

[For those interested, it's a pun on the similarity between the greeting meaning, roughly, "a greeting with god's blessing" and the phrase "give my regards to (person)". Hence "yeah, I'll say hi to god if I come across him."]

#50

Posted by: Happy Tentacles | July 4, 2009 5:54 PM

Memories of the German O-level I took in 1979 translate it as a home-made pork something-or-other, along with that fabulous dark German beer that never seems to get exported to the UK. Sounds delicious! Enjoy!

#51

Posted by: Olorin | July 4, 2009 6:04 PM

I see by your greeting that your inner German is from the south....

#52

Posted by: CryoTank | July 4, 2009 6:16 PM

Ugh, I hate this "Grüß Gott" thing. I usually say "Guten Tag" (Good day) or just "Tag". But in certain regions of Bavaria or here in Austria people will look at you as if you were some kind of alien ;-)
Ah, ein Weißbier wäre jetzt lecker :)

#53

Posted by: Wildflower | July 4, 2009 6:21 PM

@HappyTentacles

That's the "downside" of the "Reinheitsgebot" (German beer purity law from the 15th century). Beer may only contain certain ingredients (water, barley, hops, wheat malt, yeast), which means only the brewing process and hops can be used to prolong the shelf-time and consequently many types of beer simply can't be exported and are available only locally even within Germany.

Oh, if you ever make it into the Münsterland, try Potts Landbier. Yummy! :)

I wrote downside in quotes since that's of course also the reason that so many different beers exist in the first place. The law got officially killed by the EU sometime in the 90ies (open market reasons if I remember right since it made the import of most foreign beers illegal) I believe, but most breweries still "follow" it.

#54

Posted by: Jadehawk, OM | July 4, 2009 6:28 PM

This entire Germany episode has made me sufficiently homesick to actually contemplate switching to ramen-only until christmas, so I can afford a ticket home for the holidays :-p

#55

Posted by: Dutchdoc | July 4, 2009 6:31 PM

Kan dat nou afgelopen zijn met al dat buitenlands hier? Begrijp er geen ruk meer van. En trouwens: ik wil m'n fiets terug. En m'n radio.

So.
There.

#56

Posted by: Jadehawk, OM | July 4, 2009 6:33 PM

Speaking of the Reinheitsgebot:

1)It's no longer officially a law
2)Every damn german beer says "brewed according to the Reinheitsgebot". They're lying :-p
3)Exported german beers lose half their flavor. The Becks in the U.S. is gross.

#57

Posted by: Dutchdoc | July 4, 2009 6:36 PM

"Exported german beers lose half their flavor. The Becks in the U.S. is gross"

Same for imported Heineken! (Not German, but STILL doesn't taste like REAL Heineken)

#58

Posted by: 'Tis Himself | July 4, 2009 6:41 PM

"Exported german beers lose half their flavor. The Becks in the U.S. is gross"

Lager doesn't travel well. British beers and ales are almost as good in North America as they are in Britain.

#59

Posted by: Davo | July 4, 2009 7:03 PM

Babel fish is of little help but funny...

Greeting God! Pig roast with house-made Spätzle, and two Leibinger yeast wheat darkly. Distinguished!

mmmmm Pig roast with house-made Spätzle mmmmm

#60

Posted by: AndreasB | July 4, 2009 7:04 PM

What's the big deal with saying "Grüß Gott" as an atheist? It's just a phrase. Just like atheists saying "god damn it" or "sweet fucking christ" doesn't mean that deep down they believe in some god.

I'm a Bavarian, I'm an atheist, and I say "Grüß Gott" as a greeting, because that's odindamned tradition here. In fact, if it acts as bait to let some godbot make the ridiculous assertion that I really do believe because of a bloody phrase, it's a good justification to point and laugh. I consider that a bonus.

#61

Posted by: Lord Zero | July 4, 2009 7:31 PM

Im waiting for some posts of eficient
german biology.

Wundabar! Sehr gut!

#62

Posted by: recovering catholic | July 4, 2009 7:53 PM

Thought several years ago Germans had decided to get rid of the ess-tset. Glad to see it's still being used!

#63

Posted by: AndreasB | July 4, 2009 8:06 PM

#62: In case you are thinking about the spelling reform, abolishing the ß was one proposal that was never seriously considered as far as I know. However the reform includes an attempt to make the use of ß more consistent and a number of words are now (supposed to be) spelled with 'ss' instead.

