[S1E9] Greetings! (part1) Mealtime Manners Masterclass with Uncle Harnold

Ever tripped over your own tongue trying to navigate the intricate dance of cultural greetings? You're not alone! Uncle Harry, or should we say Harnold Schnitzel-Lecker, gives us a rib-tickling reality check on the do's and don'ts of salutations. With his blunt criticism of the edelwisecrackers and a name that's a story in itself, Harry schools us on the fine line between a humorous greeting and a cultural misstep, especially when it comes to the non-existent "Guten Hallo" and the fictional "Guten Bye-Bye." 

Strap in for a whirlwind tour through Vienna's proper hellos and goodbyes, and learn why sometimes, it's best to stick to the script when it comes to cultural traditions ... which we'll address in more detail in part 2!

But why stop at hello? Why not ponder over America's missing mealtime memos as well? We'll dissect the versatile "servus," chuckle at the conundrum it poses for unsuspecting Scotts, and give a nod to the omnipresent "Grüß Gott." Hold on to your forks as Uncle Harry re-enters the fray with his own zesty twist on Italian goodbyes, ensuring your cultural culinary journey is peppered with laughs and learning. Get ready to feast on a smorgasbord of linguistic delights and faux pas that will leave you both enlightened and entertained.

Transcript

Uncle's Cultural Sensitivity in Greetings

Mr. Giggles 0:38

Well, guten hallo and welcome to the Schnitzel Giggles podcast. So funny here with Dr Schnitzel. Mr Giggles, here for you, yeah, here for you, to talk about life in Vienna.

Dr. Schnitzel 0:56

And today we have something special planned for our listeners.

Mr. Giggles 1:00

Oh, we've planned this out, have we?

Dr. Schnitzel 1:03

We'll see what happens. Is your phone ringing, my phone's ringing? Are you expecting a call? No, but let's see. Alright, let's see what it is. Hello, this is Dr Schnitzel speaking.

Uncle Harnold 1:15

Yes, yes.

Dr. Schnitzel 1:20

I think I know who's calling.

Mr. Giggles 1:22

I mean, it sounds pretty familiar.

Dr. Schnitzel 1:24

Yeah, I think it's my uncle.

Mr. Giggles 1:25

Oh, it's my uncle.

Dr. Schnitzel 1:29

Hello, hello, uncle Harry, is it you?

Uncle Harnold 1:31

Yeah, it's me. I'm just calling you. I just want to say something to you.

Dr. Schnitzel 1:35

Yeah, I'm just recording an episode here with Uncle Harry. Yeah, uncle Harry, we all call him Uncle Harry, okay, but his full name is actually Arnold.

Mr. Giggles 1:48

Arnold, arnold, arnold. Okay, sounds a lot like a guy I've heard before.

Dr. Schnitzel 1:52

I don't think you've heard of my uncle before. I've never heard of a person named Arnold.

Mr. Giggles 1:57

Arnold goes by Harry.

Dr. Schnitzel 1:59

Yeah. So, Uncle Harry, what's up? Why are you calling?

Uncle Harnold 2:02

I just wanted to tell you I've been listening to your podcast.

Mr. Giggles 2:05

Hey, whoa, thanks, it's good to have a good listener.

Uncle Harnold 2:08

It's really funny at times. Good.

Mr. Giggles 2:10

Yeah, we think so.

Uncle Harnold 2:10

Yeah, but I need to call because I'm so upset right now.

Mr. Giggles 2:14

Oh, but I thought you said you like the podcast. Well, what I do not, I'm going to tell you in your face, even though I don't see you right now I'm going to tell you right away.

Uncle Harnold 2:26

Okay, wow, that got kind of tense pretty quick. Just let me talk now. Okay, sorry, sorry, arnold, I'm talking here.

Mr. Giggles 2:29

Sorry.

Uncle Harnold 2:30

You keep messing up the guten hallo and you keep saying guten bye-bye, as if it is a real German thing.

Mr. Giggles 2:35

But it is not, and I think you should know that it's not the way you greet each other here in austria I mean, yeah, it's kind of just a funny thing that we say, because it kind of connects our two ways of speaking well, you think it's funny, but it's so disrespectful to our culture. Wow, yeah, I think well, my uncle's yeah, I feel like I'm taking the brunt of this right now.

Uncle Harnold 2:59

He's really a little help here yeah, because you think you're an American, you come here. Where are you even from?

