#German fiction

[theaskew]

The Tin Drum, a novel by Günter Grass. (Pantheon, New York, 1959)

[book0ftheday]

The Tin Drum by Günter Grass, first published in 1959, translated into English from German in 1961 by Ralph Manheim, this edition printed 1990. Cover illustration by Angela Arnet.

[maxedes]

german terms of endearment for your fanfics

i‘ve recently stumbled across some fanfics about german drivers (mainly nico & seb if we‘re being honest) and quite a few liked to use german terms of endearment. thing is, that they mainly use words that aren‘t really used in germany & sound a little strange. like „liebchen“ which i have never heard anyone say irl & which frankly just sounds like bad german from an american n*zi movie. or „mädchen“ which just means girl & can be used as „mein mädchen“ (my girl) but does kinda sound like something your weird toxic first bf would say. so to make everyones lifes a little easier: some german pet names that actually get used with a little context:

Schatz (treasure)

probably the most commonly used term in german. everyone & their mom uses it for romantic partners. can be used in any situations. i think there are people who forget their partners name because they just call them Schatz. to make it even cuter you can say „Schatzi“ but use carefully since that could easily sound condescending. same goes for „Schätzchen“ which in theory makes it cuter but actually mainly sounds like a guy talking down on you.

mein Herz (my heart)

emphasis on the „mein“ just calling someone a heart is a strange thing to do. you can also say „Herzchen“ but same problem as „Schätzchen“

Liebling (my beloved, my dearest)

this is what everyone thinks liebchen is. from personal experience i‘d say it‘s a word more often used by older people but could work.

Engel/chen (angel)

actually alright. maybe also use „mein“ in front of it. „mein kleiner engel“ → my little angel

Baby / Babe (same as english lol)

gets used rather frequently. same implications as in english

Hase / Hasi (bunny)

not inherently romantic/sexual. a cute one.

Maus/i (mouse/little mouse)

has been vERY popularized by the kids™️ and i mean that in the sense that quite literally everyone & everything gets called „maussss“. maybe to the point where it‘s been a little overused.

Schnecke / Schnecki (snail)

or schnegge. but with that your easily in a little creepy territory. schnecki is kinda cute though. i think my mom used to call me that so it doesn‘t have to be romantic. also no, i don‘t know why you would call someone snail as a cute little nickname and no it doesn‘t have to relate to their general speed (walking, driving or thinking)

Spatz / Spätzchen / Spazl (sparrow)

i don‘t know what germans have with this bird but it is popular. the last version „spatzl“ is mainly used in southern germany. it‘s what my parents call each other so if someone tried to call me that my toenails would curl up and not in a good way.

Dicker (fatty)

not to be confused with digger/digga which comes from the word but is more used like „bro“ (yeas i know what it looks like a first glace, pinky promise thats not what it is). only fun if used endearingly.

Sonnenschein (sunshine)

for my seb girlies (gn). it‘s a pretty long word though so probably not something to call someone on a regular basis

in conclusion: most of them are still bad and maybe even a little icky. i think the real way to go would be an inside joke or just a shorter or cute version of their name. german really isn‘t the language to be romantic in, in spite of what göthe might what you to think. i literally couldn‘t think of any more so i googeled & saw some of the most disturbing pet names imaginable.

[writingwithcolor]

Characters reconnecting with their ancestral cultures in an interplanetary setting

@pixiedustandpetrichor asked:

Hi! I am writing a novel with three main female characters in an interplanetary setting. They grow up as orphans in an Irish-coded country and as children are mostly exposed to solely that culture, but they leave after becoming adults. Character A is Tuareg-coded, B Mongolian-coded, and C is Germanic-coded. It isn’t central to the story, but I would like them to get in touch with/learn more about their ancestral cultures, especially in terms of religion. A does this by actually visiting the planet her parents came from, but B and C do not. What can I do to depict their relationships with said cultures and their journey to reconnect with them? Would it be realistic for each of them to have different mixed feelings about participating in these cultures and for them to retain some sense of belonging to the culture they grew up in as well? Thank you for your time.