#64

Posted by: Joel | July 4, 2009 8:16 PM

Mmmmm, sounds tasty.

#65

Posted by: Gilian | July 4, 2009 8:18 PM

#58 British beers and ales are almost as good in North America as they are in Britain.

Is a bit like dwarf bread for the Pratchett fans I'm sorry to say :)

Where the new colonies have benefited from the imported joined European brewing skills, The UK has valiantly managed to keep their swill up to swill standards.

Just saying :)

#66

Posted by: Gilipollas Caraculo | July 4, 2009 8:56 PM

Mein Luftkissenfahrzeug ist voller Aale.

#67

Posted by: Canuck | July 4, 2009 9:42 PM

Why is "Wenn ich ihn mal treffe" difficult to translate? Seems to be "If I meet him sometime" or "If I actually meet him", or "If I once meet him", any of which gets the sense of it across. English is my mother tongue, then I learned French, then German, but the English rendering of German has always seemed to me the easiest of translations among these three. YMMV, but I've found German to be very precise, and with the huge vocabulary available in English there is nearly always a good translation that captures the sense. Mind you, some words, like "doch", have no equivalent in English, but phrases like "on the contrary" can still render that perfectly well, just not so compactly. Much as I like my computers, I don't think they will, in my lifetime, be very good translators. I just recently re-read "The Unbearable Lightness of Being" and I don't think any machine could have produced what I read from the original Chezk that was written by Kundera. It took a human to produce that compelling work.

#68

Posted by: Stone Age Scientist | July 4, 2009 10:05 PM

Er, Professor, don't you think it's still too early for Oktober??

#69

Posted by: Stone Age Scientist | July 4, 2009 10:07 PM

Er, Professor, don't you think it's still too early for Oktober??

#70

Posted by: Tom S. Fox | July 4, 2009 11:49 PM

Stone Age Scientist, in case you are referring to the oktoberfest, it actually takes place in september.

#71

Posted by: Nicolas Keller | July 5, 2009 2:29 AM

well well, its 8:27 am here in munich. time to get a lovely weißwurstfrühstück. yummi..

#72

Posted by: uncle frogy | July 5, 2009 3:48 AM

machine translations are not very good but lacking an ability to learn foreign languages they do help in understanding some of it but it is kind of like deciphering a code? ;)

sometimes it can be really funny

#73

Posted by: sinned34 | July 5, 2009 4:28 AM

Mmmmm, hefeweizen dunkel! I need to go to the Gasthaus for dinner tomorrow...

#74

Posted by: Stone Age Scientist | July 5, 2009 6:19 AM

Oh, okay, let me rephrase that: Er, Professor, don't you think it's still too early for September??

#75

Posted by: 'Tis Himself | July 5, 2009 6:51 AM

He's avoiding the rush. Drink early, drink often, to paraphrase the Chicago political machine.

#76

Posted by: MadScientist | July 5, 2009 8:23 AM

How do you say "curse god" rather than "praise (greet) god"?

Meine gott ist nicht so gut...

#77

Posted by: Strangel | July 5, 2009 9:33 AM

Mmmm.... hefeweizen.

#78

Posted by: Chuck | July 5, 2009 10:06 AM

PZ - Make sure you don't forget your Fruhschoppen (second breakfast, basically), Weisswurst und Weizenbier! When in Bayern ...

Damn, but I do miss me some Sunday Jaegerbraten mit Spaetzle oder Knoedel!

Na ja, aber wird Ich und die Kraueterhexe in Bayern besuchen in Oktober!

#79

Posted by: Mena | July 5, 2009 12:33 PM

On the topic of machine translations, it does look like Google is better than Babelfish. Just be glad that you are translating European languages. I sometimes have to translate Malay and I have only found one site that will do that and it is horrible.
http://www.stars21.com/translator/malay_to_english.html
Here's an example:
"baru abis belasah satay Kajang. Kenyang!"
apparently means:
"new abyssal wallop Kajang Satay. Full!"
which bears almost no relationship to him eating a lot of Kajang satay. Sometimes Google translating it thorough Indonesian works, but I usually just end up asking for a translation if it isn't too long.

#80

Posted by: George | July 5, 2009 1:54 PM

I have never been a fan of wheat beers...

#81

Posted by: Alles gutes | July 5, 2009 2:08 PM

Ich möchte ein ertberkuchen haben, und eine dose Fanta, bitte. Entschuldigung, wo ist in der nähe ein post? Sie gehen geradeaus, und dann die dritte strasse links.

