jetyhimalajsky

[jetyhimalajsky]

whoever made the decision to make umpires wear cameras... you are a legend

this is genuinely the funniest thing i've ever seen

[jetyhimalajsky]

Právě jsem si vzpomněla na frázi "vyser si oko".

Čeština je tak krásná 💖💖💖💖

Hoďte mi sem vaše oblíbence! :3

[jetyhimalajsky]

Já, když je nebe modrý a zlatý

[jetyhimalajsky]

"women are always like—"

"men are always like—"

shut up shut up shut up shut up shutupshutupshutupsHUT UP 🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄🐄 gender essentialism-hating herd of cows running you over

[jetyhimalajsky]

[jetyhimalajsky]

EU Kennzeichen / License Plates / Number Plates

in another post I mentioned that my fiance and I like to talk about where the cars around us come from when we're on the Autobahn, and that that's not possible in all european countries

for those outside the EU or outside of Germany I thought it might be very slightly interesting to go into more detail!

European license plates all look the same at first glance:

they're white (in a few countries yellow), have a blue stripe on the left with the EU stars at the top and 1-3 letters in white or yellow for the country at the bottom. The other (big) lettering is usually black. Sometimes there are flags/icons on the right side too.

You'll find that some other european countries have similar designs for their license plates, though not necessarily on purpose. In the UK you'll see both non-EU license plates and EU-license plates (with "GB" as the country code), though the latter is only permitted if the car was fitted with it before 2021.

Before talking more about German license plates, I want to note that there are various exceptions to the standard EU-license plate. Temporary license plates, plates for very old vehicles, for military/police/state vehicles, etc. often have a design that is different from the standard, including letter color, stripes left and right, etc.

Deutsche Kennzeichen

(i'll only talk about standard car license plates, thus ignore old timers, motor bike plates, etc.)

German license plates look like this:

It is always 1-3 letters, another 1-2 letters, 1-4 numbers

In total, it may only be 8 digits long

Electric cars can end in an "E" (optional)

The two letter groups are separated by space for round stickers. On the rear plate are two stickers: the "TÜV-Plakette" on the top (indicates when the next mandatory vehicle check is due), and a sticker for the Stadtkreis or Landkreis that registered the plate on the bottom. The front plate only has the Kreis-sticker.

First letter group

The first letter group always shows the Verwaltungsbezirk (≈ administrative division/district in which the car is registered (because license plates are always registered to a vehicle, not a person, as apparently is the case in other european countries)).

This is what I meant with talking about "where a car is from". The first couple letters tell you where a car is registered (and usually then too, that the owner lives in that area; you're obliged to register your car in your new district if you move, but idk how much that is really enforced)

There are more than 700 districts. Sometimes these are singular large cities (like Berlin, Cologne, ...), often they are larger (especially rural) areas.

Most people have one or two districts with which they associate bad driving. I come from the north-west of Baden-Württemberg. When I see a shitty driver and they have a "PF" or "GER" district code, I always "of fucking course it's a fucking Pforzheimer/Germersheimer"

There's also some silly mnemonics some people employ (like my fiance who points at every SÜW car (district: Südliche Weinstraße) and says "sie üben wieder" ("they're practicing again").

Beyond getting annoyed at vague areas, it's also just a trivia game to pass the time. Occasionally we'll ask one another if we know a certain district code and, if not, google it.

You'll also learn new ones if you're driving and notice an influx of a certain district code on plates (like how I learned that PS is Pirmasens yesterday)

The letters of a code usually correspond to letters in the full name. One exception is plates of Hansestädte. Hansestädte are cities that belonged to a collective of trade cities in the middle ages, primarily port cities or cities along big rivers (e.g. Rhein, Neckar, Elbe). Six of them (200 overall, 70 with active hanseatic politics) have their district code start with an "H":

HB - Hansestadt Bremen

HH - Hansestadt Hamburg

HGW - Hansestadt Greifswald

HL - Hansestadt Lübeck

HST - Hansestadt Stralsund

HRO - Hansestadt Rostock

HWI - Hansestadt Wismar

(Bremen is why Heidelberg, a large city in the north of BaWü is labeled HD instead of HB (which would be natural since it's two words Heidel-Berg))

December 2023 also saw a first in German license plates: a city is close to running out of combinations and thus cars in München (Munich) can now have one of two district codes: M and MUC (new)

Second letter group

The second group of letters can be chosen freely by the person registering a car. There are certain forbidden combinations, most because of nazi-associations (KZ, HJ, SS,), some of them vary from Bundesland to Bundesland. Singular letters are sometimes forbidden because of what they spell with the letters of the first letter group.

Of course a general restriction is that there can't be two identical license plates.

Beyond these restrictions, the second letter group is of course often used to make words (if the district code allows), though often with incorrect spelling. In Karlsruhe (district code: KA), common license plate words are KA LT (cold), KAOS (das Chaos - the chaos), KA OT (der Chaot - the chaotic person), KA TZE/KA ZE (die Katze - the cat), KA LB (das Kalb - the calf (animal)) ...

If making a word is not possible or desired, many people instead go for initials (of themselves, them and their partner, their children, etc)

Number group

The numbers are also free to choose, though there are also forbidden number combinations (14, 88, ...). Additionally, the limit of 8 digits must be observed.

People often chose personally significant dates for better memorabilty.

Relevance

Is any of this important or necessary to know for tourists? Absolutely not.

But maybe other Germans want to share where the shitty drivers in their area come from (if that's not too personal, there is of course some information to be derived from this) OR what fun words they've seen or know of!

Personal favorites sind DEL LE (District: Delmenhorst; "dent") und PIR:AT (Pirna; "pirate")

[jetyhimalajsky]

"nedá se svítit" je vlastně takový ekvivalent k "there is nothing we can do"

[jetyhimalajsky]

If a girl is to do the same superman thing where he takes off his disguise, we just look pervy. Not the same effect

[jetyhimalajsky]

dachte bei der Überschrift kurz Postillon, aber nein. Danke Spiegel

[jetyhimalajsky]

horká čokoláda by průjem

[jetyhimalajsky]

wonderful pair of posts on the dash tonight

[jetyhimalajsky]

[jetyhimalajsky]

I miss her hole (the headphone jack on the cell phone)

[jetyhimalajsky]

an absolute fuckton of people at pride rn

[jetyhimalajsky]

HAPPY PRIDE!!

[jetyhimalajsky]

Růže jsou rudé,

kabáty maj velké límce,

[jetyhimalajsky]