Hoggin' Wild

This little piggy went to market,
This little piggy stayed at home,
This little piggy had roast beef,
This little piggy had none.
And this little piggy went...
"Wee wee wee" all the way home...


One theme that crops up in virtually every corner of German language is the pig and all things piggish. Words with a pig reference carry the double-edged sense of filthy yet tasty, wild and destructive yet happy-spirited and funny, stupid yet cunning, ugly yet undeniably cute, wild and undisciplined yet not mean in spirit. German offers three basic nouns describing the various forms a pig may take: Sau (sow), Schwein (hog), and Ferkel (piglet) (and its synonym Schweinchen, or little pig or piggy). These three terms are then combined with a variety of other words to yield a vivid and picturesque vocabulary. Here are a few of my favorites:

Schweinegeld (literal translation: 'hog money') figuratively means a lot of money, or more vividly, megabucks, as in "he earns megabucks" or "that costs megabucks." If you are going shopping, there are two words you need to know: saubillig ('sow cheap'), which is best translated as dirt cheap, and sauteuer, ('sow expensive'), which means exorbitantly expensive or, if you want to get really gritty, f**king expensive.

If you want to go to a soccer game, you will need to make sure you don't run into a Schweinebande ('pack of hogs') that may be out and about. Figuratively, this term means pack of hooligans or pack of bastards. Nevertheless, it'a also often used in a more affectionate manner by farmers or guinea pig enthusiasts to describe their stable of animals.

But going back to its nastier connotation, a true Schweinebande is also likely to include a Schweinehund ('hog hound'), which, depending on the context, can mean a ratfink or bastard or that evil critter inside you that makes you cave in to worldly temptations, or even a Schweinepriester ('hog priest'), which is best translated as a son of a bitch. This troop of rascals may also include a few Schweinigel ('hog hedgehogs'), which are considered to occupy the lowest rung on the human social structure because they are the most coarse and most unclean characters conceivable. When this group of hooligans talk to each other, they schweinigeln, which means that they talk smut.

After the soccer game, these troublemakers often trash the city center, leaving behind a Schweinerei (a mess or great disorder that verges on being scandalous). But Schweinerei is also a quite flexible word in that it can also be used to describe the mess you create when you spill your cup of morning coffee all over your work desk.

Fortunately, this mishap does not make you a Schweinehund, Schweinepriester or Schweinigel, or, just as bad, a Saukerl ('sow guy'), which is basically a lout or yokel, or a Saubär ('sow bear'), which means an uncouth fellow or filthy bastard, or a Drecksau ('filthy sow'), or a Dreckschwein ('filthy hog'). A couple of adjectives that may be used to describe such characters are saublöd ('sow silly') or saudumm ('sow dumb'), both of which mean stupid or idiotic or really dumb. As you can see, the Germans really have that area covered.

As you and all of those other soccer fans are headed to the city arena for the afternoon game, you will be hoping for clear skies and pleasant temperatures. But your prayers will likely remain unanswered. After all, this is Germany, and you are more likely to get cloudy skies, one form of precipitation or another, cool to cold and clammy temperatures, and maybe even some chilly winds. The Germans call this type of weather Sauwetter ('sow weather'), whose English equivalent is nasty weather or lousy weather. And it may occur any time of year.

For example, today is June 6, and the weather here is saukalt ('sow cold'), in other words, it's cold as a witch's tit. The temperature is in the low 50s, heavy clouds are sprinkling us with drizzling rain, the air is humid, all in all downright messy.

In these conditions, you are not going to catch me at any outdoor arena. If I have to see the game, I will stay home in my saugemütlichen ('sow warm-and-cozy') apartment and feel sauwohl ('sow good'), which is equivalent to happy as a clam, although this may cause my schweinegroßen ('fat-ass') rear-end to expand even further and make me sauschwer ('sow heavy'), that is, heavy as a piano. But I'm not going to worry about that, especially if my team wins, which would be downright saugeil ('sow great'), or fantastic or really cool. On the other hand, if my team loses, that will be saumäßig ('sowlike'), which means beastly or rotten or lousy, and I will feel sauschlecht ('sow bad'), which is somewhere between horrible and awfully bad, as well as saumüde ('sow tired'), i.e. dog-tired.

Some Germans find all of this saulustig ('sow funny'), i.e. hysterical, or at least saukomisch ('sow odd'), which means hilarious or damn funny.

And there is one last word that you are not likely to find in any language except German: Pistensau ('ski slope sow'), which is a highly inconsiderate skier who hogs the ski slopes. The image of a pushy pig on skis knocking down everyone else as it rips toward the bottom of the snow hill is one that all of the Sauwetter in the world can't erase.