WileeCoyote
Eatibus Almost Anythingus
Unfortunately there is no standard procedure, if you try learning a language with this sort of "labeling" system you'll soon find out why.
For the sake of example, I'll give you an instance thereof.
In the English language, all objects - and thusly all nouns - are neuter, otherwise there would be something supplementing "the" in the case of certain words being feminine or masculine.
The German language, and a good many others, are vastly different in this respect.
I will use a message I often hear over the intercom at the Mainz Central Station.
"Ladies and Gentlemen, due to an operational delay (usually something in the form of the engineer talking on his mobile phone or something going horribly screwy with the train), the 18:46 train to Saarbrücken has been delayed by approximately 15 minutes"
In English this is so easy to say, I could do it off the top of my head if I so wished.
Now let us observe how much more difficult this becomes in German.
Now, ladies and gentlemen is relatively easy, both are plural, thus we merely need to use "Meine". Next we come to "an operation delay". In German this would be a Betriebsverzögerung, because it's feminine, it can have any one of four different terms, those being Die, Der, Der or Die.
This is where the fun starts. Seeing as the delay is on account of something, we'd need to use "Der", seeing as we'd need to use the word "wegen" to get this across.
The sentence would thus far have this form:
"Meine Damen und Herren, wegen einer Betriebsverzögerung..."
So we've come this far, now how do we translate "has been delayed" ? This is particularly interesting as it's simply in concept, yet tediously complicated in execution. I'll use "verspätet sich", which although it does not have any form of "the" in it, will end up getting the point across anyways.
"Meine Damen und Herren, wegen einer Betriebsverzögerung verspätet sich..."
If you're already sick of this, then grab a barf bag, there's more to come. Now we come to what has actually been delayed. In this case it would be the 18:46 train to Saarbrücken (well duh!). "Train" in German is "Zug", a word with more variations of "the" than it has letters. This word is masculine, thusly bringing Der, Dem, Des and Den into play. Due to grammatical "laws" we are required to make use with "Der". Since all trains that go to Saarbrücken from or via Mainz, we need to use RE, which is shorthand for RegionalExpress. Our sentence so far would thusly appear as the following:
"Meine Damen und Herren, wegen einer Betriebsverzögerung verspätet sich der 18:46 RE nach Saarbrücken..."
But wait! The torture isn't over! Now we actually need to perform the task of completing the sentence! This is relatively easy. The phrase "verspätet sich requires the use of "um", an instigator of sorts. "Um" is like a lot of two and three lettered words in the German language, they're all literal Bondo, filling in all the cracks and seemingly empty bits where there is no action. The train is delayed by 15 minutes, thusly we convert this into German by means of a literal equation who's complexity rivals that of a similar algebraic formula.
Having beaten our brains out with this last bit, the finished sentence looks like this.
"Meine Damen und Herren, wegen einer Betriebsverzögerung verspätet sich der 18:46 RE nach Saarbrücken um circa 15 Minuten."
Thus far have you seen, dear reader, the tediously intimate complexity and overuse of thought and characters that goes into forming a single sentence in what Samuel Clemens described as "the awful German language". I cannot even begin to describe what sort of pain one begins to endure when they have to write out multiple sentences, even paragraphs. A book could even kill you!
WileeCoyote
For the sake of example, I'll give you an instance thereof.
In the English language, all objects - and thusly all nouns - are neuter, otherwise there would be something supplementing "the" in the case of certain words being feminine or masculine.
The German language, and a good many others, are vastly different in this respect.
I will use a message I often hear over the intercom at the Mainz Central Station.
"Ladies and Gentlemen, due to an operational delay (usually something in the form of the engineer talking on his mobile phone or something going horribly screwy with the train), the 18:46 train to Saarbrücken has been delayed by approximately 15 minutes"
In English this is so easy to say, I could do it off the top of my head if I so wished.
Now let us observe how much more difficult this becomes in German.
Now, ladies and gentlemen is relatively easy, both are plural, thus we merely need to use "Meine". Next we come to "an operation delay". In German this would be a Betriebsverzögerung, because it's feminine, it can have any one of four different terms, those being Die, Der, Der or Die.
This is where the fun starts. Seeing as the delay is on account of something, we'd need to use "Der", seeing as we'd need to use the word "wegen" to get this across.
The sentence would thus far have this form:
"Meine Damen und Herren, wegen einer Betriebsverzögerung..."
So we've come this far, now how do we translate "has been delayed" ? This is particularly interesting as it's simply in concept, yet tediously complicated in execution. I'll use "verspätet sich", which although it does not have any form of "the" in it, will end up getting the point across anyways.
"Meine Damen und Herren, wegen einer Betriebsverzögerung verspätet sich..."
If you're already sick of this, then grab a barf bag, there's more to come. Now we come to what has actually been delayed. In this case it would be the 18:46 train to Saarbrücken (well duh!). "Train" in German is "Zug", a word with more variations of "the" than it has letters. This word is masculine, thusly bringing Der, Dem, Des and Den into play. Due to grammatical "laws" we are required to make use with "Der". Since all trains that go to Saarbrücken from or via Mainz, we need to use RE, which is shorthand for RegionalExpress. Our sentence so far would thusly appear as the following:
"Meine Damen und Herren, wegen einer Betriebsverzögerung verspätet sich der 18:46 RE nach Saarbrücken..."
But wait! The torture isn't over! Now we actually need to perform the task of completing the sentence! This is relatively easy. The phrase "verspätet sich requires the use of "um", an instigator of sorts. "Um" is like a lot of two and three lettered words in the German language, they're all literal Bondo, filling in all the cracks and seemingly empty bits where there is no action. The train is delayed by 15 minutes, thusly we convert this into German by means of a literal equation who's complexity rivals that of a similar algebraic formula.
Having beaten our brains out with this last bit, the finished sentence looks like this.
"Meine Damen und Herren, wegen einer Betriebsverzögerung verspätet sich der 18:46 RE nach Saarbrücken um circa 15 Minuten."
Thus far have you seen, dear reader, the tediously intimate complexity and overuse of thought and characters that goes into forming a single sentence in what Samuel Clemens described as "the awful German language". I cannot even begin to describe what sort of pain one begins to endure when they have to write out multiple sentences, even paragraphs. A book could even kill you!
WileeCoyote