Mr. Giggles 3:06

Okay, we're getting personal. I'm from California.

Uncle Harnold 3:09

California.

Mr. Giggles 3:10

No, california, california. Okay, maybe you're saying the same thing, I don't know.

Uncle Harnold 3:17

You just upset me so much, that's why I can't even talk.

Mr. Giggles 3:19

Wow, uncle Harry, can I call you uncle harry, you may, okay? Um, I'm sorry, I didn't. I didn't think we were.

Dr. Schnitzel 3:26

you know, we certainly weren't trying to offend you I didn't even know he was listening to this podcast.

Mr. Giggles 3:30

Yeah no, I mean, it's great to have a listener that's you know, please continue listening and tell all your friends, uncle harry I'll think about it so are you harnold schnitzel? Is that your name? Yeah, I'm part of the schnitzel. Is that your name?

Uncle Harnold 3:40

Yeah, I'm part of the Schnitzel family Okay, like my nephew, but I got married a couple years ago.

Mr. Giggles 3:45

Oh well, good for you, congratulations, thank you thank you yeah.

Dr. Schnitzel 3:48

Yeah, so his name is actually Arnold Schnitzel-Lecker Schnitzel-Lecker.

Uncle Harnold 3:52

Yeah, I met this woman from Germany some years ago and her last name is Lecker to me, if you don't know what Lekha means. So we got married right away.

Mr. Giggles 4:09

Well, I mean, it's very progressive of you, Uncle Harry, to take on your bride's name. That's very progressive.

Uncle Harnold 4:17

That's what we do in this culture. We're very open-minded but, also very straightforward. So we got married. Yeah, right away.

Mr. Giggles 4:22

We have both names inminded, yeah, but also very straightforward.

Uncle Harnold 4:23

So we got married. Yeah, right away. We have both names in our name. Now she also has my name.

Mr. Giggles 4:25

Well, I'm glad that we can call Mr Arnold Schnitzel-Lecker as one of our listeners. Thank you for being such a loyal listener. You're the number one podcast I'm listening to. Yeah, great, I'm happy to hear that.

Say Hello to Scott

Uncle Harnold 4:39

I have to go back to the job right now.

Mr. Giggles 4:40

Okay, get to the job.

Dr. Schnitzel 4:42

Bye. Yes, my uncle.

Mr. Giggles 4:46

Wow, that was certainly unexpected.

Dr. Schnitzel 4:49

Yeah, he takes himself a little too important, I think, you know, because he feels like he has this great body and he acts as if he's a movie star or like some star politician.

Mr. Giggles 4:58

All right, yeah.

Dr. Schnitzel 4:59

Something like that. I don't know where he's got that from. Oh good politician, all right.

Mr. Giggles 5:01

Yeah, something like that I don't know where he's got that from, but oh good for him, good for him, and he, I mean he certainly has a point like there there are some more acceptable ways of greeting people yeah um which we are aware of yes, and I think how to greet each other in in austria and vienna might be another thing we should be exploring the next couple minutes.

Dr. Schnitzel 5:16

Yeah, let's talk about it.

Mr. Giggles 5:19

Well, I guess after that call, we should probably maybe clarify some things about greetings and share with our listeners how to properly greet each other when they're in Austria. True. Since the guten 하루 and guten bye-bye won't work Well it shouldn't probably be your main way of talking to strangers? Yeah, obviously, amongst friends it might be a good greeting, but, as we've seen, some of our listeners are pretty upset about it, true?

Dr. Schnitzel 5:47

and I've noticed.

Mr. Giggles 5:48

At least one of our listeners. At least one of our listeners.

Dr. Schnitzel 5:55

As far as we know, playing grammar games here, speaking of grammar, my students that I'm supposed to teach german have started greeting me with a guten heilo as well. So I don't know if there's a good influence that I'm having on them, but I'm feeling yeah, that'd be one thing if you, if you, were teaching anything else other than german.

Mr. Giggles 6:16

Yes, they're leaving your class with improper German greetings.

Dr. Schnitzel 6:19

I'm giving them improper German greetings and that's not my job. In the end, we need to take some time to correct any possible misleading information.

Mr. Giggles 6:27

Yeah, just in case any of your superiors at the school are listening.

