Growing Pains with German
A Thunderstorm
rolled in and so the temperature has not moved above 14 C (57 F), the normal morning temperature during the summer. I managed to dodge the rain both to and from class, yeah, since I forgot my rain jacket. I shouldn’t have left my nifty WWF umbrella in Florida.
Today, we had to switch classrooms and merge with another class because the class became too small for inlingua to make any money off us poor speakers of German. Problem is I had 5 more lessons left in Buch 2 and the other class is already on Lesson 8 of Buch 3. My class hasn’t practice alot of grammar that is presented in Lesson 8, Buch 3. Yikees! Luckily, my teacher sympathizes to those shafted by the quantum leap and will make the smarter ‘kids’ suffer with stuff “they have already learned, but obviously have not mastered.”
Also… Endlich, treffe mich ich mit einem anderen Auslander aus den U.S.A.! Er heisst Tim und er kommt aus Kalifornia. Naturlich, er ist verheiratet mit einer deutschen Frau, die besser deutsche und englisch als ihn spricht 
Leider. Nachtdem er komme ich aus den U.S.A. gelernt hatte, sprach er sogleich mit mir auf englisch. Er wohnt in München seit 5 Monate und ich spreche besser deutsch als ihn mit nur 2 Monate. Wie schade!
Not sure if that was right up there but, I’ve gotta practice. I am coming to the stark realization that I will not pass this up-coming language examination. Here’s why:
According to German.About.com:
With two months of intense learning, I can reasonably estimate that I have a vocabulary of about 500 words and understand about 2,000. I have looked at the practice tests for the Deutschen Sprachprüfung (german language test) and it compares to the reading comprehension sections within the SATs. Even my language teacher told me I am not ready to pass the exam. I am feeling a bit discouraged. But…this exam is good practice for when I am ready and Alex has given me pointers to calm my spirits and help me convince the Universities that I serious about the language.
But my slowness puts things in perspective. I have to continue the intensive language classes for another 3 months after my tourist visa expires. My visa automatically? transfers to a language student visa. From there, once I pass the language exam I can take the final exams for my major.
Keine Panne! Just a lot of red tape and hoops to jump. B)
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Money isn’t everything
Geld allein macht nicht glüchlich
We had a lession on Geld in my Sprachkurs today. I was slapped with about 120 vocabulary words and they aren’t the easiest to remember. For example, einzahlen means to deposit, auszahlen means to pay out, like the bank gives you money out of your savings account, and bezahlen means to pay up, like the tab at a restaurant. Similar looking words and slightly different meanings. The same with abheben meaning to withdrawl and abbuchen meaning to debit directly.
There is place called das Bank which has the same meaning as a bank in the U.S. And now there is a place called die Post which is short for das Postamt or the post-office as is the meaning in the English language. However, as I understand it, there is also another meaning for die Post which is short for die Postbank, where one can do bank transactions but sometimes one can mail stuff there, I think. Now, at the die Post/das Postamt you can’t do banking there but you can mail things and place long distance phone calls there. Well Leo.org doesn’t explain it all. so…
Confused? No? Good, you avoided a headache…
According to Deloris, meine Lehrerin, Germans are just as uncomfortable with announce their salaries as people in the U.S. And they experience the same doof Salary Question during an interview. Germans also skirt around the question of how much one paid for a Wohnung to own. I find this fascinating why we as people are so secretive about this topic. I know I have reservations about the truth behind my Kleingeld but that is through society training… Well owning a home in Munich is close to impossible. An average German home, which is probably equivalent to the style of a 2-3 bedroom condo, is about 400.000 Euro (or ~$500,000 in USA). The bank won’t help finance the Wohnung if you don’t have 25% of the cost of the home to put down. Most average families don’t have 100.000 Euro so most everybody rents. Bye, bye real estate venture!
New Orleans, New Babies, New Beginnings
A truly wonderful weekend.
Amazing weather; sunny and cool. The flood waters in the Isar and Donau Rivers receded within a week with no major damage or siltation problems. Amazing! I wish I could say the same for the poor people in New Orleans. I donated some money but I am afraid this is such a disastrous event for Americans on so many levels I unable give more of what I am capable of giving.Anyone who has stomached Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States knows that this region (Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana) is ever so quickly forgotten by the Federal Government and the rest of the world. People who live on the edge of nothing have been forced to do with even less and now victims are believing that “Natural disaster is caused by the sin in the world.” This is a false and dangerous assessment of the Earth. The Zoo Keepers at the New Orleans Zoo took successful precautions to protect and ensure food and clean water for the animals for the duration of this ordeal, what does that say? There is no logic to human behavior. I am so sad for those effected by Hurricane Katrina and the ripples to come.
HOWEVER on a happier note, congratulations to Julee and Gordon Schoenfeld for their new family member, Ryan Alexander. Good middle name :thumbup: Born bright and early in the morning 29 Aug. Also, thanks Grandmajeanny for reading my blog and the encouragement.
Alex and I are doing fine. We miss each other during the week (much more than when we lived on separate continents, wacky!) but we both need the time to put our noses to the books. My first language course with Inlingua ends 16 September. And my written Language exam is 13 September and the verbal exam is the following week. It’s no time for stage fright or getting sick. I highly recommend “ginger with camomile, black pepper and other good stuff” tea to combat any would-be bug. You get a nice tea pot of this stuff at the Victoria House cafe near the Viktualienmarkt.
