Quote:
Originally posted by Dom
Well Billy, I just happen to know what that means ;-)
It is a greeting between FISHERMEN -- i.e., there really is no English conversion that can be used all the time in this greeting. Most times it is meant as "Good Fishing" but can also be used as "Hi Fisherman" or "Goodbye Fisherman" or "Hello Fishermen" when a few are sitting at a table.
In other words, it is the equivalent greeting/hello/goodbye/goodluck to Fishermen as Waidmannsheil is to hunters.
Hey, what were all those fishermen doing in a gunshop anyway? Waidmannseil, Dom.
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dom
they weren't fishermen, not that day anyway, they were hunters and most ex military and we were discussing germany, when someone mentioned "petri heil". i thought it was a fishing term and told them so. i didn't hunt in germany, but my wife and i were both fishermen. that is where i remember the expression from.
it was in bismarck, yes as in otto von bismarck. the town was named to attract german settlers to the area. worked quite well. it was a big drawing card in bismarck if you were bi-lingual german/english. a lot of stores and companies wanted employees that spoke german. that went on through the 30's, 40's, 50's. german , finnish, norwegian, swedish and polish are also spoken here quite regularly.
thanks for the info, i appreciate it.
by the way where are you in germany? i was stationed at bitburg. i loved that part of germany. our kids really adapted to it. for them it was almost like home. bitburg was about the size of minot and bismarck. we lived in a small farming community called niederstedem. my wife was really accepted there, she spoke german from year one and she and the ladies from the village would get together for coffee klatches all the time.
thanx again
bill