The above is a common German phrase that appears a bit odd in English, in that it seems to have the prepositions "on" and "to" in it, but that's not the case. On its own, the verb zukommen means "to belong to" or "to be assigned to," but when you add the preposition auf, together with a direct object such as einen, mich, dich, sie, ihn, uns, etc., its meaning changes: 

BANNER PLACEHOLDER

Ich weiß ja noch nicht, was auf mich zukommen würde.

I don't know yet what would lie ahead of me.

Caption 83, 18 Miss-Kandidatinnen - beim Friseur

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Wir wussten, was auf uns zukommt.

We knew what to expect.

Caption 55, Fußball - U21-Nationalmannschaft

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...weil wir eben zu viele Einflüsse haben, die auf uns zukommen.

...because we just have too many influences that are reaching us.

Caption 29, Gamification - Wie Spielen den Alltag interessanter macht

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Wie wenn Störtebeker eine Hanse-Kogge auf sich zukommen sah.

Like when Störtebeker saw a Hanseatic ship approaching him.

Caption 89, Großstadtrevier - St. Pauli rettet HSV

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Die Koggen, die du heute Abend auf dich zukommen siehst...

The ships that you'll see coming toward you tonight...

Caption 92, Großstadtrevier - St. Pauli rettet HSV

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Damit war eigentlich nur gemeint, ob euch klar war, wie viel da auf euch zukommt.

I actually just meant whether it was clear in your mind how much there is in store for you.

Caption 20, Luxuslärm - Interview

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As you see above, depending upon the context, auf [einen] zukommen is variously translated as "to be expecting someone or something," "to be reaching someone or something," "to be approaching someone or something," "to be coming toward someone or something," and "to be in store for someone or something." 

BANNER PLACEHOLDER

Further Learning
Look at the examples above on Yabla German to get a better grasp of the contexts in which auf einen zukommen is used so that you can better understand its meaning and learn how to integrate the phrase into your own vocabulary.

A "xenonym" is an external name for a geographical place, the people who live there or the language spoken there. For example, English speakers say "Germany" rather than Deutschland and "Munich" rather than München. The names of many countries in German are very similar to the English xenonyms. However, even if they sound almost the same, the spelling is often different. For example, we see in many names that a C converts to K (Canada is Kanada, Cameroon is Kamerun),  a Z to an S (Zimbabwe is Simbabwe, Zambia is Sambia) or a V to a W (Slovakia is die Slowakei). Of course, this may not be the only difference.

Jetzt ist deine Münze in der Slowakei.

Your coin is now in Slovakia.

Caption 23, Sparefroh-TV - Warum sehen die Euromünzen in jedem Land anders aus?

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Der Kea-Papagei stammt ursprünglich aus Neuseeland.

The Kea parrot comes originally from New Zealand.

Caption 19, Wettlauf gegen den Verfall - Beruf Präparator

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BANNER PLACEHOLDER

Another common pattern is an -ien ending. You can likely guess which countries Spanien, Italien, Serbien, Rümänien, Slowenien, Australien, Saudi-Arabien, Tunesien, and Kroatien are!
 

Hier haben wir zum Beispiel, äh, Rohkaffee aus Kolumbien.

Here we have, for example, uh, raw coffee from Colombia.

Caption 8, Kaffee - Noch von Hand gemacht

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Dabei haben die deutschen Titelverteidiger diese Woche eins zu zwei gegen Tschechien verloren.

And the German title holders lost one to two against the Czech Republic this week.

Captions 6-7, Fußball - U21-Nationalmannschaft

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There is also a small group of countries with names ending in -land in German, which don't necessarily match up with those that have this ending in English. 

Hm, in Griechenland ist es im Sommer sehr heiß.

Hm, in Greece it is very hot in the summer.

Caption 37, Jenny - Reiseziele

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Diese da ist aus Russland und diese hier ist eine alte Polaroid-Kamera.

This one here is from Russia and this one is an old Polaroid camera.

Caption 23, Drei Leute - beim Kofferpacken

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BANNER PLACEHOLDER

Further Learning
Check out this very thorough list of country names and get memorizing! Concentrate on the country names that sound less like the English versions or are easily confusable. On Yabla German you can see which require a definite article (such as die Slowakei above), as detailed in our previous newsletter, or which require one in English but not in German (such as Tschechien).