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Absolute Beginner S1 #1
Is Your Coee as Strong as Your
German Apologies?
CONTENTS
2
2
3
4
5
5
6
German
English
Vocabulary
Sample Sentences
Vocabulary Phrase Usage
Grammar
Cultural Insight
#
COPYRIGHT 2012 INNOVATIVE LANGUAGE LEARNING. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
GERMAN
1.
2.
A:
3.
D:
4.
A:
5.
D:
6.
A:
7.
D (grins):
8.
A:
Kein Problem?
9.
D:
10.
A:
11.
D:
ENGLISH
1.
2.
A:
3.
D:
It's okay.
CONT'D OVER
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4.
A:
5.
D:
6.
A:
7.
D (grins):
8.
A:
No problem?
9.
D:
No, no problem.
10.
A:
11.
D:
VOCABULARY
Ge r man
English
C lass
wirklich
really
adverb
ich
personal pronoun
no
expression; Yes is
"Ja"
Yes is "Ja"
plural can be the
same or Wsser
nein
Wasser
water
noun
nur
only, just
adverb
ja
yes
adverb
sicher
sure
adjective
Sie
you (formal)
personal pronoun
schon
already
adverb
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Ge nde r
es
it
personal pronoun
sein
to be
verb
und
and
conjunction
SAMPLE SENTENCES
D i e se S ta d t i st w i rkl i ch g ro .
D a s w a r w i rkl i ch l e cke r.
Ich bi n Li sa .
I am Lisa.
U n d d e r Ka h n so l l u n s w i rkl i ch h e i l
be r d a s Wa sse r bri n g e n ?
And this barge is really supposed to bring
us savely over the water?
Ei n G l a s Wa sse r o h n e Ko h l e n s u re
bi tte !
Ich e sse n u r G e m se .
I only eat vegetables.
J a , d a s sti m m t.
Bi st d u d i r si ch e r?
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S pre ch e n S i e En g l i sch ?
S i e si n d H e rr S m i th
Bi st d u sch o n m d e ?
Es i st sch n , d a ss S i e d a si n d .
Es i st fr h a m Mo rg e n .
D a s ka n n d o ch n i ch t w a h r se i n !
Ich bi n S tu d e n t.
Th o m a s u n d Li sa .
I am a student.
Sie = you, formally. There is a notion of formality in German, just like in French, Spanish,
Italian and other languages. If you're addressing somebody by their family name, you should
also call them Sie and use the corresponding form of the verbs. If you're addressing
somebody by their first name, you will usually use another pronoun, du. The formal address
is the default in German unless you're talking to children or people who explicitly asked you to
switch to an informal address. As a foreigner, you'd do well to address everybody as Sie
initially.
GRAMMAR
Th e fo cu s o f th i s l e sso n i s th e ve rb "se i n " (to be )
Ich bi n J o e .
"I a m J o e ."
In this lesson we've seen three forms of the verb sein, to be. This verb is irregular in almost
all languages, and German is no exception. Here are the forms we've seen;
sein to be
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ich bin I am
es ist it is
Sie sind you are (formally)
We've also seen that German word order corresponds to English so far. When you're asking a
question, the verb moves to the front of the sentence in German, just like in English.
Sind Sie Joe? = Are you Joe?
Sind Sie sicher? = Are you sure?
CULTURAL INSIGHT
Apo l o g i zi n g a n d re a cti n g
The most general word of apology in German is Entschuldigung. This literally means
apology, and it's used in most situations:
1.
something bad
2.
3.
It is NOT used when somebody tells some sad news about themselves, because that is not
something you should apologize for unless you had any stake in it.
If you need something stronger than Entschuldigung, use Es tut mir leid (literally it does
me harm). And you can make it even stronger by adding an adverb before the leid.
Es tut mir wirklich leid. - I'm really sorry.
Es tut mir sehr leid. - I'm very sorry.
To accept an apology informally, say;
Es ist (schon) okay. - It's okay (now).
Kein Problem. - No problem.
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