Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Cheers!

So you may be wondering why I always end my postings with "zum Wohl!", and you may have guessed why.  It's a German phrase for "cheers!" that is literally translated as "to the health".  I was doing some reading online tonight and found out that "zum Wohl!" (pronounced "zoom vole") may be more commonly used in a formal setting when toasting with wine. The German word for "cheers!" that is more commonly used when drinking beer (in any setting) is "Prost!" (pronounced "proast") or its variant "Prosit!".  (Honestly, I knew this at one point.  I studied German for 8 years and minored in it in college, but when you don't use it, you lose it!)

For how to say cheers in just about any language you can think of, check out www.awa.dk or www.omniglot.com (includes some sound bytes of words pronounced in the native tongue). My favorite is Zulu: "oogywawa".

Thanks for reading - Prost!

No comments:

Post a Comment