For me, one of the most difficult words to use correctly is the German word “doch”. After all these years!

Perhaps you struggle with the word “dabei”? It’s a tricky word to translate into English, because there are so many different ways to express it.

Let’s take a closer look.

Do you know the chorus, “Ich bin dabei, du bist dabei, wir sind dabei uns zu verlier’n”? (Good that you can’t hear me singing it.)

Here we could say, “I’m in the process of …” or “I’m in the middle of …“

So you might say that you are in the process/in the middle of writing a book. (Ich bin dabei ein Buch zu schreiben.)

Imagine I’m telling you about a concert I  went to recently. You might exclaim, “I was there, too!” (Ich war auch dabei!)

If I ask you if you would like to join me later, you might answer, “Count me in” or simply, “I’m in!” (Ich bin dabei!)

And now you would like to invite me for a coffee, but realise that you’ve forgotten your purse. You might say something like, “Christine, I don’t have any money with me!” (Ich habe kein Geld dabei.)

Do you have any other words that are tricky to translate?

“Life’s too short to wake up with regrets. So love the people who treat you right, forgive the ones who don’t and believe that everything happens for a reason. If you get a chance, take it. If it changes your life, let it. Nobody said it’d be easy, they just promised it would be worth it.”
Dr. Seuss

My children were big fans of Dr. Seuss (aka Theodor Seuss Geisel) and loved reading his comic book style books—like ‘The Cat in the Hat’ or ‘Green Eggs and Ham’—again and again.

You might like to read some of his works online. It’s amazing just how much wisdom is hidden within many of his quirky poems.

Would you like to finish this sentence?

“Life is too short to …”

Which type of questions do you think has the greatest impact on people?

1. Introductory questions (“How are you?”)
2. Mirror questions (“I’m fine. How are you?)
3. Full-switch questions (ones that change the topic entirely)
4. Follow-up questions (ones that solicit more information)

If you answered 4., you are correct!

Researchers found that follow-up questions are the most powerful ones. They show your conversation partner that you’re listening, that you care about what they’re saying, and that you want to know more.

So how does it work? Here’s an example:

You: “What do you like doing in your free time?”
Your conversation partner: “I love painting.”
You: “That’s amazing. How long have you been painting and what kind of paints do you use?” 

If I ask you, “What do you like doing in your free time?”, how would you respond?

You’ve got a German proverb you would like to translate into English—something like, “Aller guten Dinge sind drei“.

You know you can’t always translate word for word. So is there any English alternative?

Go to Wikiquote and see!

Yes, we’re in luck. There is: “All good things come in threes“.

If you have a favourite German proverb, why not go over to the site now and see whether there’s an English alternative?  And if you like, you can tell me about it.

A thank you to Susan Graul for telling me about the site!

The way people write dates often confuses me, so I presume others will feel the same.

If you see a date written like this: 09/08/2021, what do you understand?

In Britain and in much of Europe we use the day/month/year format. So the above would mean 9 August 2021.

In the US, the month comes before the day, so it would mean 8 September 2021.

(To make matters worse, in Asia most countries use the year/month/day format!)

So instead of using numerals alone, I suggest you write out the month in words. That should avoid confusion.

And even if you still see it today, in modern writing we don’t use the abbreviations 1st, 2nd, 3rd and so on. But they are still spoken!

So I’m writing this post on 22 May 2021, but it will probably be posted on 1 June 2021.