Sow you, sow me…

In German, you can add the word “Sau” (sow) to quite a lot of other words to add some porky emphasis to your point. So, for example, “saukalt” (pigging cold), “saublöd” (pigging stupid), or “saugeil” (frigging great) are all possible.

Pigging delicious

In my efforts to amaze and impress my students, I like to bust out a few German expressions every now and then. This is normally met with reactions like, “AWWWWW!” and “Aww, so süß!” (Aww, how sweet!), but I persevere anyway.

So I was at a lesson, one rainy afternoon…

Me: Ugh, das ist wirklich ein Sauwetter. (Ugh, this weather is really shite.)

Gudrun: Ja. Hey, what’s “Sau” in English?

Me: Sow. 

Gudrun: Sow – Sau. Huh, maybe that’s where the English word for “sausage” comes from?

Me: Ha ha! (Hmm, I wonder…)

Sauresearch

Linda-brain in overdrive is a dangerous thing and, really, something that should be prevented from happening with any sort of regularity. But, on this occasion, there was no stopping me. My brain hit the ground running – there’s a nice image for you – and, by that evening, I was ready to share my profound new theories with my unfortunate German friend. I installed myself on the sofa and prepared to make linguistic history.

Me: So, I’ve been thinking…

Long-suffering friend: Oh no.

Me: You know the English word “sausage”?

LSF: (Groan)

Me: OK, and you know the German word “Sau” and the verb “sagen” (to say)?

LSF: I’m German. 

Me: Yes, yes, but listen. What if “sausage” comes from those two German words? 

LSF: Go on…

Me: I mean, maybe, back in the day, in a village called BAD Wurstemburg or something, there was a local guy who used to sell pigs at the market? He’d have called out descriptions of the pigs and “Get your pigs, five for fifty!” or something, making him…

LSF: Yes…?

Me: The Pig Sayer! Sausager! 

LSF: Groan.

Me: Or, OR, maybe in BAD Wurstemburg, or wherever, the pigs developed kind of an attitude problem and the locals found it hard to deal with them.

LSF: (Pours another glass of wine)

Me: (Singing) Who they gonna call? THE PIG SAYER! 

LSF: (Downs said glass of wine)

Me: You know, he’d have been like Robert Redford with the horse-whispering, except in Lederhosen – and with pigs, obviously. Whenever someone had an uppity pig on their hands, they’d send for Sieghard the Sausager. 

Probably not a realistic likeness of Sieghard the Sausager

Me: But “sausager” was a bit too cumbersome for native English speakers to get their poor little tongues around so they shortened it to “sausage”! Ta-dah! 

LSF: Is any of that true? 

Me: I have no idea. Let me check. 

Of course, it turned out that I was talking absolute nonsense. The word “sausage” actually comes from the old Northern French word, “saussiche”. How dull. Anyway, it’s all sausage to me. I live to drivel another day. My apologies to any Germans who make my acquaintance.

 

 

 

 

 

As happy as a pig in shit

Well, I’ve done it. I’ve finally cracked the German language. It turns out it’s not as difficult as everyone makes out either.

It will come as a surprise to absolutely no one that Germans really love pork – in fact, they eat approximately 0.15kg of pork a day. Therefore, I guess it shouldn’t really come as a surprise that so many porky expressions permeate the language.

So now, instead of spending years trying to learn the vagaries of the German language, I’ve decided to communicate mainly through the use of piggy expressions.

Elvis the Pig has been helping me with my extensive research.

Here are my top eight pig-related German expressions (or, to be more correct, the only eight I know).

8. Alles hat ein Ende, nur die Wurst hat zwei

Everything has an end, only the sausage has two. Pretty self-explanatory and quite profound in a porky sort of way.

7. Unter aller Sau

The literal translation of this one would be “under all pig (or sow)”, which doesn’t really make much sense to the average English speaker. However, when you imagine what usually lies  under all pigs, then it starts to become a little clearer. I guess you could translate it as “everything is in total shit or chaos” – something Germans do not like.

6. Ich habe die Schnauze voll

I believe the original version of this one was “Ich habe die Nase voll” but, naturally, the Germans had to porkify it. And so, “I have the full nose” became “I have the full snout”, which does not mean that your nose is blocked. No, it means that you’ve had enough of something.

5. Eierlegendewollmilchsau

Ah, one of those brilliant German compound nouns, but what on earth does it mean? Translating it doesn’t provide much help either – an egg-laying wool milk sow.

???

German engineering gone mad?

I can’t even think of an English equivalent for this one but the basic idea is that you’ve got one animal that can lay eggs, grow wool, produce milk, and even give you bacon and sausages. So, for example, if someone is asking you to do more work than you can cope with, you could yell, “For God’s sake! I’m not an egg-laying wool milk sow! There’s only so much I can do!” At least I think that’s how you could use it…

4. Ich glaube, mein Schwein pfeift

Literally, “I think my pig is whistling.” Obviously, pigs don’t normally whistle, not even German pigs, so this one expresses great surprise.

3. Der Kummerspeck

Grief bacon. Initially a bit of an oxymoron to me as bacon induces anything but grief in me. More accurately, it’s the excess weight that you gain from comfort eating in times of heartache. (Snigger.)

2. Es ist mir Wurst

If you translate it word for word, it means “It is to me total sausage”, or to put it into words that people can understand, it means “I don’t care about this at all”.

Combining Irish and German culture

And my absolute, all-time favourite:

1. Jetzt geht es um die Wurst

Or “Now it gets about the sausage”, which means “Now it’s time to get serious” or “It’s now or never”. As I’ve mentioned before, Germans take their sausages very seriously so if a German says this to you, you might want to start running.

So, you’ve seen my top eight porky German idioms, but maybe you’re struggling to see how I could get by communicating through porky idioms alone. Well, for example, imagine that I’m breaking up with my imaginary German boyfriend. This is how that conversation could go:

Me: I have a full snout. It’s over.

Dagobert: But why? We’re so good together, baby! 

Me: Everything has an end. Only the sausage has two. 

Dagobert: But I don’t want this to end! 

Me: Huh. Our relationship is under all pig. I think you know that.

Dagobert: But I thought everything was perfect! 

Me: You expect too much. I’m not an egg-laying wool milk sow, you know. 

Dagobert: I think my pig is whistling. I wasn’t expecting this.

Me: It’s all sausage to me. 

Dagobert: But why now??

Me: Now it gets about the sausage.

Dagobert: But, but…

Me: Oh, just leave me in peace. I need to get my grief bacon on. 

Hopefully it’s now clear how my new approach to German language-learning will work. Or maybe I’m just throwing my pearls before swine?

The image of the egg-laying wool milk sow was taken from here.