Hello, asker! WWC doesn’t have Tuareg or Mongol mods at the moment, so we're not able to speak to the specifics of cultural and religious reconnection for these particular groups. Still, I want to take this opportunity to provide some general context and elements to consider when writing Tuareg-coded characters, or other characters from groups that have experienced colonization in the real world. My fellow mods will then share thoughts about cultural reconnection in general and with respect to Germanic heritage in particular.

Drawing inspiration from groups that have experienced colonization

As you’re probably aware, the Tuareg are an ethnic group indigenous to North Africa. As with many indigenous groups, they have experienced colonization multiple times over the course of their history. Colonization often leads to the loss or erasure of certain aspects of culture as the colonized people are pressured to conform to the culture of the dominant group. In many cases, it’s near impossible to say what the ancestral culture of a colonized group was prior to colonization.

When coding a fictional culture based on a group that was colonized in the real world, it's important to ask questions about:

Which aspects of culture you're portraying

Where these aspects come from

Whether you're ready to tackle their implications for the world you're building

It’s not necessarily wrong to use elements of coding that draw from cultural aspects influenced by colonization. As I said, it can be very difficult, even impossible, to portray a “pure” culture as it would have been had colonization not occurred–because we simply can’t know what that alternate history would look like, and because so much has been lost or intentionally suppressed that the gaps in our knowledge are too wide to breach. But it’s important to be aware of where these cultural elements are coming from.

Where is your coding coming from and what are the implications?

For example, while the Tuareg today are majoritarily Muslim, this was not the case prior to the Arab conquest of North Africa. Some elements of Tuareg culture today, such as tea ceremonies, are derived from the influence of Arab and Muslim culture and likely did not exist prior to the 20th century. As you’re developing the culture of the Tuareg-coded group in your fictional setting, you have to decide whether to include these elements. There is no right answer–it will depend on what you’re trying to do and why.

Is your setting in our far future, in which case we can assume your Tuareg-coded group is distantly related to today’s Tuareg?

In that case, they will probably have kept many cultural aspects their ancestors acquired through their interactions with other cultures around them–including cultural groups that colonized them. They may–let’s build hopeful worlds!–have reclaimed aspects of their ancestral culture they’d been forced to abandon due to colonization. They may also have acquired new aspects of culture over time. This can be very fun to explore if you have the time and space to do so.

I would recommend speaking with Tuareg people to get a better grasp of how they see their culture evolving over the next however many centuries or millennia, what they wish to see and what seems realistic to them.

Alternatively, maybe your setting is a secondary world unrelated to ours and you only want to draw inspiration from the real-world Tuareg, not represent them exactly. In that case, you need to decide which period of history you’re drawing from, as Tuareg culture is different today from what it was 50 years ago, and different still from 200 years ago or 1000 years ago. You’ll need to research the historical period you’re choosing in order to figure out what was happening at that time and what the cultural influences were. If it’s pre-colonial, you’ll probably want to avoid including cultural elements influenced by colonization from groups that arrived later on.

Finally, if the time period you’re drawing from is post-colonial:

Are you planning to account for the effects of colonization on Tuareg culture?

Will you have an in-world equivalent for the colonization that occurred in real life?

For example, will the Tuareg-coded characters in your world be from a nomadic culture that was forced to become sedentary over the years and lost much of their traditions due to colonial pressure to conform?

Where did this pressure come from in your world–is it different from what happened in ours? If so, how different? And what are the consequences?

Writing about colonization can be quite the baggage to bring into a fictional setting. I’m not saying it can’t be done, but it will certainly require sensitivity and care in portraying it.

In summary: think it through

I’m not saying all this to discourage you, but to point out some of the considerations at play when drawing inspiration from a real-life culture that has experienced colonization. Similar challenges arise for coding based on any other indigenous group in the world.

My advice to you, then, is to first sit down and decide where and when in history your coding is coming from, and what you’re trying to achieve with it. This will help you figure out:

which elements of contemporary Tuareg culture are pertinent to include

How much your coding will be influenced by the Tuareg’s real-life history

To what extent that will inform the rest of the world you’re creating

This, in turn, may help in deciding how to portray your character’s reconnection journey.