Dr. Schnitzel 6:30

My job's on the line here, so come and help me out here. All right, if you do greet somebody, if you meet someone in Vienna, Austria, what kind of greetings have you encountered as an expat so far?

Mr. Giggles 6:41

Well, often, you know, if I'm walking onto the baseball field, see the guys we'll throw up a servus, servus, servus.

Dr. Schnitzel 6:49

Servus, which is actually servus. Servus. Originally it's Latin, yeah.

Mr. Giggles 6:55

A guten morgen in the morning.

Dr. Schnitzel 6:57

That's very nice yeah.

Mr. Giggles 6:59

Guten.

Dr. Schnitzel 7:00

Abend in the evening that's very nice. Yeah, good evening in the evening, good day in the day and good night when you go to bed.

Mr. Giggles 7:06

Yeah, so good, we've got all parts of the day taken care of. Yeah, sometimes just a hello wie geht's?

Dr. Schnitzel 7:13

they are very short and to the point. How do we get servus? The nice thing about servus is that you can use it to greet and to say goodbye.

Mr. Giggles 7:20

Oh, that's universal I don't think I knew that. Yeah, can use it to greet and to say goodbye.

Dr. Schnitzel 7:22

Oh, that's universal. I don't think I knew that. Yeah, so if you wave goodbye and say Servus, oh, okay.

Mr. Giggles 7:26

Yeah, it works. Oh look, we're all learning something on this podcast. That's nice.

Dr. Schnitzel 7:30

There's an educational purpose. Good, I'm just trying to save my job here.

Cultural Mealtime Greetings and Customs

Mr. Giggles 7:34

Yeah, grosgot, oh, gru Scott. Ah, that was kind of the initial one that we were taught, especially like going into a store seeing somebody in a more formal way. Really confusing initially for people named Scott.

Dr. Schnitzel 7:49

Who's that guy, or why?

Mr. Giggles 7:51

Why don't we greet him? Yeah, who is Scott, gru Scott? Or why is everybody saying hello to me? Why do they know my name? Yeah, how do you know my name? But did you know the background of the saying? Grüß, got well, it's like a in religious background.

Dr. Schnitzel 8:04

that's like a greeting in god, or god greets you, or it really was originally a form of a blessing with god in and greeting, so as, as you greet each other, may god bless you. Yeah, it just got shortened down to grüß got. It's good, the same as it's not really a greeting, but I think it fits into this conversation. The word mild side. Yeah, you've heard that before, of course so when do people say that at mealtime?

Dr. Schnitzel 8:27

at lunch, probably specifically yeah as a matter of fact, martyr is just. I mean literally means mealtime. Yeah, mealtime. It's only the last word of a sentence that was also a blessing. The original sentence that people used to say back in the day was God segne di malzett, which means may God bless this meal. Okay, like a little prayer Literally may God bless this time of the meal, the meal time. It's hard to translate word by word here.

Mr. Giggles 8:51

Also hard to say with a mouthful of food yeah well, the reason for shortening it to malzett. You shouldn't eat before you pray or before you bless the food.

Dr. Schnitzel 8:59

Yeah, but if people were walking by saying outside, I guess all you're saying is duncan if your mouth is fully, just nod at them and smile at them, or, yeah, smile with your mouth closed, your food all over them especially if it's soup.

Dr. Schnitzel 9:08

I also didn't really like consider it as a greeting, necessarily, but I suppose it is, but the funny thing is it is it is really the lunch greeting. So imagine you work at an office building, you go to the, the elevator for lunch, you go down to the cafeteria or wherever you're having lunch. So if you meet people at the elevator or the stairway or in the hallway, you wouldn't say hallo or guten tag or grüß Gott, say it's 12 o'clock. You would actually greet each other, even if you go to the bathroom or something you meet the other way out and the way in.

Mr. Giggles 9:33

It's the right timing.

Dr. Schnitzel 9:34

It's the right timing. It's, of course, not the place to have the meal, but it is really an Austrian tradition to say that once we hit lunchtime, that's what you say.

Mr. Giggles 9:43

It always makes me laugh if somebody burps and the response is Mausaites.

Dr. Schnitzel 9:47

That's always, that's comedic, that's passive aggressive.

Did Americans Steal Mealtime Manners?

Mr. Giggles 9:53

Yeah, it's just funny. Yeah, it's. You know, you're amongst the boys and somebody burps and Mausaites. Yeah, no matter the time. No matter the time, no matter, it's a funny thing to say it is.

