das Dingsbums: thingamabob
Isn't it beautiful how in both languages the word to describe something for which you can't place the name is a goofy combination of word and letters? In both languages the first part of the word means "thing" (Ding), but the second part is just incoherent babble.
Steffi uses the word "Ding" a lot in her speech. She even refers to Dominick as "der Typ" (that guy) and "das Ding" (that thing) sometimes. It's quite funny. When I told Christin about Steffi calling Dominick "that thing", she said it is actually quite common to call someone "das Dingsbums" when you can't recall his/her name. So, it's like saying "whats-his/her-name". But whereas we have "thingamabob" and "whats-his/her-name" in English to differentiate between objects and people, apparently it is okay to mix the situations in German. You probably shouldn't conclude that they don't also have a specific word just for people because I probably just haven't been educated on this word yet.
Das Dingsbums...it just sounds so funny!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment