The Future Tense: Present for Future

There are several ways to refer to the future in German.

The easiest way is to use a time phrase together with the Present Tense.

Beispiel: Am Sonntag gehe ich in die Stadt. - On Sunday I’ll go into town.

Am Sonntag is the time phrase. Because the time phrase is at the beginning of the sentence it has to be followed immediately by the verb gehe, as in a German sentence the verb always has to be the second idea.

Note that in German we use the Present Tense here compared to the English will + infinitive.

Other common time phrases are:

morgen                                 tomorrow

übermorgen                          the day after tomorrow

nächste Woche                     next week

nächstes Wochenende         next weekend

nächstes Jahr                       next year

in zwei Tagen                        in two days

im Jahr 2012                         in 2012

Task

Say or write the following sentences in German. Remember to put the correct verb form in second place. All the verbs used have been Words of the Day in the blog so that you can easily check the correct forms.

1. In two days he’ll go to Germany. (to Germany – nach Deutschland)

2. Next week we’ll travel to Spain. (to Spain – nach Spanien)

3. Next weekend they’ll eat pizza. (pizza – Pizza)

4. The day after tomorrow her brother will sing in a concert. (in a concert – in einem Konzert)

5. Tomorrow I’ll laze about at home. (at home – zu Hause)

Answer Key:

1. In zwei Tagen fährt er nach Deutschland.

2. Nächste Woche fahren/ reisen wir nach Spanien.

3. Nächstes Wochenende essen sie Pizza.

4. Übermorgen singt ihr Bruder in einem Konzert.

5. Morgen faulenze ich zu Hause.

Word of the Day: reisen

reisen - to travel

ich reise                                   I travel

du reist                                    you travel

er/sie/es reist                         he/she/it travels

wir reisen                                we travel

ihr reist                                    you (pl) travel

sie reisen                                 they travel

Beispiel: Sie reist jedes Jahr mehrmals in die Vereinigten Staaten.

Example: She travels to the United States several times per year.

Imperfect: regular - reiste

Past Participle: gereist (sein)

Articles: Definite Articles

Today we are looking at articles. There are two groups of articles, definite and indefinite ones. Definite articles are the equivalent to the English word ‘the’.
In German we have three different words for ‘the’: der, die and das; der is used for masculine nouns, die for feminine nouns, das for neuter nouns and die again for plurals.

masculine       der Mann         the man          

feminine          die Frau          the woman     

neuter             das Kind          the child         

Plural              die Männer, die Frauen, die Kinder   

Well, that’s not all there is to know; the forms we went through above are only for the nominative case. Now let’s have a look at the rest:  

German Definite Articles
	masculine	feminine	neuter	plural
Nominative case	der	die	das	die	the
Genitive cases	des	der	des	der	of the
Dative case	dem	der	dem	den	to the
Accusative case	den	die	das	die	the

Here are some examples:
Nominative: der Mann ist hier (the man is here)
Genitive: Ich habe das Buch des Mannes (I have the book of the man)

Dative: Ich gebe dem Mann ein Buch (I give the book to the man)

Accusative: Ich grüße den Mann (I greet the man)

Task

Memorize the table above. It will help you produce accurate written and spoken texts.

Word of the Day: malen

malen - to paint

ich male                                  I paint

du malst                                  you paint

er/sie/es malt                        he/she/it paints

wir malen                                we paint

ihr malt                                   you (pl) paint

sie malen                                they paint

Beispiel: Wir malen heute ein Bild.

Example: Today we are painting a picture.

Imperfect: regular - malte

Past Participle: gemalt

Word of the Day: trinken

trinken - to drink

ich trinke                                 I drink

du trinkst                                 you drink

er/sie/es trinkt                       he/she/it drinks

wir trinken                              we drink

ihr trinkt                                  you (pl) drink

sie trinken                               they drink

Beispiel: Er trinkt Cola, weil er das Getränk mag.

Example: He drinks cola because he likes the drink.

Imperfect: trank

Past Participle: getrunken

Ein Lied: 99 Luftballons von Nena

A song: 99 red balloons by Nena

This is an 80s classic by the German singer Nena.
You can listen to the song and read the German lyrics on YouTube.
Nena: 99 Luftballons

A little story about the history of the song:

While at a June 1982 concert by the Rolling Stones in West Berlin, Nena's guitarist Carlo Karges noticed that balloons were being released. As he watched them move toward the horizon, he noticed them shifting and changing shapes, where they looked nothing like a mass of balloons but some strange spacecraft (referred to in the German lyrics as a "UFO"). He thought about what might happen if they floated over the Berlin Wall to the Soviet sector.