Dr. Schnitzel 10:03

Yeah, it's usually what maybe a parent would say when they kind of feel disgusted and want to say sarcastic way oh, that's not very tasteful, tasty, that's, that's really. It actually has a hint of criticism in it. Interesting, although I think when you hang out with guys, as in a sports team, it's really more. They're kind of of more mimicking what their moms would say, maybe at home I see they don't really care, perhaps Interesting.

Mr. Giggles 10:24

So it's not just because they're being funny, it's when they are, but it's also turning around, something that they are deeply ingrained with.

Dr. Schnitzel 10:29

Yeah, it's more an ironic statement, really Interesting it's meant to be originally.

Mr. Giggles 10:33

All right yeah we're learning. We're a couple minutes in and we have already covered so much. You know it is interesting. You know, at mealtimes, you know, bon appetit is always one that people also say when they're giving you food or something.

Dr. Schnitzel 10:55

And I've been asked a couple times in the last year or so like well, what do you guys say in America?

Mr. Giggles 10:58

You just stole it and we don't, we don't. I mean, maybe we'll say bon appetit, yeah, but Did you say anything else?

Dr. Schnitzel 11:05

That's kind of pretentious.

Mr. Giggles 11:07

I feel like anybody who's oh bon appetit is just kind of Fancy. Yeah, but we really don't have a mealtime statement that we say and so you wonder why Europeans regard the Americans as uncultured. Yeah.

Dr. Schnitzel 11:22

I don't know why. I don't know why Jerry's still out.

Mr. Giggles 11:25

Exhibit A Bon appetit, yeah it's just interesting that we've never like, really, because there's one in the Spanish-speaking world. Buen provecho.

Dr. Schnitzel 11:35

Even in German you can say guten appetit, so it's the similar thing to the French Guten appetit. So you don't have to say bon, that's really sitting at the table and not being out in the elevator or anything but good appetite would really go all day. We're just about to start the meal.

Mr. Giggles 11:51

Enjoy Interesting. Yeah, I mean it makes sense that it came from kind of a prayer, because you know, I know we take time to thank God for our food before a meal. But maybe just us Americans we were not wanting to have that type of statement or blessing, blessing on your food. Yeah, I don't know why we never had one of those things develop. Looking at some.

Dr. Schnitzel 12:20

American food?

Mr. Giggles 12:21

it does need some extra blessing. No amount of blessing is going to help it.

Dr. Schnitzel 12:26

What I find funny is the American statement. It's maybe an English statement, I don't know if the British also say let's say grace as you pray before a meal.

Mr. Giggles 12:35

Yeah, I don't know if the British will say it, but yeah, saying grace is code for let's pray.

Dr. Schnitzel 12:43

Because I've had people say who's going to say grace? Oh sure, yeah, Okay, I say grace sure yeah, it's like.

Mr. Giggles 12:49

Okay, I say the word.

Dr. Schnitzel 12:49

I say grace, but grace, grace, okay, but then now to me they're gonna pray for that, so I don't. I wonder how that's how it came about, and how did it also get shortened?

Mr. Giggles 12:58

it is a strange phrase to use for for praying before a meal because it is very specific to praying before a meal. Like nobody says hey, who's gonna? Who's gonna say grace now, when you don't have food on the table?

Dr. Schnitzel 13:13

As you pray, maybe in America before the foods. I mean, you pray, you say the amen and then you say anything, or you just start eating them. Is there anything in between? Any phrase?

Mr. Giggles 13:22

I mean, there's always rub a dub dub. Thanks for the grub. Okay, we would say Shoot. Where are some of the other ones? Yeah, there's just funny little like dig in.

Dr. Schnitzel 13:32

Okay, dig in. People say dig in yeah.

Mr. Giggles 13:33

I've heard that, yes.

Dr. Schnitzel 13:36

But that's not a very formal way. No, it's not like bon appetit. Yeah, that's a yeah.

Mr. Giggles 13:39

Yeah, the American version of bon appetit is dig in would just slap their laps and say all right, then.

No Meals Without Mozart

Dr. Schnitzel 13:50

All right, then yeah, and then just all right. But coming back to some they would tuck in.

