It was amusing to see the CDU in Berlin dancing to An Tagen wie Diesem (sp?) by the Tote(n) Hosen (that was difficult to spell in an English sentence). Watch them here, led by Volker Kauder.
Here’s the song plus translation.

The band distanced itself from the use of its songs in political campaigns (strafakte.de).

Die Toten Hosen distanzierten sich durch Erklärung schon im Wahlkampf von der Verwendung ihrer Musik durch die Parteien zu Wahlkampfzwecken, stellen aber wohl rechtlich richtig fest:

In letzter Zeit sind wir mehrmals darauf aufmerksam gemacht worden, dass unser Lied „Tage wie diese“ immer wieder auf verschiedenen Wahlkampfveranstaltungen eingesetzt wird, vor allen Dingen bei CDU und SPD. Die Rechtslage ist leider so, dass wir dagegen nichts tun können.

Is this a violation of the rights of personality of Die Toten Hosen?

(via Strafrecht Itzehoe)

This Piraten poster is the one I have most often seen defaced.

Here the original:

And here an altered version – on a close inspection it did not look tampered with:

It’s looking rather colourful here. Not only did Bavaria have elections last Sunday, Hesse has them next Sunday at the same time as the Bundestag elections.

This seemed inappropriate in retrospect:

Local. Notice complete Great Dane:

This one I saw in a spot where I could neither park nor photograph (that’s where some of the worst posters always are):

In Frankfurt last week, near that church:

Sat-nav devices have at least three times let me down just when I wanted to drive back to Germany, and I once got lost in Frankfurt am Main and found myself facing this Russian Orthodox church of St. Nicholas.

I was lucky enough to actually stop there on Sunday.

However, we were not welcome. The church is not for tourists, but for God. My friend said she was from Frankfurt, but this made no difference. Photos of the interior were not welcome and we were rapidly escorted out.

We were told that had we attempted to photograph the inside of a mosque, we would have found our heads cut off next to our bodies. The Russians were less aggressive, however.

Somehow I feel Nathan der Weise would have seen things differently.

Ken Adams drew my attention to his post on German speakers and the use of ‘will’ in contracts. The subject is why some Germans don’t like the use of ‘will’ as opposed to shall.

The theories seem to be:

1. ‘will’ and ‘wollen’ have completely different meanings (I’m not convinced by the wordreference definitions, or rather by the examples it gives, which to me seem to be ‘also rans’ rather than good illustrations.

2. Germans think ‘will’ is a ‘simple future’ (horrible term) and expect ‘shall’ for compulsion (this is the view I incline to)

Apropos ‘simple future’: there are at least five ways of expressing the future in English and they overlap with modal meanings. ‘Will’ often implies a promise.

Ken refers to ‘will’ in contracts as ‘language of policy’, which I need to investigate further.

In my experience, contracts of insurance often use ‘will’ for the insurer and ‘shall’ for the insured. I take the two verbs both to mean an obligation, although stylistically (but not legally9 there is a sense of ‘will’ being an act of grace and favour from the more powerful party.

In translations, I sometimes use ‘will’ mixed with ‘shall’ myself, but I may avoid it because I fear the German client may not like it. At one of the conferences I attended some weeks ago, someone mentioned the phenomenon where translators simplify the English language in order to avoid arguments with clients.

It’s been pointed out to me that Ron Pattinson has been down my way, and in fact as a beer lover (who eschews taking notes) he visits Franconia every year. Mind you,
Franconia day six looks a bit like Munich. I wonder if his downloadable little ePub book on Bavaria includes Franconia? I think when it comes to beer, Franconia needs its own book.
Anyway, scroll back for the earlier days of Franconia, starting with What I did on my hols:

It wasn’t a particularly long or complicated trip. Four nights in Ebermannstadt and one in Munich. A day at Annafest, one in Bamberg and another at the Kellers of Buttenheim. A return to places I love, beers that quench and a peace to be cherished.

I love Lager. Annually renewing that love has become part of the rhythm of my life. It’s not about drinking the rarest, oddest or strongest beer. But about reconnecting with the gloriously simple Franconian approach to beer. Where drinking a beer with your breakfast evokes no condemnatory glances. Where the beer isn’t trying to show off and the food not straining to be clever and quirky and new. Where there’s time to just sit and enjoy life, watching it meander past like lazy brook.

There wasn’t a beer I didn’t enjoy, though one really sated my thirst for Lager’s perfect simplicity: Neder Export. Sublimely drinkable.

With thanks to Trevor.