Literally: “ass fax” / meaning: a label of your underwear that sticks out over your pants
It’s every foreign intern’s nemesis in Germany: this old-fashioned communication device that looks like a discarded push-button telephone has banged a printer. While business in other countries has become so digitalized that paper only plays a role in company toilets, the good old fax machine can still be found in many offices in the Federal Republic.
But it is not only at the workplace in government offices or old-fashioned companies that you can receive a fax in Germany. Also, when Germans squat down and wear a slightly shorter top, a small printed sheet is spit out here and there. If the care tag unintentionally peeks out of your panties, Germans will mockingly point it out to you: „Du kriegst ein Arschfax“ – “You’re getting an ass fax!”
The word has been around since the mid-2000s and was even nominated for Youth Word of the Year in 2010. The fact that German teenagers still understand this pun today speaks volumes for the German refusal to digitize.
