German easy words and tips for remembering

 

German - English

Massage - massage

Die Massage - the massage

How do I remember it is die, not das? I think, because  some people would die for a massage.

Die Natur - nature

Rat - advice (not a rat, but I remember the memory aid I have just devised, he likes advice like a rat. We have a rat. We need advice. When a German says rat, he does not have a rat, he needs advice.)

Rathaus - town hall (That's British English. Americans say City Hall.)

Wo ist das Rathaus? - where is the town hall?

Gibt es dort ein Restaurant - does it have a restaurant (literally gives it there, dort is means is there ...? or are there ...?)

dort - there

All over Germany, when we were touring, we saw signs to the Rathaus in the city centre. The Rathaus was the town hall. It usually had a sensibly priced restaurant or cafeteria in the basement, a historic cellar with antiques, serving local food, promoting local specialities. The perfect place for a tourist to take photos.

The same word, Rathaus is used in Austria and the German speaking cantons of Switzerland.

However, they sometimes use the word 

Gemeindeverwatung - town hall 

English -  German

Remember to use capitals for German nouns.

massage - Massage

town hall - Rathaus

Gib mir

Geben Sie mir

Gebt mir

I asked Ask Gemini and got this result.

AI referred me to a You tube video on the subect. On first listening to it I was confused. However, I think if you listen to the video several times it will become clear and help to remember what you have just been taught. To remember anything in a foreign language, as with remembering anything else, such as somebody's name, say it three times, from English to German and fro German to English.

Gib mir deinen Pass (informal singular: give me your passport) Geben Sie mir Ihren Pass (formal: give me your passport) Gebt mir euren Pass (informal plural: give me your passport)

For plural ("passports"): Gib mir deine Pässe (informal singular) Geben Sie mir Ihre Pässe (formal) Gebt mir eure Pässe (informal plural).

My name is Angela - Mein Name ist Angela / Ich heiße Angela

Wie heißt das? (informal / general)  

Wie nennt man das? - What does one call that? (literally what calls one that) 

Ask Gemini explains in more detail in response to my question

Useful Resouces for Learning German

Duolingo.com

Translate Google 

Wikivoyage phrasebook German

AI - Ask Gemini

More details in the next post.

What to see at City Hall MRT and the Padang in Singapore

City Hall MRT escalators bring you up outside a shopping mall with a large Starbucks and McDonald's where you can meet your friends, but if the weather is clear there's plenty to see outside.

Facing the road, you see the padang in front of you. The Padang, a Malay word, is not a paddy field, more like a playing field. In the old days National Day parades and other events would be held here in front of city hall. (In the UK, you will more often find a 'town hall' on the main square or green.) The dignitaries would be watching from seats set up in from of the City Hall.

Nowadays (2019) you can see people on the Padang racing around, desite the heat and humidity, energetically playing all kinds of sports.

Notice the Characterful Cricket Club
To your right is the Cricket Club, a low building with attractive orange roof tiles. Across the road from it is another building with orange roof tiles and a white tower, the old Vic theatre. Nowadays live performances are usually held at the larger and modern stadium just along the road.

See Singapore Recreation Club building
On the opposite side of the padang to the cricket club is the Singapore Recreation Club. In front of the SRC is a small fountain and an account of the club's history. As you walk up the  road towards the SRC, you come to a dogleg double road crossing. To your left is the Swisshotel. In the distance, framed by trees, is the cricket stump silhouette of the magnificent triple tower Marina Bay Sands, one of Singapore's main landmarks.

The SRC is a members' club with a swimming pool. Sometimes the ground floor conference room is rented to other organizations. I have been there two or three times to the SRC Toastmasters Club. The SRC has a bar where you can sit looking out across  the grassy padang, watching the tennis and the team sports. Inside is a swimming pool, open to visitors for a fee. So, if you know somebody who is a member, accept any invitation offered, work out what it will cost them or you, and enjoy.

In a case in the hall they have on sale long full size umbrellas at a reasonable price in assorted colours.

MRT Stations Nearby
Pick up a copy of the free MRT map which is is a rack by the window of the ticket office in most stations. On the back is a mini map headed Approximate Walking Time Between Stations Nearby.

