English Translation
Do you mind if we cross your garden?
warum passt “überqueren” hier nicht?
“überqueren” passt meiner Meinung nach sogar besser. Der Fokus liegt bei überqueren mehr darauf, dass man durch den Garten nur überquert, um zum eigentlichen Ziel zu kommen.
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Interesting. This is an example where even the natives don’t agree.
In my opionion, “überqueren” does not fit here.
“überqueren” contains “über” = “over”. That’s mostly used for rivers or bridges, for example. It means you don’t enter the area that you cross. In the case of a river, you don’t touch the water.
“durchqueren” contains “durch” = “through”. This is for closed areas that you can actually be inside of. With a river you actually swim or wade through the water.
A “Garten” is a closed area that you cannot cross without being inside of it for the duration it takes you. So unless you fly over it, or there’s a bridge, you would need “durchqueren”.
A counterexample would be “Wiese”. It’s open, so you use “überqueren”, because you cannot be “in der Wiese”. It’s always “auf der Wiese”.
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