Bier is one of those German words that's absolutely identical to English except for a tiny spelling difference, which is handy for anyone going drinking in Germany. Another near-neighbour is hier, which means here – and is pronounced the same, as "IE" in Gemran is always being pronounced "EE". It reminds me just how straightforward German spelling is, which is actually one of the unknown pleasures of the language. English is never quite as obvious as there seems no rhyme or reason why it should be beer and here not bere and heer.

The other thing to remember is that "EI" is pronounced "I" – as in EIN BIER. Or even better, ZWEI BIER. Or DREI. You get the drift.

This one's easy. Hand means "hand" of course. I guess when those Anglo-Saxon hoards came to Britain in the first millennium, it made sense for the locals to make sure they didn't muck around with those Germanic words for parts of the body - it avoids all that confusion especially if a swivel-eyed German nutter was about to chop off something that belonged to you.

But it's amazing that English and German have not diverged more on the bodily-parts front, even on spelling. So as well as Hand, other totally identical words are Finger, Arm and, er, Penis. Then there are some words that are almost the same, such as Haar, Lippe and Knie, for hair, lip and knee.

Some body parts are close relatives that you can kind of guess, like Mund, Nase and Kinn for mouth, nose and chin. But German, being German, it just can't resist having some daft, long words, the silliest culprits being Oberschenkel for thigh and Unterschenkel for calf. I'll explain those in more detail another time.

But back to hand. One word I particularly like in German and which illustrates nicely its love of compound nouns is Handschuh, which literally means "hand-shoe" - a glove. Neat, huh? Then you've got Handschlag (handshake), which I also like. ­Bayern Munich president Uli Hoeness used the word "Handschlag" to great effect in this ridiculous post-match outburst from 2012, in which he was quizzed about why Bayern coach Jupp Heynkes refused to shake the hand of Frank Ribery who was substituted in a Champions League match that Bayern lost 1-0. "Hört auf mit eurem Scheiß Handschlag", bellows Höness at the interviewer, followed swiftly by a string of other insults. "Shut up about your shitty handshake."

Steady on Uli...

http://www.whoateallthepies.tv/champions_league/111918/for-fks-sake-is-this-a-boarding-school-for-girls-hoeness-riled-by-questions-after-ribery-ducks-heyncke-handshake.html