You will hardly find expressions of the colloquial language (‘Umgangsspache’) in a textbook. Characterised by different words unknown in ‘Hochdeutsch’ (standard German), or the same words with a different meaning, or the grammar not always used in a grammatical way, sometimes it might sound harsh, however capable to come straight to the heart of the matter.I will teach you some common expressions used in everyday life conversation.

I was surprised to learn from a student that he considered watching a TV movie in German far more difficult than watching German news. I had expected that since the language in the news is more formal it would be more difficult to understand. For him, the opposite was the case. The language of German movies, or in other words, the language of our everyday life can be quite different from the language taught in books. The textbook one is, of course, the correct one, the standard one, the one we learn at school or hear in the news, so nothing wrong with that. Yet, the command of a language might not end here. Let’s discover some typical expressions of the spoken language.

Our first word has become very popular in the last years, but it is also used in the standard language.

krass  

extreme, extremely good/nice, terrible, cool

Das ist ja echt/total krass!

That sucks. / That’s (really) incredible.

A pregnant woman is telling her friends about her longing for strange food. In the last time, she was eating lots of olives together with cornflakes and with cherry jam toasts. One of her friends’ comment goes like:

Das ist ja echt krass!

From the translation you can tell that it is suitable for many different occasions. You can use it when you’ve just learned about something not very nice. In other cases, it can have a positive meaning, like in:

Wow, die Musik ist ja (echt) krass.

Wow, the music is really cool.

In the standard language, ‘krass’ has usually the meaning of extreme.

Die Unterschiede zwischen …. sind sehr krass.

The differences between … are very extreme.

echt’ is a modal particle, as ‘ja’ and ‘total’. They emphasize the statement, make it stronger, more convincing. However, in the spoken language, ‘echt’ often means really.

A: Stephens Firma hat ihn gefeuert.

A: Stephen’s company has fired him.

B: Echt?

B: Really?

A: Mhm.

B. Krass!

Another meaning of ‘echt’ is genuine, in opposite to fake (‘’nachgemacht’). Close to this meaning comes the use of ‘in echt’ (in the flesh).

Bisher habe ich ihn nur im Film gesehen, noch nie in echt.

So far, I have seen him only in movies, never in reality.

Another popular expression is:

Ich glaub’, es hackt / mich hackt’s!

You can’t be serious.

You can use it when you are shocked about something, you don’t agree with it. The expression has become so common that you can even find a book and a webpage: ich-glaube-es-hackt.de (both are actually a pun of ‚hacken’ – hacker).

It is not clear where this expression comes from, but one explanation could be that ‚hacken’ originally meant to pester somebody. Nowadays, ‚hacken’ is also used in chopping wood, for birds pecking on others, and what hacker are doing regarding computer. From the chickens pecking on each other comes the following expression:

auf jemandem herumhacken

to nag at somebody

Warum hackst du die ganze Zeit auf mir herum?

Why are you nagging at me the whole time?

If you want to say how boring you find a place where nothing interesting happens, you might say:

Da ist nix los!

There’s nothing going on.

Notice that ‘nix’ is the spoken language version of ‘nichts’. The same meaning, but usually talking about a party:

Tote Hose!

Dead boring! (Literally: dead trousers)

There is also a famous German punk band named ‘Die Toten Hosen’.

Another idiom with the same meaning, when talking about a (small) town, or a village:

Da werden abends die Bürgersteige/Gehsteige hochgeklappt.

They roll up the sidewalks at night.

I like this idiom, because it describes very well what is or actually what is not going on in small towns. This is also true for many German city centers at night. After the shops have been closed, the CBD often looks like a ghost town, because places for going out are elsewhere. Notice that ‘Bürgersteige’ is Hochdeutsch, while ‘Gehsteige’ is used in the southern part of Germany and Austria.

The next expression is one of my favourite ones just because of the sound. If you want to say to somebody to hurry up, you can say:

Mach’ ma’ hinne!

Hurry up!

I am not sure if all Germans do understand it. I have heart it the first time in the northern part of Germany, but actually it is from Hesse, quite in the south of Germany.

The next two have the same meaning. Notice that here ‘zumachen’ does not mean to close or to shut (because it would need an object), but to hurry up as well.

Mach zu!

Hurry up!

Same meaning, but this one sounds a little bit more relaxed (maybe because it is from northern parts of Germany and definitely more used there):

I don’t like the next one very much, because it is pretty vulgar, yet quite common:

die Arschkarte ziehen

to draw the short straw

Da hast du die Arschkarte gezogen!

You have been really unlucky!

The English translation probably doesn’t express the rudeness of this expression. It is not a nice comment to somebody who had been not very lucky. However, the etymology is interesting. In 1970, at the football world championship in Mexico, the red and yellow cards had been introduced. Back then many people didn’t have a colour TV yet, so the referee put the red card in his back pocket and the yellow one in his front pocket. In this way the audience could distinguish the two cards.

There are not only many ways to say that somebody has lost his/her mind, but they are also pretty common.

Hast du sie nicht mehr alle?

You can’t be all there!

What about your inner clock? ‘ticken’ means the ticking of the (inner) clock.

doch/wohl nicht ganz richtig ticken

to be not right in the head

‘ticken’ does not necessarily have a negative meaning:

anders ticken

to have a different mentality

Der tickt ganz anders.

He has a completely different mentality.

Do you always know where a saying or an idiom comes from? As native speakers, we all use them, but often we are not wondering anymore about their funny or weird meaning. For you as a language learner, it might be easier to understand and to use the idiom if you have a picture in your mind.

Nowadays, we have often lost the object an idiom refers to. ‘Klatsche’ once was an instrument to make – useless – noise. The meaning then was transferred to useless chitchat, obviously of a crazy person who opened and closed her mouth using the same movement as when playing the instrument.

Du hast doch einen an der Klatsche!

You are nuts!

Instead of saying: ich habe (keine) Lust … zu … (standard German for: I would like to …), a fairly stronger version is:

(keinen) Bock haben auf

Ich habe (keinen) Bock darauf Musik zu hören.

I am (not) eager to listen to music.

Ich habe Bock auf ein Eis.

I am up for an ice cream.

Da habe ich echt keinen Bock drauf!

I can’t be bothered.

The next one has nothing to do with backing bread or a cake, but it means to be unable to get something done.

etw. nicht gebacken kriegen

to be unable to get something done

Er müsste sich eigentlich um einen neuen Job kümmern. Aber er kriegt es nicht gebacken.

He should try to find a new job. But he doesn’t manage to do so.

You just worked through a lot of expressions. Of course, you can learn them all at once. Or take your time. When listening to anything in German try to figure out if you can hear them somewhere. And then, choose a few you like most and start to use them!