A Very Brief and Not Particularly Helpful German Lesson, Lektüre 2

While the first installment of A Very Brief and Not Particularly Helpful German Lesson focused on a few of my favorite words the language has to offer, I would like to spend part 2 on an often over-looked part of learning a new language: Handwriting.

Of course, German uses the same alphabet with just a couple new letters: ä, ö, ü and ß - but nothing too wild. And of course everybody has different handwriting even when they speak the same language. So how could "handwriting" actually be a part of the German language? 

Well, even with a world of varying handwriting, some differences that exist and may be quite normal in Germany can be completely unrecognizable to an English speaker.

The number one.

It is my completely unprofessional, unqualified opinion that most prevalent difference in terms of handwriting is the number one. I always think the German 1 looks a little bit like a teepee (but hey, Indians Native Americans are pretty big in Germany, so maybe there is a connection!) Because of this difference, though, many English 7s get confused for German 1s. So whenever I am filling out official documents or anything I know has to be read by Germans I generally right my 1s like a teepee and cross my 7s to avoid any confusion or misunderstandings! 

The number nine.

German 9s have a hook on the bottom, making them completely indistinguishable from lowercase Gs. Fortunately a little common sense will tell you that 4+5 equals 9 not g, or that that word says "gehen and not 9ehen". But sometimes when you're living with a teacher whose address is 2g, you might accidentally tell the bank it's 29 when she writes it down for you. Not that I did that... often. 

The letter s. 

This one isn't always different, and in fact, I see it most commonly written like this with the younger students. It's obviously a cursive s, but it catches me so off-guard sometimes I really have to think about what I'm seeing. 

The letters h, m, and n.

These get me every time. I usually read Ns as Us and Ms as Ws at first glance. Just take a look at this German writing sample of my name:

Sometimes I've seen Ns and Us differentiated by using a line above the U.

Of course, this becomes even more confusing when we get to...

The Umlauts.

You know those funny dots above some letters? They have a name. And they're called umlauts. In German, they only exist for ä, ö and ü. Sometimes people get lazy when writing their umlauts and just draw a straight line instead of two dots.

So now that u with the straight line above it could either be a U with and umlaut or a U without an umlaut just being differentiated from an N (and that umlaut just might mean the difference between calling the weather humid or gay).

Is your head spinning yet?

So now you know, don't discredit the importance of learning the handwriting of a new language as well!