Coffee Break German

Lesson 24
Study Notes

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 1 of 16

LESSON NOTES

DARF ICH MIT HERRN SCHMIDT SPRECHEN?

It’s time to learn to use the phone in German. In this lesson you’ll
become familiar with lots of phrases which will come in useful when
dealing with phone calls in German. You’ll also learn more about
dative pronouns and about the concept of Kurorte in German-
speaking areas.

INTRODUCTION
In the introductory conversation, Thomas uses an expression which
we’ll come back to later in the lesson:

Mark: Hallo zusammen!

Thomas: Und herzlich Willkommen zu Coffee Break German, der
Kurs der euch hilft euer Deutsch zu verbessern.

Thomas: Es ist Zeit anzufangen!

der Kurs der euch hilft

the course which helps you

euer Deutsch zu verbessern

to improve your German

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 2 of 16

es ist Zeit anzufangen
it’s time to begin

A REVIEW OF MÜSSEN
Based on what we learned in the last lesson, Thomas and Mark
reviewed some parts of the verb müssen, “to have to”.

Sie müssen diese Tabletten nehmen

you must (formal) take these tablets

Sie müssen
you must (formal)

du musst
you must (informal)

ich muss
I must

er/sie muss
he/she must

Note the difference in pronunciation between ich muss, du musst,

er/sie muss and sie müssen: the u and ü are pronounced
differently.

Müssen is a modal verb:

ich muss ein Ticket kaufen

I have to buy a ticket

As you can see from this example, ich muss sends the infinitive to

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 3 of 16

the end of the sentence. Here are some other examples:

ich kann ein Ticket kaufen

I can buy a ticket

wo kann ich ein Ticket kaufen?

where can I buy a ticket?

USING THE PHONE IN GERMAN

Continuing the idea of using the modal verbs, we can use the
expression kann ich ... infinitive in the following sentence:

kann ich mit Steffi sprechen?

can I speak to Steffi?

In German it is more normal to ask if you can speak “with” someone,

rather than “to” someone as we do in English.

ich muss mit Steffi sprechen

I must speak to Steffi

darf ich mit Steffi sprechen?

may I speak to Steffi?

The word darf comes from the infinitive dürfen, another modal
verb. Darf ich ... is a polite way of asking “may I...?”

darf ich mit Frau Schmidt sprechen?

may I speak to Mrs. Schmidt?

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 4 of 16

darf ich mit Herrn Schmidt sprechen?
may I speak to Mr. Schmidt?

The word for “Mr.” as in “Mr Schmidt” is normally Herr. However

the preposition mit requires us to use the dative case and the word
Herr changes to Herrn in the dative.

kann ich mit Herrn Schmidt sprechen?

can I speak to Mr. Schmidt?

When starting a phone conversation in an official context you could

say something like:

Guten Tag. Mein Name ist Frau Müller.

Hello. My name is Mrs. Miller.

In a more informal context you could say:

Hallo / Servus
Hello

Another common expression you will need to use and understand is:

wer ist am Apparat?

who is speaking?

Literally this means “who is on the apparatus?”, i.e. “who is calling?”

Equally, you may also hear:

mit wem spreche ich?

with whom am I speaking?

In answer to this question you can give your name:

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 5 of 16

ich heiße Donald
My name is Donald / I’m called Donald

However a more natural way to answer the question would be:

Sie sprechen mit Frau Fischer

you are speaking to Mrs. Fischer / this is Mrs. Fischer / Mrs.
Fischer speaking

DAS ALPHABET
If you have a name which is not particularly common in a German-
speaking country it is likely that you would be asked to spell your
name. For this you’ll need to know how to say the alphabet in
German! The table below provides the pronunciation of each letter in
German. Pay particular attention to the letters c, h, j, v, w and y.

LETTER PRONUNCIATION LETTER PRONUNCIATION

a ah n enn

b beh o oh

c tseh p peh

d deh q koo

e eh r err

f eff s ess

g geh t teh

h ha u ooh

i eeh v fow

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 6 of 16

 LETTER PRONUNCIATION LETTER PRONUNCIATION

j yot w veh

k kah x ex

l ell y oopsehlon

m emm z tsett

Note that in the alphabet pronunciation columns the pronunciation is

offered as a guide for pronunciation: these are not official spellings of
the German letters. Note also that the sound ‘eh’ used in a number of
the pronunciations is a short ‘eh’, similar to a short version of the
letter “a” in the word “lady”. Pay careful attention to how Thomas
pronounces the letters in the audio recording.

If you are asked to spell your name, the question you will hear is:

wie buchstabiert man das?

how do you spell it?

The word buchstabiert comes from the verb buchstabieren,

meaning “to spell”, and this in turn comes from the noun der
Buchstabe, meaning “the letter” (as in a, b, c, etc.)

You may also hear:

können Sie das (bitte) buchstabieren?

can you spell that (please)?

