When guiding someone through an outdoor obstacle course, you need to be precise about directions. In German, directional adverbs often use the prefixes hin- and her- to indicate movement relative to the speaker:
- hin- means movement away from the speaker.
- her- means movement towards the speaker.
Herüber and Hinüber (Over)
You can attach these prefixes to prepositions like über (over) to describe crossing an obstacle. Use herüber if the person is coming over to where you are, and hinüber if they are moving away from you to the other side.
| You climb onto the box and jump over to me. | Du kletterst auf die Kiste und springst zu mir herüber. |
| You run over the board and swing over the water. | Du läufst über das Brett und schwingst über das Wasser hinüber. |
Hindurch (Right through)
When someone needs to go completely through an obstacle, combine hin- with durch (through) to make hindurch. It is often used alongside the preposition durch to emphasize passing all the way through and out the other side.
| We have to crawl through the tunnel together. | Wir müssen zusammen durch den Tunnel hindurchkriechen. |
| Nobody is allowed to stay clean, because we are running through the mud! | Niemand darf sauber bleiben, denn wir laufen durch den Schlamm hindurch! |
Hervor (Emerging from)
When something emerges from a hiding place—like coming out from under a sofa or the mud—use hervor. Because the object is appearing into the speaker's line of sight, it uses the her- (towards) root.
| The dog crawls out from under the sofa. | Der Hund kriecht unter dem Sofa hervor. |
| A shoe suddenly emerges from the mud. | Ein Schuh kommt plötzlich aus dem Schlamm hervor. |
