This week in German, we worked on travel related words: trains, planes, busses and their related stops. We also worked on “seperable verbs” (Trennbare Verben) for the first time: words like aussteigen and abfahren.
Much of the travel related vocabulary is more familiar to me than it might otherwise be. Working on a map search product with a team based in Berlin means that I’ve spent a lot of time looking at data around Flughäfen (airports), Bahnhöfe, und so weiter. I also understand the difference between die S-Bahn und die U-Bahn – though admittedly, “The one that starts with U is the one that often runs underground” makes that pretty simple.
Seperable verbs are interesting: When conjugated, the prefix is separated from the root. So, with the verb aussteigen, which means something like “to get off” something like a train, when you conjugate to end up with “I get off the train”, you end up with “Ich steige dem Zug aus” – the prefix moves to the end of the sentence.
For one of our homework assignments, I had to describe the route from the airport to my house using public transit. This is what I created.
Du steigst am Airport, in die silberne Linie S1 Richtung South Station ein. In die South Station, steigst du um in die rote Linie Richtung Alewife. Du steigst in Central Square aus. Mein Hause ist in Central Square.