Mr. Giggles 13:52

They would tuck in, yeah, if they like. If we would say I'm gonna, I'm gonna dig into this meal, they would. They would oh, I'm gonna tuck in. This is something I've heard. British listeners. Please, please, comment, tell me how wrong I am. I know you'll do it nicely with culture, you'll?

Dr. Schnitzel 14:06

you'll'll apologize for my mistake, okay, okay, now that we've offended more countries yeah, so there's more countries on the list to offend, but we'll keep it short list today.

Mr. Giggles 14:17

Oh man, as long as the Gov doesn't call in.

Dr. Schnitzel 14:19

Yeah, no, I don't think I could take a call from Uncle Arnold and the Gov on the same podcast, the same podcast on the same day. No, that would be too much. Yeah, that's tough, we'll save that for another day. Wow, great, well. Or one last funny story about my side. A friend once told me a long time ago they were having visitors, and it was as a matter of fact, I think they were in the in the city of salzburg and the family was sitting down with the guest from outside, I think I don't know where guest was from and so the whole family saiditzzeit to each other and they started eating and the guest from outside said okay, they are really obsessed. Well, they're obsessed. And so they asked their host why do you keep saying the word Mozart before you start your food? I mean, you're really obsessed with this guy. I mean he's a great composer. Hey, when you're in, you can't start a meal without saying Mozart.

Mr. Giggles 15:06

Yeah, it's a rule. Yeah, don't visit Salzburg without always mentioning Mozart before you eat.

Dr. Schnitzel 15:11

That was a nice little misunderstanding, easy to clarify. Maybe you should make this a thing.

Mr. Giggles 15:15

Yeah, Mozart.

Uncle Harry's Guten Goodbyes

Dr. Schnitzel 15:19

Mozart, all right, but then you don't, and then you just have to say goodbye at some point, right, yeah, so Instead of goodbye you might say oh, I feel the same.

Mr. Giggles 15:28

So instead of goodbye you might say oh, that's too properly for once. Once in a change, once in a while.

Dr. Schnitzel 15:36

no-transcript, all right but if you paid attention bis später, what can you say as a greeting and as a as a good goodbye? Servus, servus, juicy papa, pussy papa is also a common phrase. Ciao, ciao, auf wiedersehen. There's so many more but we might cover that another day it was nice. That was really nice, yo, I don't know how we're going to end. It's like, I mean, what was going to be the last thing.

Mr. Giggles 16:08

Yeah, because usually we just kind of Just the usual, all right.

Dr. Schnitzel 16:11

Yeah, there was some great insights about Greetings.

Mr. Giggles 16:16

Greetings.

Dr. Schnitzel 16:17

Start over, wow, the way we talked about greetings was so great. Absolutely yeah, well, I guess.

Mr. Giggles 16:27

So you know, if you come visit Vienna now you can, you know, greet others as a local and hopefully use the right greetings in the right context.

Dr. Schnitzel 16:38

Yeah, I hope so. Hold on my phone's ringing again. Another call, yeah, call, yeah. Well, it's the same number. No, okay, uncle harry, again hello yeah, hello hey, guten hallo, uncle harry yeah, hello again.

Uncle Harnold 16:53

I just was listening to your episode. It was really great, really good stuff. Thank you for sharing all these things.

Mr. Giggles 16:59

Which episode were you listening to? The one you just did right now? Have you been recording us while we record? I?

Uncle Harnold 17:07

have my skills a special skill set Anyway.

Mr. Giggles 17:10

Okay.

Uncle Harnold 17:11

There's one thing you forgot.

Mr. Giggles 17:13

Okay.

Uncle Harnold 17:14

Yeah, you forgot to tell the people how they say goodbye in Italy.

Mr. Giggles 17:18

Okay, I mean, we're not a podcast about Italy.

Uncle Harnold 17:21

We're not talking about Italy here. But you have to tell them.

Dr. Schnitzel 17:24

But isn't I mean? Don't they say ciao or something in Italy?

Mr. Giggles 17:26

Yeah, we say that in a lot of places.

Dr. Schnitzel 17:28

Yeah, they say it in a lot of places. Yeah, we can toss up a ciao.

Uncle Harnold 17:32

No, no, you're wrong. When they say goodbye, what they say is Pasta, la pizza, baby.

Mr. Giggles 17:43

Oh, uncle Harry, uncle Harry, all right, guten, bye-bye, guten bye-bye everyone and Uncle Harry Bye-bye.