Again, I am not Tuareg and this is by no means meant to be an exhaustive list of considerations for writing Tuareg-coded characters, only a few places to start.

If any Tuareg or Amazigh readers would like to chime in with suggestions of their own, please do. As always, please make sure your comments adhere to the WWC code of conduct.

- Niki

Pulling from diaspora and TRA narratives of cultural reconnection

Marika here: This ask plotline could also pull directly from diaspora and TRA narratives of cultural reconnection. Many diaspora and TRA cultural reconnection stories are, in effect, about navigating the difficult process of resuscitating, or renewing ties to culture using limited resources in environments that often lack necessary cultural infrastructure or scaffolding.

See this question here to the Japanese team for suggestions of how to handle such a storyline in a similar sci-fi setting.

More reading: Japanese-coded girl from future

-Marika

Reconnecting with German heritage

Hi, it’s Shira. I’m not sure whether German-Jewish counts as Germanic for the purposes of your post but since German Jews were more assimilated than other Ashkies, Germanness does feel real and relevant to my life (especially because my father worked there for approximately the last decade of his life.) NOTE: when I see “Germanic” vs German I think of cultures from 1500 years ago, not 100-200 years ago, so I can’t help you there, but I’d be surprised as a reader if a character focused on that for reconnection to the exclusion of the 19th century etc.

People in the United States specifically, reconnecting with German heritage, often lean into Bayerischer/Bavarian kitsch, I’ve noticed. Personally, though, what I find most relevant is:

1. The food (although I’ve come to learn that what I grew up eating was closer to veal/chicken scallopini than actual schnitzel because it was drenched in lemon, but I do like the other foods like the potato salad and sweet and sour red cabbage etc.) Your character could try making one of these “ancestral” foods as a way to reconnect?

2. The classical music, because I’m a second generation professional musician – if character C plays an instrument, leaning into that might be meaningful (Beethoven, Bach, Brahms, Mendelssohn, Clara Schumann and her husband Robert, etc.)

3. The nature, especially specifics that I enjoyed during my time there – personally, I loved the bright pink flowers all over the chestnut trees, but there are a lot of choices especially because of the Alps. If C is an artist maybe they can sketch something Germany-related from old photographs they found on the Space Internet?

I think it is VERY realistic for the characters to remain connected to the culture in which they were raised, by the way, whether or not they have positive feelings about it. Culture isn’t an inherited trait. Sure, if they want to completely walk away, they can, but I bet there are still ways it will creep back in without them realizing it simply because it’s really hard to have universal knowledge of the origins of all our quirks. Plus, not everyone feels alienated from their raised-culture just because they’re genetically something else.

P.S. There is also Oktoberfest, which I don’t really get into but is a thing, and beer, which is another point of German cultural pride.

German gentiles, weigh in – y’all have your own stuff, I know! OH YEAH so for German Christians, Christmas “markets” are a whole thing. That’s worth looking up. 

–S

What do you mean by Germanic?

Hello it’s Sci! I had to study German history for my historical fantasy novel set in the late 18th century Holy Roman Empire. I am not sure what is meant by Germanic as that can encompass a variety of things.

Germanic people: from the Classical Period of Roman Empire and early Middle Ages. Similar to Mod Shira, I unfortunately can’t help very much here.

The Germanosphere: regions that spoke German, which includes modern day Germany, Austria/Hungary, Switzerland, Lichtenstein, Belgium, and Luxembourg. I generally define this as the regions captured in the Hapsburg Empire along with Switzerland usually encompassing “Central Europe.”

Modern German national identity (i.e. German): post Napoleon and the Congress of Vienna (> 1815) only including the territory of modern day Germany.*

I ask this because modern German national identity is surprisingly recent since Germany only popped up in 1871 under Otto von Bismarck. Previously, Germany was divided into smaller states and city states as a very decentralized region under the German Confederation and before that, the Holy Roman Empire. Depending on the era, you can see different conflicts and divides. During the early days of the Protestant Reformation started by Martin Luther, the northern and southern German territories generally split along Protestant-Catholic lines. The 18th century saw Austria and Prussia as the foci of global power who warred against each other even though both were part of the Holy Roman Empire.

