Do you really care?

Another great phrase for "I don't care" in Austrian is "Des is ma Powidl". First, you need to learn what Powidl is. Here you have an image of Powidldatschgerln:

Sorry, if you are hungry now; I definitely am. Above seen delights are made out of tasty potato tough filled with jam from plums. I am sure they are calorie reduced. But then Garfield the comic cat stated that calories are there to be eaten and not to be counted…
Now, we call jam in Austria Marmelade, we don't care about the European Union telling us that Marmelade must be made out of citrus fruits, we would rather exit the EU than renaming our Marmelade to the German Konfitüre.
Also, we call our plums Zwetschgen. We would never even dream of calling them Pflaumen, no matter how much pressure might come from Germany in the form of entertainment shows produced there.
Austrians say to this kind of pressure - from the EU to rename the Marmelade to Konfitüre or from the Germans to call their Zwetschgen suddenly Pflaumen - simply "Des is ma Wurscht!" At least with this statement of indifference I managed low carb, as I failed with low calories above.
Just in case you don't know what I mean and to end the post with a fruit - the actual Zwetschge
Homework: Eat a good dessert but don't waste your time counting the calories, simply enjoy it.

Comments

  1. MyrtoneMay 09, 2014

    By the way, this seems to be another Slavic borrowing. I don't see what Powidel has to do with carelessness or neglect.
    On a related topic, does any dialect of Austrian use si with all persons (as Yiddish does with sich)? As in "I wosch si" rather than "I wosch mi."

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    Replies
    1. TheAustrianMay 09, 2014

      Hi there! Thank you very much for your faithful following!
      This is what I see the beauty of the Austrian language: It is not that obvious, why some phrases are used; sometimes there is no connection at all - like in the posted example - "Des is ma Powidl" for "I don't care.

      To answer your question: In German there are two ways of addressing a person, or better saying "You". "Du" is informal and used for friends and children - much like as in English using the first name. "Sie" is used formal, much like the English use of the surname.

      Myrtone, where are you from? What is your native language?

      Delete
    2. MyrtoneMay 11, 2014

      I am writing from Australia, an anglosphere nation, my paternal grandparents were native speakers of Yiddish.

      I don't see how that thing about sie and du answers my question about reflexivity marking, as I tired to show by the example I gave. Schriftdeutsch might use such only in the third person, the object pronoun marking reflexivity in all other person and number combinations. Yiddish, which has many slavic borrowings, uses sich in all persons, much as slavic languages all use the same reflexive pronoun in all persons. Are at least some dialects of Austrian like Yiddish in this way?

      Delete
  2. MyrtoneMay 09, 2014

    This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete

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