/ɪç ˈɡlaʊ̯p maɪ̯n ʃvaɪ̯n p͡faɪ̯ft/ lit. ‘I think my pig is whistling’
German idiom, colloquial. To be so astonished you can hardly believe what you’re seeing or hearing.
Draft Not yet checked by a native German speaker.
How do people use Ich glaub, mein Schwein pfeift
?
A colloquial exclamation, said on the spot when something is so absurd you can’t believe it. It works on its own or before the thing that surprised you, and the full “Ich glaube” sounds stiffer than people really say it. It can also sound annoyed, as in “you’ve got to be kidding me”.
Also said Ich glaube, mein Schwein pfeift
Ich glaub, mein Schwein pfeift
in real sentences
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Ich glaub, mein Schwein pfeift!
Blow me down!
Tatoeba, sentence by Zaghawa, translation by sundown, CC BY 2.0 FR
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“Ich glaub, mein Schwein pfeift!” - “Nein, das ist der Nachbarssohn mit seiner neuen E-Gitarre.”
“I think my pig is whistling!” “No, that’s the neighbor’s son with his new electric guitar.”
Tatoeba, sentence by BraveSentry, CC BY 2.0 FR
Where does Ich glaub, mein Schwein pfeift
come from?
Nobody has pinned this one down. German Wiktionary says it comes from 1920s Berlin slang, where a round, piggy-bank-shaped kettle whistled on the stove and gave people an excuse to leave a conversation, but the entry itself flags that claim as unsourced. What’s safe to say is that it’s a playful impossibility: pigs don’t whistle.
Mistakes learners make with Ich glaub, mein Schwein pfeift
Changing the verb: the pig whistles (“pfeift”), it doesn’t sing or grunt, and you never put it in the past (“mein Schwein pfiff”), because it’s a fixed exclamation.
Other German idioms like Ich glaub, mein Schwein pfeift
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?
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