One for the night crew

I still can't figure out what "ich eil" means or even what language it is
- Ich iel is a german acronym for "meirl"
  
  Ah, im echten Leben, iel! Finally the quarter fell.
- And it's somehow still an amazing experience despite not knowing a single word
- Ich im echten Leben.
  They take English and translate it word for word in a very literal fashion. It's very difficult to understand for regular Germans because you kinda need to know the original English sayings to make sense of it.

Back when this meme format was making the rounds on 4chan, I always saw it as a guy with a really long Fu Manchu moustache and to this day I still can't unsee it.
- That's how I've always seen it too. Your comment just now made me realize that those are his forearms.
  You have ruined the Internet and memes for me forever now. I hope you're happy.
  
  Suffer well, brother.
- Wasn't there even a rage comic about that?

At first it annoyed me slightly but I've noticed that I can understand most of them without having to use a translator, so now it's just free language practice. And deciphering memes is decidedly more fun than taking a course.
- Herzlichen Glückwunsch! Ich hoffe du triffst nie auf Zangendeutsch, da weiß selbst ich nicht mehr, was dort eigentlich gesagt wird.
  
  This is how I do it
  
  Zangendeutsch ist v.a. auf ich_iel sehr weit verbreitet, dem Hauptinkubator deutschsprachiger Memes auf Lemmy.
  
  Tangendeutsch heff ik ja noch nie höört aver dat geiht ja noch. Dat klingt hollt meist bloot temlich swacksinnig. Wat seggt denn eerst bi zB Plattdeutsch.
  Edit: Zangendeutsch habe ich ja noch nie gehört, aber das geht ja noch. Das klingt halt meist bloß ziemlich schwachsinnig. Was sagst dann erst bei zB Plattdeutsch.
  I've never heard Zangendeutsch before, but that's still possible. It just usually sounds pretty stupid. What about Low German(Plattdeutsch), for example?
- Yup, same, I'm enjoying learning German this way now
  
  Und ich lerne Englisch vor allem durch eure Michmichs ^^

I saw this one and was like "oh shit i guess i speak german."

- If it helps: "Tisch" is table in German and Feta is a greek cheese. => Feta + Tisch = Fetisch, but actually "Fetisch" has a complete different meaning on its own (eng.:"fetish") so its a play on words. Thanks for coming to my TED-Talk.
  
  That makes much more sense than "tofu table"
- Das ist ser schön!
- Wehe, irgendwer plaudert, Jungs/Mädels/Diverse.

Also learn everything about Linux so I can get all these Linux memes that keep popping up. And learn to program so I can get all the programmer memes.

Also non-Americans trying to browse Lemmy during work...
I really wish I could understand German humour
- German human is no laughing matter.
- German idioms are funny. I read a book translated from German into English using ai. And Some of their idioms had me rofl.

Haha I wake up pretty early in the US and see a lot of the German content. I have learned a lot about tables recently.
- Still new here. But I haven’t come across any German instances yet….
  
  feddit.org is the main German instance, although not all communities on here are in German.
  
  Are you browsing all?
  
  Hi

I speak spanish and I feel like I'm fouble dipping in the fun. But once I tried diving into a german thread with the help of translators. Boy they were SAVAGE some shit was like "He got another dick surgery probaly wants to suck it himself at this point." Idk who says german have no sense of humor but man that's wrong AF.
- They have a great sense of humor. It's just that when it's time to be serious (at work, meeting a stranger, out in public), they act serious.
  
  Fun facts about Germany: No fun in Germany. Get back to work!
  However, German humour is very special. Me, as a German, I love it.

Ich habe vier Jahre auf Deutsch gelernt, aber mein Deutsch ist sehr schlecht.
Honestly, I couldn't even remember if Deutsch was feminine, masculine, or neuter... but my pronunciation has always been spot on at least. I should just pick it back up, it'd be mostly vocab grind for me at this point. But I last learned years and years ago... dang, almost 18 years now.
- Articles in German make no real sense honestly. Deutsch is neuter, but since it's mostly an adjective the article is that of the accompanied noun. The German language is female, the German court neuter and the German football field is male (the stadium is neuter though)

I blocked all the German instances because I couldn't understand them anyway.
Edit:
Apparently a solution to the problem offends them lmao, didn't realize me seeing posts I can't comprehend was so important to these goofballs.
- Get good and learn a little German you silly American
  
  I don't have time energy or fucks to give when it comes to that sorry, it's nothing against German I took German in highschool but I'm not trying to do that just so I can doomscroll in another language
- Nimm es nicht persönlich, dass alle Deutschen hier im Faden dich beleidigen oder einfach anfangen, Deutsch zu schreiben, obwohl du Angelsachse bist. Es ist eher eine Art Maimai, auch wenn du natürlich Deutsch lernen solltest und diese Kommentarsektion nun Eigentum der BRD ist.
  Sadly I'm not allowed to speak English since it's forbidden by the German-ich_iel-internet-law, also known as Sprich Deutsch du Hurensohn.
  
  Richtig so.
- Artikuliere auf deutsch, du Sohn einer Fachfrau für Selbstvermarktung
  
  Ich dachte das nennt sich Geschlechtsteilvermietungsfachpersonnachkomme?
- You're missing out on the English communities on the German instances then.
  