Other states and city-states like Baden-Wurttemberg or Saxony sometimes had power but it was typically more localized compared to Austria. Post-WW2, you saw the split of Germany into West Germany run under capitalism and East Germany run under communism as a satellite Soviet state leading to more modern cultural divides. Due to heavy decentralization historically, each region had its own character with religious and cultural divides. 

Assuming that the Germanic character is not from the classical period or early Middle Ages but not from the 19th century either, you can include your character reconnecting to classical folklore like that of Krampus (if they’re Christian), German literature and music like the works of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe or Mozart, or German philosophy like Immanuel Kant.

*A major wrinkle: German royals and nobility married into other states and nations frequently with Britain and Russia being notable examples. In Britain, the House of Hanover took over after the Stuart House died without clear direct heirs. When Queen Victoria married the German prince Albert, they celebrated Christmas with a tree and brought the German tradition of a Christmas tree to Britain and the British Empire. Only during World War I did the royal family’s house of Hanover name change from House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to the more “English-sounding” Windsor. As a result, the German cultural influence may be even more widespread than we think.

However, without more specific descriptors of what Germanic means in the context of your story, it can be difficult to determine which aspects of German culture your character could reconnect to.

-Mod Sci

[dreamermonica]

BLUE LOCK BOYS + ROMANCE TROPES

—includes isagi yoichi, bachira meguru, itoshi rin, itoshi sae, michael kaiser (sorry if this asshole's part is freakishly longer than the other boys' parts. favoritism exists in this blog, unfortunately.)

—fem pronouns are used, swearing cause it's me, major crack, fluff, messy attempt at humor, teenage pining and such, god help me t.t

ISAGI YOICHI is definitely childhood friend material. sworn friends ever since diapers, promises of being together till the very end, marriage proposals at the tender age of 6—all that type of cheesy stuff that would get you squealing and have your little feet kicking in the air out of giddiness. but as time goes on with him being set on football and you doing your own thing, the promise gradually gets left behind in your heads, slowly getting buried underneath all the pressure of being an adolescent. the once childish promise only resurfaces during an unexpected reunion—with both of you having achieved your dream careers. will your puppy love rise once more from the depths of your memories and perhaps turn into something...more serious? hah. what are you talking about? this old friend of yours should take you out for a proper dinner first, atleast.

BACHIRA MEGURU with the ugly duckling trope. no friends, seen as an outcast, too eccentric for his other classmates to comprehend—and there's you—the popular and extroverted individual loved and befriended by many others. you as the campus crush, who found an interest in the lonely bowl cut boy. though your curiosity is piqued at first, you were quite reluctant in actually befriending him. with rumors of him being a weirdo—most people often shy'd away from the idea of letting him inside their radars. but you aren't going to let that stop you from—wait, he's actually super sweet? and kind too? surprisingly a huge sweetheart? what kind of plot twist is this?! though the monster he speaks of kind of scares you, you're still terribly attracted like a fly to a light by his strong will to become the best striker in the foreign dimension of soccer. in the end he's just doing what he loves, a good-hearted boy who simply got misunderstood for his obsession with football—oh? why is your heart suddenly picking up its pace?

