Let’s have some fun with this weird German language!
In this series of posts, I’ll show you how to make your German speaking colleagues laugh, with ONE simple sentence.
Die Arschkarte ziehen
(The ass card to draw)
First of all, let me give you a warning (eine Warnung).
YES, this is a more colloquial expression.
I mean, “der Arsch” means “ass” in German.
So please, just use this expression with someone you know very well and someone who already laughed about some of your jokes (über einige deiner Witze) :-)
Ok having said this, now let’s dig into what this expression (dieser Ausdruck) means and when we use it (und wann wir ihn benutzen).
If you’re a football fan, you know that there is a red card and a yellow card (eine rote Karte und eine gelbe Karte).
The red card is to send a player off the game (aus dem Spiel).
For the player, this feels like a loss and it’s frustrating because he is out of this game and he will miss even some more games (und er wird sogar einige weitere Spiele verpassen).
And you might remember that the referees usually have the yellow card in their shirt (in ihrem Hemd).
And they usually pick the red card from their shorts (aus der Hose).
And in this sense, we call the red card “die Arschkarte” (ass card).
Got it!?
So when we say in German:
- Du hast die Arschkarte gezogen.
We actually mean:
- You drew the short straw
- You drew the shortest straw
- You got the shit end of the stick
So here’s your action step:
Imagine your German-speaking colleague Winfried comes to you with a pile of documents (mit einem Stapel Dokumente).
And he goes:
“Ok, this is going to be a long working day for us today. Our boss wants us to work through all these documents (all diese Dokumente).”
Look at him frustrated and say to him:
- Da haben wir mal wieder die Arschkarte gezogen! (Seems like we’ve once again drawn the shit end of the stick.)
And this is what it sounds like:
Then, tell me in the comments below how he reacted :-)