Lingua

Aber nichtsdestotrotz, …

I knew it was too good to be true! Such a wonderful word that sounds very formal must have had a special history. And as a matter of fact, it has. The moment I saw it today, it became my personal favorite of a day (I’ve heard it many times before, but sometimes it’s only when you see it written that a word puts a spell on you) and I automatically put into a drawer with all those formal, stuck-up, long, complicated and sophisticated words. And then I googled it. What a surprise it was to discover that in fact originally it is a humorous neologism coined by German students. It has been used a lot, however, therefore making many people believe it was a ‘real word’. Most dictionaries still mark it as colloquial but the fact that such a creation made it to the respectful dictionaries is already impressive. How I love to get to like one word and then discover a whole story behind it! Long live German!