Off into the Turkish sign-jungle!
Read this post in German (Deutsch)
In the middle of the multicultural Berlin neighborhood of Kreuzberg, you will find Germany’s largest Turkish community – and our Babbel offices! What for die-hard, born n’ bred Berliners is an everyday part of the landscape, often makes visitors do a double-take: Many shops and businesses around here not only publicize their wares with German signs, but also Turkish ones.
Sure, most people already know what “döner” and “ayran” are, but what kind of meat or vegetable arrives on your plate when you order “sığır” or “patlıcan”? Like me, many of you might also be wondering why sometimes the door to the supermarket won’t open even though it seems like there are people inside…? Had I known that the sign “çıkış” meant “exit”, I of course would have been trying to push through the “giriş” (“entrance”) instead!
With this in mind, among the course editors we had the idea to do a little course where we introduce some basic signs that you might see in Turkey – but also in the German capital. Armed with bicycles and cameras, we combed the Berlin streets, photographing everything that passed in front of our lens. And we discovered that if you keep your eyes peeled, all sorts of signs and sayings start to come out of the woodwork. Besides the dentist’s office “dişçi” (dentist) the book shop is called “kitapçı”. The driving school is branded with “sürücü kursu” (driving courses) and the “baklavacı” (Baklava-bakery) offers Turkish sweets.
Some words that you come across in the sign-jungle sound a lot like the German – or the English, for that matter: “taksi” (taxi), “kurs” (course), “büro” (office/bureau) and “yoğurt” (yogurt), for example. You can find these so-called internationalisms in many languages; they sound alike and mean the same thing. That means you can often understand more than you think!
So that the course would be more than just showing the signs and their translations, we studded it with grammar explanations and pronunciation tips, too. So when in doubt, you can ask where the “tuvalet” (toilet) is with the proper emphasis – and say thank you with a “teşekkürler” afterwards!