ITOSHI RIN with...*drum rolls*...quiet kid at the back of your class. 😐 not that surprising is it. anyways, this emo kid is obsessed with soccer, yet still able to keep up with his studies just fine. though he's mostly neutral with everybody, you sometimes fear the he might be plotting all your deaths with that unconventional stare of his that looks like he's constantly displeased. but you eventually come to a conclusion that that isn't the case. you both take the same bus home everyday, and you can confidently confirm that he really just looks like that. the stare only softens when he brings out his phone and starts playing granny or something. not to be a creepy stalker or anything—your field of view just always inconveniently contains him and the contents on his phone! he appears to have a knack for the genre of horror. games, movies, even tutorials. (this lil' cheat—) but of course, for this headcannon to work my way imma have to embarrass you in front of him for chemistry and relationship development purposes :p. so once upon a time, where you're tired as hell after some shit going down in school, you fail to remember your usual spot and slump down onto an open seat beside itoshi rin—who was on his phone paying you zero mind whatsoever, playing a horror game that you recognized to be some popular roblox game. you don't know if it's the tiredness that took over you, or the sole fact that seeing rin play so goddamn horrible on the game got on your nerves up to the point you couldn't hold in your thoughts anymore and outright told him what you'd come to regret in just a few moments—“what the hell, dude. you're terrible. you're supposed to get the key and then—” about to reach for the phone out of sheer frustration, you suddenly pause, realizing what you've just done. oh no. your eyes flicker to his expression and holy crap. rin itoshi is giving you the biggest, bombastic, judgemental, dehumanizing side eye you've ever seen in your life. actually, scratch that—he's full on staring at you like you've just directed 57 slurs at him. you feel like you've shrunk into a mere insect with how intense his stare is, mentally slowly melting into a puddle of shame as you stand up and profusely bow while spewing out pitiful apologies. after a few moments, you hear him heave a deep sigh, you slowly crane your neck up to look at him expectantly—only to find him and his absurdly gorgeous face challengingly raising a brow at you, “then what do you suppose i should do, miss i'm-so-good-at-the-game? please continue.” rin roblox kid confirmed.

ITOSHI SAE as the regular who has caught your eye trope. i really wanted to use childhood friends on this guy with the amount of angst it'd produce but isagi already got the trope so...'eye candy regular at the local coffee shop you work part-time at' trope it is. a bit specific but yeah you get what i mean :). it's hard not to notice this man whenever he comes in with that unfortunately charming blank face of his—so charming that in fact some girls from other nearby schools actually gather to seat themselves and wait for his appearance, shoot their shot with the guy and get immediately shut down with just one cold sweep of his indifferent stare. being pretty sure does have its downsides. you can still feel the shivers from when he full-on glared at a girl who was getting a bit too persistent. you've never really interacted with him aside from taking his regular order, but there's still the underlying fear that he'd cuss you out and embarrass you in front of teenage girls should you get his order wrong so now you have a note plastered onto the wall that always has his regular order tip up to the notch—with a highlighted nickname, “duckbutt james” since you never caught his name. but oh fuck, he sees it one uneventful day and raises a brow at you, nonchalantly and coolly saying that his name is “itoshi sae”. god. is this the part where you roll over and die in shame? why did you even think it was a good idea to put the note in point-blank range?! it's the same as basically shoving it in his face! you think you might pass out—but then suddenly—he smiles. he smiles. what. but it immediately disappears as fast as it came so now you're questioning if you're hallucinating or not. he takes his usual order and heads out once more, but as your head clears itself from the multiple stages of grief you experienced in one singular moment—you think of his name in wonder, finding it terribly familiar. itoshi sae. itoshi sae. itoshi...SAE?! WAIT—

MICHAEL KAISER is definitely enemies to lovers material, change my mind. a football hotshot who has to begrudgingly graduate first before officially signing a contract with the famous german world-wide football team—bastard münchen. at this point in life, he's basically already successful, so he literally just ignores and passes up all opportunities to actually study anything that isn't related to football. he's not a troublemaker perse, but you're convinced the entire faculty staff hates him due to the amount of unnecessary work his laziness spews out, but they would still have to pass him regardless of his lax attitude towards his studies due to the sole fact that the entirety of germany has their eyes on this genius of a prodigy. it was relatively obvious that failing him and delaying his awaited pro-debut would do no good for the name of the school, so he's now spared from the chains of corrupted education. despite being in the same class as him, kaiser was someone you've barely talked to—you both only interacted a grand total of two times. one was regarding a class project, and the other was that time you walked in on him getting confessed to for the what, thousandth time? needless to say, you're both barely acquainted, so being friends was out of the question. besides, it's not like you want to befriend him anyway (y/n moment)—you were both complete opposites. you were a study freak, and he was an infamous prodigy who had a passion for kicking a ball—he's the emperor who lived in a completely different world from your mundane life as a mere commoner in his story.