Pretty much what I know...

#82

Posted by: JJR | July 5, 2009 2:28 PM

Lecker!

I go in for Jaegerschnitzel myself...usually with potatoes, rotkohl on the side. Good stuff.

#83

Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | July 5, 2009 2:42 PM

You can use "Moin" as a greeting in Norddeutschland at any time of the day.

That's because it doesn't mean "morning" as lots of people believe. And that, in turn, is because it's not even German in the first place: it's Frisian, short for moien dag "beautiful day".

Beer may only contain certain ingredients (water, barley, hops, wheat malt, yeast)

Hopfen, Wasser, Malz – Gott erhalt's!

(Hop, water, malt -- God protect it!)

However the reform includes an attempt to make the use of ß more consistent and a number of words are now (supposed to be) spelled with 'ss' instead.

Yep. Before the reform, it was used whenever a long /s/ follows a vowel, and wherever it follows a short one but syllables can't be separated through it in writing. The reform dropped the second rule (which, incidentally, was never even explained well in elementary school!), which means that the use of ß now depends on the language itself rather than on the written word.

#84

Posted by: blf | July 5, 2009 2:47 PM

I have never been a fan of wheat beers...

Heretic! Heathen! Infidel! Burn him! Burn him!!

#85

Posted by: Lindis | July 5, 2009 4:42 PM

that sounds great. Für mich bitte auch a dunkles hefe, wanns net zu vui Aufwand is.

#86

Posted by: Arnulf | July 5, 2009 4:49 PM

@Chuck: Be careful! Obacht! Never ever say "Weizenbier" (or even "Hefeweizen") in Bavaria - otherwise the waitress will ignore you for the rest of the evening ;-)
It's "Weißbier".

#87

Posted by: Peter B. | July 5, 2009 5:11 PM

Happily, I understood most of the message BEFORE consulting Google. Verbatim, I thought the translation came out quite well...

Gruss Gott! Roast pork with homemade noodles, and two Leibinger Hefeweizen dark. Excellent

What I found interesting about the Google effort after a little playing around with it...

Grüß Gott! is simply...

Hello!

Whereas Grüß! alone is...

Greetings!

In my ignorance, I was surprised to think that our PZ would have used the expression as I thought it meant, being...

Großer Gott!

Glad to have been wrong about that, and apologies to PZ for even thinking it of him.

BTW - Hefeweizen will translate OK if broken up into component words (i.e. hefe weizen)...

yeast wheat

While have to agree with other comments here that without true AI, machine translation will probably never match a human, but I still wouldn't want to be without it - especially when faced with a page of Katakana or Arabic.

#88

Posted by: Monado | July 5, 2009 7:11 PM

Un Spätzle em der hand is worth two in the mittens?
If you can't find un Spätzle, you can make do with kittens!

#89

Posted by: Waydude | July 5, 2009 10:35 PM

Oh Mann, das klingt so gut!

and

What the hell's an Aluminum Falcon?!

#90

Posted by: Frank B | July 5, 2009 10:50 PM

While PZ was in Germany, I was at Convergence in Bloomington MN saddened by the fact that I didn't get to see him. But I had a good time anyway. The MST3K crew was there, and so were the skepchicks.

#91

Posted by: JackC | July 6, 2009 12:02 PM

Late to teh party, but I am amazed to say that my 36-year-old German schooling (plus a visit or two) allowed me to read that entire thing without resorting to any translating pages. Yay!

And "Ausgezeichnet" is what I always say when someone sneezes! I love the look on their face when I do.

Ich liebe hausgemachten Spätzle.

#92

Posted by: JBlilie | July 7, 2009 8:43 AM

I am amazed to say that my 36-year-old German schooling (plus a visit or two) allowed me to read that entire thing without resorting to any translating pages. Yay!

Dare I say "ditto"?

#93

Posted by: George Acogny | July 23, 2009 10:05 PM

I' m ein Brunnen hing athletischen zuckerkranken Mann und ich mag meine Eselsbacken für ein hartes Bumsen verbreiten.

Lecken Sie meine Kugeln und I' ll ließ Sie Faust mich bumsen. I' d-Liebe, zum Ihr mit von irgendeinem heißem jungem Rugrats Ass. zu trinken. Meine Fische Elizabeth lassen mich nicht diesen Backdoor bumsen, also benötige ich etwas Tätigkeit, in der ich es erhalten kann.