The brisk walker who devised this map for hurrying commuters claims that you can walk to Esplanade on the yellow circle line in five minutes, or Bras Basah in only seven minutes. If you find yourself between City Hall and the other big train hub Raffles Place, note that it is only a ten minute walk from Raffles Place to Chinatown.

To change from the blue Downtown line to the Yellow circle line go to Promenade.

Promenade MRT station platform mural. Photo by Angela Lansbury.

Useful Websites
singaporeair.com
visitsingapore.com

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. Please share links to your favourite posts.

Do you know these false friends - words in American and British English, French and German?

Problem
You see a word which sounds like English. You think you know what it means. But it turns out to be something different.

Answers
False Friends
American English - British English
erasers are rubbers
pacifier is dummy
pants are trousers
pantyhose are tights
rubbers are condoms
suspenders are what the British call braces (holding up trousers; for the British supenders and what hold up ladies' stockings
the car's hood is the bonnet
the car's trunk is the boot
underpants are pants

French - English
Hotel de ville in French means town hall.
Grand in French is not grand but big.

German - English
Old-timer in German and Dutch is what the English would call a classic car; old-timer in English means an elderly person
Rathaus is not a rat house but a town hall, usually containing a tourist restaurant serving local specialities in a historic cellar.
A gymnasium in Germany is academic, a college, but in the UK it is a hall with equipment for physical activity indoors

LANGUAGES
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_friend
what is the easiest language to learn
https://www.babbel.com/en/magazine/7-reasons-to-learn-languages-from-a-guy-who-speaks-9
https://www.babbel.com/en/magazine/language-quotes-01

duolingo.com

earwormslearning.com

http://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.co.uk/2018/02/how-many-english-words-from-foreign.html
http://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.co.uk/2018/02/learn-ten-portuguese-words-from.html
http://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.co.uk/2018/02/polyglot-poem-by-angela-lansbury.html
http://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.co.uk/2018/01/how-to-remember-23-portuguese-words-or.html

http://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.co.uk/2018/01/port-and-portuguese-wine-labels-and.
http://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.co.uk/2018/01/how-to-ask-for-food-and-drink-in.
http://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.co.uk/2018/01/learn-your-first-ten-words-in.
http://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.co.uk/2018/01/how-do-you-say-please-in-portuguese-is.

TRAVEL
visitbritain.org
http://www.visit-usa.com (Links for all state tourist boards)
http://www.germany.travel/en/index.html
http://uk.france.fr
https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/germany

visitportugal.com

http://www.spain.info/en_GB/

visitbrasil.com

http://ww

w.visitmadeira.pt/en-gb/homepage

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and phtographer, author and speaker. Please share links to your favourite posts.

Wales' Last Invasion Tapestry and the Bayeux Tapestry

Fishguard's town hall, painted green, is easy to find.

Downstairs is a three panel tiled panorama of Fishguard and Goodwick.

Here is the train which brings you to Fishguard, perhaps from Paddington Station, London, or elsewhere in England, Scotland or Wales, via Cardiff, Newport or Swansea, depending on time and route.

The Welsh lady, Jemima, who captured French invaders.

Typical Welsh woman's high Black Welsh hat and red cloak, national costume worn by Jemima, which fooled the French into thinking soldiers were marching around.

The long gallery housing the 100 foot tapestry.

Some souvenirs of Wales sold in the shop and tourist information centre of the ground floor of the town hall in Fishguard. (More goodies such as Welsh wooden carved love spoons in craft shops around the town.)

Photos by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Problem
How do you celebrate the successes of the men and women of Wales?

Answer
With Fishguard's imitation of the Bayeux Tapestry. On the one hand it's a celebration of a victory over the French invaders, in 1797, on the other hand it is a tribute to the enduring popularity of the French Bayeux Tapestry which is a tourist attraction in Hastings in England.

Watch the fascinating film of how the story was researched. The backing and wool were obtained at the best value price. The drawings were made, with trips including one to the church which the French soldiers pillaged, and where they surrendered. Then the drawing was transferred to the backing. Finally, the kinds of stitches were selected, to make the whole tapestry consistent although each panel was sewn by a different groups of stitchers.

