This Sunday, there’s a major election coming that will mean big changes to the German government and could have repercussions for Europe. “Come, again?” you might be entitled to ask: “Didn’t the Germans already have a general election just six months ago?” Yes, they did: but now they’re having another one.

The North Rhine-Westphalia Regional Parliament (Flickr: farruska)

Not on a national level, however; no, this is a regional election in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany’s third largest state in terms of area, and its largest by population. Almost one quarter of all Germans live here, several million of them in major cities like Cologne, Düsseldorf and those of the Ruhr region; and on Sunday, they go to the polls. Although they are only officially voting for their state government, the results will have a major impact in Berlin.

There’s a school of thought that says the best way to get good at a language is to concentrate on the words that can’t be translated. In so doing, you really get into the mindset of the speakers of that language - and so can speak like them, too.

So when learning German, you should definitely take some time to look at the word Bildung. Don’t worry: it’s not completely and utterly untranslatable like Fahrvergnügenserfassungsbogen (lit. “driving enjoyment questionnaire form”); no, Bildung can in fact frequently be translated with one word – education. This is especially the case in politically charged slogans such as “Bildung ist der Gesellschaft höchstes Gut”, or “Society’s most important asset is education”.

German Foreign Ministry