262 At Customs in Frankfurt Airport

262    At Customs in Frankfurt Airport

I am going to assume now that you want to try out your new found German in public. A word of warning here ... a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. One of the traps tourists fall into when they come to a foreign country armed with their phrase book on the plane and away they go. They volunteer something which their conversation partner interprets to mean that they speak the language. Next thing of course comes a reply in the foreign language and often fairly fast and the poor old tourist is lost floundering. My advice to you would be this ...

If you are talking to anybody in an official capacity - customs,  police, doctor  etc., try your own language first or in Germany you might like to ask ...  Bitte,  sprechen  Sie  Englisch?  It is very easy to make mistakes and cause yourself problems in situations requiring accuracy.

From here on in, I will start with dialogues using simple structures and vocabulary and up the ante as we go. Where necessary I will refer you to relevant blog posts.

Beim Zoll in Frankfurt

Beamter     Guten Tag!

Tourist        Guten Tag!

Beamter      Ihren Pass bitte!

Tourist        So, bitte schön!

Beamter      Danke schön, wie ist Ihr Name bitte?

Tourist         Mein Name ist Ross, Martin Ross.

Beamter       Wie alt sind? Wann sind Sie geboren?

Tourist         Ich bin dreißig Jahre alt und ich bin am achten August 1985 geboren.

Beamter       Und Ihre Adresse?

Tourist         Ich wohne in Newcastle in der Marktstraße 12

Beamter       Und Sie sind Australier?

Tourist          Ja,  ich komme aus Neusüdwales, Australien>

Beamter        Wie lange wollen Sie in Deutschland bleiben?

Tourist          Sechs Wochen. Wir reisen überall im Süden Deutschlands.

Beamter        Wann reisen Sie ab?

Tourist          Am zweiten November fliegen wir nach Wien.

Beamter        Gut, alles in Ordnung. Viel Spaß noch!

Tourist          Danke schön.