  Maybe but I think I'll be ok not wading through hundreds of posts I can't understand, I wouldn't expect someone who doesn't understand English to do it with American posts.
  If that's how someone else wants to spend their time more power to them, I do not have time for that unfortunately.
- Apparently a solution to the problem offends them lmao, didn't realize me seeing posts I can't comprehend was so important to these goofballs.
  That's German humour
- I did the same. Will do until the apps integrate translation.
  
  Will do until I get bored with Lemmy altogether
- Your loss.
  
  Come on, loss is so over.
- Tja, keine Maimais für dich du doofmann
  
  Google translates this as "no mail for you" is that correct? Does mail here mean any kind of communication?
  I do like learning "doofmann" since where I'm from you might call someone a doof if they're stupid.

I've been doing German on Duolingo for over a year and I can get about 20% of the content they post, so I'm pretty happy to have an actual use for the work I put in.

I use Google translate to bridge the language barrier and I'm happy to do so. Some of their memes are top class.
- Habibi digga bekommst Nutriscore A von mir

jokes on you, I have been learning german before lemmy

Good choice. Nobody who speaks German could be an evil man.
As a side benefit, you will also be able to converse with Kim Jong-un, Vladimir Putin, and Robert Terwilliger.
- Oh, I didn't know Kim Jong- un can speak German
  
  He went to school in Switzerland. Maybe that explains the Laibach concert.
  
  I bet he speaks it like the same he doesn't have to shit.

Ja genau.
I had a two year streak on Duolingo and I still get maybe 40% with context clues help.
- A lot is inside jokes and playfully bad translations from English. Don't know if that makes it easier or more difficult
  
  It’s probably half an indictment of Duolingo effectiveness and half an indictment of my retention skills.
- I took German in high school, and while I understand maybe 60% of the words, 90% of the (what I assume to be critical) context is lost on me
  
  with how the german community is radically translating everything english directly into german, i too tend to need some time figuring out what the heck they mean. lemmy is translated as „let me“ but in one word, same for meme being translated as „me me“. so, oftentimes, i need to translate half the words of a sentence directly into english without taking context into consideration, then try to put them together and reread, if that makes any sense…

Swede here dealing with the same realization. Although continental Scandinavian is a Germanic language and share the same ancestry as German, eg proto-Germanic, and thereby shares a lot of similarities, it’s not mutually intelligible. I can how ever often times pick out some words and with some bending and shuffling around get a gist of what’s going on. But only if it’s presented in a meme format.
- Jag älskar köttbullar
  
  Wer macht das nicht! Sie bestehen schließlich aus den beiden magischen Zutaten Fleisch und Ball.

I ended up blocking a bunch of German instances, I don't dislike it or anything I just get nothing out of it lol.
- Das ist aber nicht sehr nett.
  
  😭

As a german Ive seen this meme alot now, but Im completly confused what your experience is actually like.
besides the german c/communities like c/dach and c/deuschland I dont see where youre seeing german everywhere and these dont show in the popular feeds for me
EDIT: As described below, I blocked the whole instance (instead of only the meme community) by accident LOL
- Not American but I got a lot of Ich_iel that sprout out in my All
  
  Und ~~Bubatzgarten oder was~~ Bubatzgärtnerclub*!
- I always sort by "Hot" and German posts definitely start to dominate after midnight here.
  
  weird I dont see it if I filter by hot
  anyone know if my instance blocks these?
  PS: LOL I blocked it for some reason, and didnt realize it blocks the whole instance rather than one community I didnt want to see (prolly ich_iel since I kinda feel like memes are degrading these platforms like reddit or insta with their short video floods)
  lets give the instance another try... hope theres a way for me to block only meme sites from a whole instance tho

You guys are aware you can filter by language in the settings of your Lemmy account, right?
- That's like the most useless setting ever because nobody enforces the language while commenting
- I wasn't! Thanks for the clue!

Kind of fed up with this "meme"
- The meme format i have no problems with, it's the content in it, yeah we get it, Germans use Lemmy.
  Thanks for the meme, much appreciated 😄

I've had to block so many German Lemmy's. It's frustrating because I can tell it's a good article and I believe European news more than US news now.

I need to not only learn the language but learn the culture so I can understand what I can only assume are fire memes

I never see any German posts, what am I doing wrong?
- Not browsing All nearly enough
- Go to your profile settings. There should be a list of languages you can select. Depending on the interface you use, Ctrl+Click may do the trick of selecting multiple languages. Then save.

How many languages can a human brain hold?
I have 3 spoken and 2 written languages and its a bit too much, I'm not trying to have 200 languages, that stupid green owl can go away.
- Deutsch reicht.
- https://www.sciencefocus.com/science/what-is-the-record-for-the-most-languages-spoken-by-one-person
- In many cultures, it's common to grow up with 3-5 languages. Learning them as an adult is much harder tho
  
  Sometimes you can mix so many 语言, that 有啲人都冇 understand you 係度说啥？

No, we are talk8ng about "Muricans" ... most of them are thinking that these people need to learn English.
- Have yet to see that opinion voiced except by you!
- Yes, so many right wing Americans on Lemmy

Ja