Having spelled your name, you may be asked to wait, or to “hold on”:

einen Moment, bitte

a moment, please

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 7 of 16

You may wonder why this is in the dative case. It’s because the
expression is a shortened form of a phrase like können Sie einen
Moment warten? where einen Moment is the object of the
sentence.

So, you’ve managed to ask to speak to someone but it’s possible that
the person isn’t available:

leider ist Herr Schmidt nicht verfügbar

unfortunately Mr. Schmidt is not available

leider ist Herr Schmidt nicht hier

unfortunately Mr. Schmidt is not here

Note in both these phrases the sentence begins with leider and the
verb must come in second position, so the subject and the verb invert.
Consider the normal word order in Herr Schmidt ist nicht
verfügbar, but when you introduce the word leider this must come
first. The verb must remain in second position, so the subject comes
after the verb: leider ist Herr Schmidt nicht verfügbar.

You may be asked to phone back again later. You may hear either of
these expressions:

können Sie später nochmal anrufen?

can you phone back later?

können Sie später noch einmal anrufen?

can you phone back later?

When saying “goodbye” on the phone, you don’t say auf

Wiedersehen, because you are not “seeing” the person. Literally
auf Wiedersehen means “until we see each other again”. Instead
you use:

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 8 of 16

auf Wiederhören
until we hear each other again

CONVERSATION
Mark and Thomas put all the words and phrases from this lesson into
a sample conversation featuring “Donald McKay” who is phoning Mr.
Fischer who works at the Hotel am Berghof.

Receptionist: Guten Tag. Hotel am Berghof.

Donald McKay: Guten Tag. Darf ich mit Herrn Fischer
sprechen?
Receptionist: Mit wem spreche ich?
Donald McKay: Ich heiße Donald McKay.
Receptionist: Können Sie das buchstabieren?
Donald McKay: M-C-K-A-Y
Receptionist: OK, danke. Einen Moment, bitte. [...] Leider ist
Herr Fischer nicht verfügbar. Können Sie später
noch einmal anrufen?
Donald McKay: Ja, danke schön. Auf Wiederhören.
Receptionist: Auf Wiederhören.

GRAMMAR GURU

Hello Grammar fans! This is your Grammar

Guru speaking, and today I'm back to help you
with a little grammar point that popped up a
couple of lessons ago. If you think back to

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 9 of 16

 lesson 22, Thomas told us how to say that part of your body hurts.
We had the relatively simple way of saying “I have a headache/I
have ear ache”, which was ich habe Kopfschmerzen/
Ohrenschmerzen. But you'll remember that we can't use this
construction for all parts of the body, just like you wouldn't say I
have hand ache in English. We'd be much more likely to say “I
have a sore hand”, or “my hand hurts”. And so that we can say this
in German, Thomas introduced us to a new construction - meine
Hand tut mir Weh, which means something along the lines of
“my hand does to me hurt”.
What we're going to focus on in this lesson is the word mir, which
is the dative form of the personal pronoun ich. In fact, you'll
recognise the first and second person forms already, from when
you're asking how someone is - Wie geht es dir? or Wie geht es
Ihnen?, so dir and Ihnen are the second person forms in the
dative, and when you reply, you'd say Mir geht es... using the
first person. What you're literally saying is “how goes it to you?”
and “to me it goes...”.
This word mir is very useful: you use it to say “I am cold” - “to me,
it is cold”, mir ist kalt. Of course if you’re talking about the
weather you say es ist kalt, but if you’re talking about yourself
then you need to say “it is cold to me”, mir ist kalt. We also heard
in the lesson mir ist schwindlig – “to me, it is dizzy”, or more
naturally “I’m feeling dizzy”.
The dative forms of the personal pronouns are also used after
certain verbs. These are often verbs which require an indirect
object, like geben, meaning to give. You “give something TO
someone”. In English, when you use this verb, you need the
subject, which is the person doing the giving, a direct object, which
is the thing that that person is giving, and an indirect object,
which is the person you are giving the thing to.
So, for example, in the sentence “you give the book to me”, “you” is
the subject, the book is the direct object, and “to me” is the indirect
object. You could also turn that around to say “you give me the
book”, but although we've changed the word order, the book is still

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 10 of 16

 the direct object and “me” is still the indirect object. In German,
then, that sentence would be du gibst mir das Buch – you give
to me the book. Another example would be ich gebe dir das
Buch, I give to you the book, or “I give the book to you”. So, the
idea here is that mir and dir really mean “to me” and “to you”,
even though we don't always say that in English.
This it turning out to be a bit of a marathon grammar session but
stick with me – there’s just one more thing to do!
Now that we know when this dative form of the personal pronoun
is used, it's time you learned the dative forms of all of the personal
pronouns. What I'll do is give you the nominative form of each
personal pronoun first, followed by its dative form.