*rubs hands together* now it's time to get even more delusional, folks. it's just supposed to be a normal day but oh nooo, you're now both forced to fully acknowledge each other's presence after a teacher falsely accuses both of you and sends you to detention—highly biased should you add. it's one of those low teachers that act passive aggressively with his early success. it's bound to get people jealous, but shouldn't you be proud as a teacher? whatever. all that you know is that you're now both stuck in detention and you're blaming him now. you know very well you're both completely innocent so for what exactly are you blaming him? absolutely nothing. you're just bored and michael kaiser was your only source of entertainment in this bland and empty classroom. jabs are thrown around from across the room as you are unable to initiate conversation without you throwing an insult everytime he attempts to flirt with you. you asked him to be quiet? babe, he's going to do the exact opposite. you asked him to shut the fuck up? he'll say the typical 'make me'. your sanity is all but squeezed out of your entire being by the time your detention is over, finally being dismissed for the day until he stops you from actually leaving the room by holding your shoulder in place and asks for your number with a playful wink. you want to slap him, maybe kick his shins, roundhouse him in the face and run away but with the knowledge that you'll both still be meeting in your class the next day is a bitter reminder that you should atleast try to remain civil with this young and growing superstar if you want to survive the school year. albeit begrudgingly—you punch down your numbers into his phone (you put a random number in at first but he quickly confirms it to be false when your phone doesn't receive the message he sent just in-case. tsk.) and immediately leave the premises after he cracks a joke about seeing him tomorrow night for dinner.

unbeknownst to you, he was the one who put the anonymous tip in the school's online forum that falsely landed both of you in detention—all just to get some alone time with you and grab your number without attracting too much unnecessary attention because oh my lord he's genuinely interested in someone who isn't a part of his football kingdom?? wowowowowow

sae reawakened my duckbutt (sasuke) phase ong (also reader doesn't know what the world-class midfielder sae looks like, only his name so that's why she was shocked)

[the-real-list-of-ominous-threats]

I'm going to make you obsessed with evil video game men

[theworldofwars]

A German light railway train, captured by the troops of the Machine Gun Corps, filled with ammunition and trench stores, 26 October 1918.

[g0ldengaze]

Saw the complete cut of metropolis with live symphony tonight and it was BRILLIANT!!! MARVELOUS!!! a very not overrated piece of media ... It is in fact that good !!!!!! and not just cause it's beautiful. It is beautiful but the writing .. pacing.. acting ..THE MUSIC!!! it all fucks tremendously !!!! Also thre are a lot of overarching vibes that are kind of gay with it

[lieutenantselnia]

A little comparison of Lieutenant Lyste's voice in the English and German dub (+ a little bit of Kallus too); because I find languages interesting and this made me really think about how a voice actor can influence how a character is perceived.

First of all, I've watched Rebels primarily in German so far (though I've seen a good amount of scenes in English as well), partly for nostalgia reasons (I was in my teens, probably around 14 when I first watched the series and my English wasn't that good at the time to just casually watch an entire series, plus I was watching it with my younger sister), but also because I think the voice actors especially for the main and recurring characters are genuinely doing a really good job. Heck, for some characters I might actually prefer their German voice because it is that good! Kallus might actually be a good example for this if he's already here, I think he has such a pleasant roughness in his voice. For Thrawn it's also a pretty close match, he sounds wonderful in both variants but I might prefer his German voice just by a teeny tiny bit.