Both the English and German versions of the song tell a story of 99 balloons floating into the air, triggering an apocalyptic overreaction by military forces. The music was composed by Uwe Fahrenkrog-Petersen, the keyboardist of Nena's band, while Karges wrote the original German lyrics.

Having achieved widespread success in Germanic Europe and Japan, plans were made for the band to take "99 Luftballons" international with an English version by Kevin McAlea, titled "99 Red Balloons", which has a more satirical tone than the original. The English version is not a direct translation of the German but contains a somewhat different set of lyrics.

Here are the lyrics (remember, it is not a literal translation):

Hast Du etwas Zeit für mich Dann singe ich ein Lied fuer Dich Von 99 Luftballons Auf ihrem Weg zum Horizont Denkst Du vielleicht grad' an mich Dann singe ich ein Lied fuer Dich Von 99 Luftballons Und dass sowas von sowas kommt	You and I in a little toy shop Buy a bag of balloons with the money we've got. Set them free at the break of dawn 'Til one by one, they were gone. Back at base, bugs in the software Flash the message, Something's out there. Floating in the summer sky. 99 red balloons go by.
99 Luftballons Auf ihrem Weg zum Horizont Hielt man fuer UFOs aus dem All Darum schickte ein General Eine Fliegerstaffel hinterher Alarm zu geben, wenn es so war Dabei war da am Horizont Nur 99 Luftballons	99 red balloons. Floating in the summer sky. Panic bells, it's red alert. There's something here from somewhere else. The war machine springs to life. Opens up one eager eye. Focusing it on the sky. Where 99 red balloons go by.
99 Duesenjaeger Jeder war ein grosser Krieger Hielten sich fuer Captain Kirk Das gab ein grosses Feuerwerk Die Nachbarn haben nichts gerafft Und fuehlten sich gleich angemacht Dabei schoss man am Horizont Auf 99 Luftballons	99 Decision Street. 99 ministers meet. To worry, worry, super-scurry. Call the troops out in a hurry. This is what we've waited for. This is it boys, this is war. The president is on the line As 99 red balloons go by.

The Perfect Tense

There are a number of ways to talk about the past in German. There is the equivalent to the English Simple Past which is called Imperfect. These are forms like I was/ had/did/went/played/ etc. In German these forms are mainly used in written language.

In spoken German the Perfect Tense is far more common. It is quite similar to the English Present Perfect Tense.

In order to say I did/ have done or I played/ have played you need a form of ‘haben’ and a past participle. Please note that there are two ways to translate it into English.

Beispiel:

ich habe gemacht       I did/ have done

ich habe gespielt         I played/ have played

Past Participles

The past participles are formed from the infinitive of the verb, e.g. spielen. Firstly, we add the prefix ‘ge’. Then we take away the ‘-en’ ending and replace it with the letter t. This works for all weak or regular verbs.

Strong/ irregular verbs

However, there are a large number of strong or irregular verbs in the German language (similar to sing – sang – sung or go – went – gone). For those verbs you need to learn the past participles. There are irregular verb lists in every good dictionary which will help you speak and write correct German.

For practice purposes there is  a small selection at the end of this blog.

Verbs of motion

There are some verbs that take ‘sein’ instead of ‘haben’ to form the Perfect Tense. These are verbs of motion such as gehen (to go), fahren (to go by means of transport), fliegen (to fly), and many more. Usually they are marked by a star or diamond in the verb lists.

To sum up, here is the pattern for forming the Perfect Tense:

A form of ‘haben’ or ‘sein’ + past participle

We looked at the forms of ‘haben’ and ‘sein’ in yesterday’s blog.

Let’s practice:

Write or say the following phrases in German. They all take ‘haben’ and have regular past participles.

1. I bought – kaufen

2. she did – machen

3. we played – spielen

4. he booked – buchen

5. they listened – hören

6. you (sg) surfed - surfen

The answer key is at the bottom of this posting.

The following list contains some common irregular past participles:

essen – gegessen        eat – eaten

trinken – getrunken    drink – drunk

singen – gesungen      sing – sung

sehen – gesehen         watch/see – watched/saw

lesen – gelesen           read – read

Form some sentences using these past participles. They all take ‘haben’.

We will look at the verbs taking ‘sein’ in another posting.

Answer key:

1. ich habe gekauft

2. sie hat gemacht

3. wir haben gespielt

4. er hat gebucht

5. sie haben gehört

6. du hast gesurft