NOMINATIVE DATIVE

1ST PERS SING ich mir

2ND PERS SING du dir

3RD PERS SING (M) er ihm

3RD PERS SING (F) sie ihr

1ST PERS PLUR wir uns

2ND PERS PLUR ihr euch

3RD PERS PLUR sie ihnen

Don’t forget that the third person plural is also used for the
“you” (formal) form, but you need to remember that the words are
capitalised: Sie and Ihnen.

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 11 of 16

 I know that this is probably a lot to take in, but if you’re using the
lesson notes, we’ve provided a handy table which you should be
able to follow easily and this will help you learn these pronouns
more effectively. With that I’ll hand you back to the studio. Bis
bald!

CULTURAL CORRESPONDENT
In previous lessons we have looked at language associated with health
and well-being. In this cultural report, Julia tells us about the
concept of Kurorte.

Hallo alle zusammen. Ich bin’s wieder,

Julia, eure Kulturkorrespondentin and
today I’m here with another Cultural
Correspondent report for you. I thought I’d
tell you a bit about the whole idea of Kurorte
– which are “spa towns” and play an
important part in the health of native
Germans, Swiss and Austrians.

Let me explain a little about the idea of Kurorte, or Kurbäder –

literally “cure places”, or places where you can find a cure for
health problems. These are spa towns or resorts which offer
various forms of hydrotherapy which can include cold or mineral
water treatments or hot thermal baths. There are many Kurorte
in the German-speaking parts of the world, many of which are
called Bad … something, like Bad Salzungen, Bad Liebenstein, and
indeed the famous town of Baden Baden. In order to achieve
official Kurort status, the towns have to meet a certain number of
requirements including offering specific types of therapy - and of
course they have to be comfortable places for visitors with
particular problems to visit. Not all Kurorte have “Bad” in their

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 12 of 16

 name – other examples include Aachen, Wiesbaden and
Heringsdorf. Different places offer different types of therapy: for
example Luftkurorte or Seebäder focus on air, Heilbäder
focus on thermal treatments.

Very often people with particular conditions can be prescribed a

period of time in a Kurort for treatment and rehabilitation. For
example, it’s quite possible that a doctor could recommend a six-
week stay in a Kurort for a patient overcoming a long illness or
recuperating after an operation. The patient would spend a period
of time in the Kurort, undergoing various thermal treatments,
swimming, spending lots of time in the open air, and so on. The
best thing is that this treatment can often be completely paid for
from existing health insurance.

There you have it, another report from me. It’s back to the studio
with Thomas and Mark!

DAS REICHT FÜR HEUTE

Ready for more? Turn the page to continue with the

bonus materials for this lesson.

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 13 of 16

CORE VOCABULARY
kann ich mit Steffi sprechen?
can I speak to Steffi?

ich muss mit Steffi sprechen

I must speak to Steffi

darf ich mit Steffi sprechen?

may I speak to Steffi?

darf ich mit Frau Schmidt sprechen?

may I speak to Mrs. Schmidt?

darf ich mit Herrn Schmidt sprechen?

may I speak to Mr. Schmidt?

kann ich mit Herrn Schmidt sprechen?

can I speak to Mr. Schmidt?

wer ist am Apparat?

who is speaking?

mit wem spreche ich?

with whom am I speaking?

Sie sprechen mit Frau Fischer

you are speaking to Mrs. Fischer / this is Mrs. Fischer / Mrs.
Fischer speaking

wie buchstabiert man das?

how do you spell it?

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 14 of 16

können Sie das (bitte) buchstabieren?
can you spell that (please)?

einen Moment, bitte

a moment, please

leider ist Herr Schmidt nicht verfügbar

unfortunately Mr. Schmidt is not available

leider ist Herr Schmidt nicht hier

unfortunately Mr. Schmidt is not here

können Sie später nochmal anrufen?

can you phone back later?

können Sie später noch einmal anrufen?

can you phone back later?

auf Wiederhören
until we hear each other again

BONUS CONTENT
In the bonus audio content for this lesson we focus on some sample
answering machine messages.

der Anrufbeantworter
answering machine

The text of these answering machine messages is given below:

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 15 of 16

1. Hallo. Das ist Familie Pirklbauer. Leider sind wir im Moment nicht
zu Hause. Bitte hinterlassen Sie eine Nachricht nach dem Ton.”

2. Kein Anschluss unter dieser Nummer”

3. Das ist die Mailbox von Herr Schumann. Leider bin ich im Moment
nicht im Büro. Bitte hinterlassen Sie eine Nachricht und ich rufe Sie
so schnell wie möglich zurück.”

hinterlassen
to leave

eine Nachricht
message

der Ton
tone, beep

der Anschluss
connection

im Büro < in dem Büro

in the office

ich rufe Sie so schnell wie möglich zurück

I’ll call you back as soon as possible

Coffee Break German: Lesson 24 - Notes page 16 of 16