Six Swiss-German Words That Caught Me Out in Basel

Basel is close enough to Germany that the journey hardly feels like leaving. I had lived in Germany for two years before I first travelled south of the border, and I arrived at Basel Badischer Bahnhof expecting differences at every turn. The bus into town, though, passed streets that could have been in any German city — which makes sense, given that Basel sits barely five kilometres from the German border. Heidelberg is still my favourite, but Basel holds its own.

What I had not prepared for was the language. A few trips to supermarkets, bakeries and cafés ended in confusion before I started writing words down, and I soon realised that a short vocabulary list would have spared me a lot of pointing. Here are the six that mattered most, for anyone visiting Basel for the first time or moving from schoolroom German into Swiss-German.

Grüezi, not Hallo

My early visits to the Migros and Coop supermarkets left me baffled at the till. In Germany I had grown used to greeting the cashier with a "Hallo" and leaving with a "Tschuss" or a "Danke". In Basel the reply was something else entirely. Swiss friends explained the local pattern: "Grüezi" is the standard greeting, with "Adieu" or "ada" for formal situations, and "Salü", "Ciao" or "Tschuss" among people who know each other.

Because the French border is so close, French has seeped into the dialect as well. "Danke" becomes "Merci", and "Vielen Dank" becomes "Merci vilmal". Once you know that, the till stops being a puzzle.

Chäs chüechli, not Käse Kuechli

Switzerland and cheese go together, and I was still learning the names of the various cheeses — and hunting for the mild ones — when a friend made a batch of small cheese snacks. I asked what they were called and where I could buy them; she translated the name as "small cheese cakes". To my ear it sounded like "Käse Kuechli".

On my next trip to Migros I went straight to the frozen section, planning to bake a box at home. Nothing began with "Käse". After several failed passes I asked a salesperson, who reached to a spot I had walked past more than once and handed me a box. The label read "Chäs chüechli": Swiss-German spelling, and the reason my search had been hopeless. There is a fuller explanation at this source.

En guete, not Guten Appetit

Most places have a phrase for the moment before a meal. I assumed Switzerland used "Guten Appetit", and my greeting met an unexpected reply. The correct local phrase is "En guete" — short, easy, and used everywhere once you start listening for it.

Gipfeli, not croissant

Weekday breakfasts have never been my strength, so grabbing a croissant on the way to work or university was standard practice for me and my friends. One morning I stopped outside a bakery to read the breakfast board and could not find a croissant-and-coffee offer anywhere. How could a bakery not sell croissants? Then I looked at the top of the board: "Gipfeli + Kaffee". The croissant was there all along, under its Swiss name.

Glace, not Eis

On a hot, sunny day there is little better than ice cream, and I have seen people abandon their evening plans for it: when someone produced a box of Movenpick from the shared kitchen, the dorm emptied. If there were ever an ice-cream eating competition, my kitchen mates would be on the shortlist. In Basel, remember, ice cream is not "Eis" but "glace" — another piece of French influence.

Velo, not Fahrrad

Anyone who loves cycling will tell you it is the most flexible way to see a city, especially in good weather with Google Maps in hand. Like many railway stations in Germany and France, Basel lets you rent a bike or an e-bike and ride out into the country. The word you need is "Velo" rather than "Fahrrad", and it is worth knowing before you book a bike in advance at rentabike.ch.

Two more that still catch me out

In German, "Paprika" means capsicum, and I had always taken "Pepperoni" to mean something like salami. In Basel I have heard people use "pepperoni" for capsicum, which makes a pizza order an adventure in itself.

The most entertaining confusion came during the Basel Fasnacht in 2014. I picked up a menu somewhere in the city and found the local dialect closer to Dutch than to German. I enjoyed myself enormously regardless, and will write about the carnival properly another time.

Before you go

None of this should make anyone nervous. Basel is an easy city to like, and a handful of words make it legible: a greeting, a thank-you, a word for bread and one for ice cream. Learn those six and the rest will follow. I hope this gives the next arrival a head start — and if you are comparing cities, there is always Heidelberg.