One of my son’s new friends was staying over at our house one night, and knowing he lived in walking distance, I inquired about his address. When he answered “Ober den Birken”, I was sure he had gotten his new address wrong and asked some more about it. No, the address was “Ober den Birken”, which is grammatically totally wrong.

Ober is not a preposition, but a noun or adjective and stands for:

waiter, chief (nouns)

senior, superior, upper (adjectives)

Den Birken stands for:

the birch trees

Most German speakers, upon hearing this street name, will offer a “correction” by saying: “You mean Über den Birken” (Above the birch trees).

A few of my expat friends tell of having to repeat the address a few times to Germans who believe the foreign resident got it wrong…. Sounds familiar.

This street name is unfathomable to any educated German speaker. Ober - a noun or adjective – might sound like a preposition, but isn’t.

I just really wonder who is in charge of giving street names to new communities.