3 ms·
I’m a “quarter past” person but I’ve always been confused by “half ten” (which thankfully isn’t used in Australia). But in German, “half ten” means 9:30, which
by gumby 3mo ago
I’m a “quarter past” person but I’ve always been confused by “half ten” (which thankfully isn’t used in Australia). But in German, “half ten” means 9:30, which is make more sense to me (probably because I’m used to how German speech often drops words, which is less common in English)
- NopIdoN 3mo agoFor "half ten" we're just dropping a word from "half past ten". How does one get to "half ten" in German? Is it simply starting from "half to ten"?
- Someone 3mo agoHalfway to ten.
- Kon5ole 3mo ago>How does one get to "half ten" in German? Is it simply starting from "half to ten"? Never thought about it much but I think you're spot on. English uses "half past" and therefore "half 10" means 10:30, whereas most other languages use "half to" which causes "half 10" to mean 9:30. One would think this should cause confusion for international meetings often enough to be common knowledge, but I didn't know until today...
- gumby 3mo agoYes but it’s uncommon in English to simply drop a word from a sentence while pretty common in German casual discourse. The only other English common case I can think of is the American “I could [not] care less” dropping “not” which is also confusing.