[Lexicog] Re: Changes in German usage

[Margaret Marks]

On 8/24/05, Patrick Hanks <hanks at bbaw.de> wrote:
> 
> '
> 
> In Germany, there are notices in parks which appear to _give permission_ 
> for lying on the grass -- "Liegewiese", literally something like "lying-on 
> meadow". 
> This, too, strikes a Brit. as odd, but maybe there is a pragmatic 
> implication that 
> dogs should not be allowed to foul it, nor bicycles ridden over the 
> recumbent 
> persons stretched out there in the sunshine. 
>  
It can be very countrified. Here in Fürth, there are a whole lot of Wiesen 
that may not be walked on, especially with dogs, between March and 
September. They don't want dogs fouling the grass because it's cut and dried 
for fodder, and they don't want the storks disturbed. There is also an 
aggressive dog-owning faction that insists on invading the meadows because 
'we pay dog taxes and this is a wicked doghating society'. This is a 
difficult place for dogs, especially after all the news about small children 
being mauled or killed. Maybe your Hundewiese is a place where dogs are 
allowed off the lead?

I do have a feeling there's more emphasis on fears about all sorts of 
dangers than there is in Britain.

Margaret Marks (delurking)
www.margaret-marks.com/Transblawg <http://www.margaret-marks.com/Transblawg>
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