It all took time. Not without a few mishaps. One enthusiastic embroiderer was told her stitching was lovely, but she had sewn the wrong colour! She had to unpick it and embroider it all over again. Despite this, everybody was delighted with the new friendships, new skills, and contributing to something which enhanced tourism to the region and might last for centuries.

Tips
First stop:
Last Invasion Tapestry Museum
Town Hall
Fishguard
Pembrokeshire
Wales
www.visitWales.com
Fishguard Tourist Information Centre is on the ground floor.
See tile three part mural by children on ground floor. See tapestry upstairs. Watch the film.
Also see the website for Pembrokeshire tourist board.

2nd Stop
Royal Oak Pub
Fishguard Square
Fishguard
Pembrokeshire
This is where the peace treaty was signed when the French army surrendered.

3rd Stop
Lower Town where Dylan Thomas' Under Milk Wood was filmed starring Richard Burton.
The Ship Inn served the cast and crew. See memorabilia.

4th Stop
Fishguard Hotel, restaurant and Bar
Goodwick
See the story of how Richard Burton stayed here, panel on left of the bar. Fine view over the bay and on the terrace.

Tips
Read about the Bayeux Tapestry In England which inspired the one in Wales.
St Mary in the Castle
Pelham Crescent
Hastings
East Sussex
England
www.visit1066 country.com

Events:
Music Festival 24 July-4 August 2017.
Writers' Holiday Feb 2018.
www.fishguardmusicfestival.co.uk
www.writersholiday.net

Travel and Tours
https://www.visitbritainshop.com/world/ (trips, tours, offers: London; England, Scotland, Wales)

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. I have other posts on Wales and speaking Welsh. Please share links to  your favourite posts.

Confusion With Foreign Words? Lost in France.

My parents drove into a town in Northern France and looked for a hotel. It was getting dark. They spied a large hotel, with a couple of lights still on. We drove around the one way system. By the time we found the entrance to the complex the last light was off except the one over the sign which read Hotel de Ville. Why had the City Hotel shut so early?

We found out later. It was not the city hotel. It was the town hall.

Lost in Translation in France. A little learning is a dangerous thing. Brush up your French with Duolingo, the free languages website.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.

Fishguard Bay - Setting For Under Milk Wood

A plaque on the little Harbour at Fishguard Bay tells you this was used as a setting for the film of Under Milk Wood, the poem written by Welsh poet Dylan Thomas, in the film starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. You can happily while away an afternoon walking around the bay. Or watching or participating in the kayaking. You might like to take the bus around the bay to the Fishguard Bay hotel, on the hillside opposite, actually in Goodwick, with a view over Fishguard Bay. This was where Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton and Peter O'Toole stayed when making the film.

Back down on Fishguard Bay, The Cafe on the Quay is a cheerful place for tea, with a small gift area. Proceedings are presided over by jolly Jo, who will tell you about local events, boat competitions and music festivals, and people, such as the twins and the police.

The houses around the bay and throughout Fishguard are painted in contrasting colours, creams and greens, and blues and plums and pinks and rust red. The Town Hall is green, and that's where you find the tapestry about the ladies with their black hats and red shawls who helped head off an invasion by the French.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.

Fishguard tapestry and more to do

Fishguard is famous for the Welsh ladies with tall black hats and red shawls who repelled an invasion by French militia who thought the black and red were uniforms and the pitchforks were weapons. When? 1797.

The story is told in The Last Invasion tapestry currently displayed in the Town Hall above the Council Offices. Unfortunately this means that the town's main tourist attraction is closed weekends, evenings and bank holidays.

Understandably the people of the town, especially those in the open seven days a week Ocean tourist centre think the tapestry should be moved somewhere more accessible to the tourists. I agree.

More ideas on what to see from the Pembroke tourist site or the handy page on the Writers Holiday website, compiled by Malcolm Chisholm. The listing is designed to help partners of those on the Writers Holiday but it's helpful to everybody. (And if you haven't yet been on  WRITERS HOLIDAY, which includes painting courses, poetry, fiction and non-fiction, check it out.)
writersholiday.net

http://www.fishguardartssociety.org.uk/The%20Last%20Invasion%20Tapestry.html

Angela Lansbury, author, travel writer and photographer, speaker.
My latest book is Larry the talking labrador.