Who I actually wanted to talk about is Lieutenant Lyste though. I'm mainly familiar with his German voice, and as he's a fictional crush of mine, this is also the voice of his that I've fallen in love with. When I imagine him talking - regardless in which language - the sound is that of his German voice. Personally, I feel like that voice makes him seem a little younger and more naive compared to his English voice. I've always headcanoned him to be fairly young, in his early to mid twenties, and that by the start of the series he had just completed his military training recently (his position as supply master might have been the first one where he had to bear more responsibility). I've always seen him as a guy who's motivated and just trying his best, but at the same time he's lacking experience, plus, if we're being honest, when it comes to his military career he's a pretty average guy. I think he'd learn and improve over the years, but he isn't the "best of his academy year" or "promising young talent with innovative ideas" kind of guy, and he's far from a mastermind like Thrawn. He's literally Just A Guy, and personally, that's actually something I really like about him and that makes him endearing to me.

In contrast, I think his voice in the English dub makes his age a bit more ambiguous (I still wouldn't guess him older than 30, also based on his appearance but I feel he seems less "boyish" than in the German dub). I think it also gives him a bit more of an arrogant tinge and less of the playfulness that at least I hear in his German voice. He still conveys that dutifulness, but he seems a bit more uptight as well. I wouldn't go so far to say that that's bad, and I still like his English voice as well, but I think for me it won't come close to the charm that his German voice has to me.

Towards the end I want to point out though, that the voice, while being an important aspect, is not everything that makes a character. Appearance, behaviour, body language, actions and decisions contribute to that as well. What I found interesting is that most headcanons that I read about Lyste actually still overlap closely with my own as well, even though I heavily assume that not all people who wrote them are familiar with his German voice. I would say that this is a good thing, because his core personality is still conveyed across language barriers, even though the way that different actors voice him may emphasise different aspects of his character more or less.

[lil-gae-disaster]

It was surely awkward when Frederick found about about the Laurens-Hamilton affair...

(It absolutely doesn't help that they both lived in England for a while)

(@hamalicious-soup @marsfingershurt)

[kohakudragon]

My ocs went to @unvale-io 's lantern festival! Here Altair x Rigel and Gamma x Lyra celebrate their love by releasing a lantern that they’ve decorated into the night sky. Subaru and Eclipse are also enjoying the moment! 🏮

[vikkicomics]

A Dutch and a Deutsch. Here Prussian Officer Major Isenstein is chatting up a Flemish girl. He's an energetic and flirtatious character. -Concept art for Moth.

[brokehorrorfan]

Bottleneck Gallery will release Metropolis 24x36 screen prints on foil paper by Chris Thornley today, May 21, at 12pm EST. The standard edition (left) is limited to 100 for $60, while the variant is limited to 50 for $70.

[obscureother]

Who had to cross a language barrier for f/o? Did they learn for you, or did you learn for them? Or did you both try to learn each other's language together? Did one of you speak the other's language at all to help translate, or at least understand even if they didn't speak it? Or did you both consult the Googles and Rosetta Rock?? Was it frustrating from the time it took to talk to each other, endearing for the effort, or both? Were you/they very willing, or did it take some convincing or some reason for you/them to learn?

Afterwards, did they have nicknames/pet names for you that they learned, or ones you were finally able to translate and understand what they were calling you? How did they respond when you found out?

What about if they thought they were calling you one thing but were actually calling you something else the whole time without realizing it? How did that go??

Did you find and use nicknames/pet names from their language, or accidentally call them something you weren't meaning to? What did f/o think of them? Did you ever mean for them know what you'd been calling them if they were finally able to translate the things you called them?

Have there been any goofy instances where you and/or f/o had trouble with the barrier of your words? Thinking you were talking about one thing when the other person was going off about something else? Embarrassing yourself/themself in front of everyone else who spoke the opposite language? Saying something obscene or ridiculous to the other? Just plain miscommunication that took forever to get over?

How fluent are you and/or your f/o with the other's language now? Are you/they a pro, still sound like a rookie, or pretty intermediate? Can you/they hold a whole conversation, or only small phrases or words? Does it sound broken to the other, but understandable enough to get by? What about writing the other language, or reading for things? If you guys went to the other language's origin, how well do you think each other would get around?

[atomic-chronoscaph]

Metropolis (1927)

[raccocoo]

Sisi & Gyula (Sisi 2021-)