It feels strange that I’m more than halfway through my course now! It has been a lot of hard work but I am confident that I am progressing. Hopefully in another couple of months I will be roughly at a point where I am able to get things done without too much trouble! Things like getting the plumbing in my apartment fixed for instance :) It also becomes frustrating when you know what you want to say but arent able to say it!

I have found that I am able to have small conversations. When I am getting food from a take away place they often ask me about myself and where I come from – basic questions like that are easy! Also, when I am out walking Lukas people are often interested in him and ask me questions. I think this is because he is very handsome :) A lot of the dogs in Berlin tend to be very small – I suppose this makes sense as people’s apartments are often small! There are also a lot of Daschunds of course, or sausage dogs as they are popularly known in the UK! These dogs are the exact opposite to Lukas: small and plump with short legs! They are very sweet though.

In terms of the course and what exercises have been the most helpful – I think its the games! We play a particular game where we have cards with a word written on it and we have to describe the word in German and try to get the people on our team to guess what it is. We’re all getting pretty good at this…and we get quite competetive! This is helpful for learnin :)

Here is a photo from the canal near my apartment – you may have noticed that a lot of my photos have contained swans in some way! This is because they are one of my favourite sights in Berlin :) I also really love the canal.

Well the Hausaufgabe yesterday was extremely hard! Sometimes I can finish it in an hour, but yesterday’s took me four hours and I couldnt even finish it! It was about what I was talking about yesterday, the Pronominaladjektivs. I think it will take me a while before I understand these. I am lucky because my mum speaks a bit of German, so often if I am having trouble with my hausaufgabe I phone her and she can help me. But now that I am progressing and the lessons are becoming more advanced, sometimes she doesnt understand either! It would be good if I had a very patient German friend who could help me, but somehow I feel shy to ask.

I am also very shy about speaking German, which is a bad habit! I am finding that I am understanding conversation more and more, which I’m really glad about, but I still feel very shy about speaking back! I may try one of the konversation kurses offered at Deutsch Akademie, or will advertise for a tandem (where you meet someone to practise conversation by way of exchange, so in my case I would practise German and the person I was paired with would practise English).

I have been told by people that the only way to improve your spoken German is to really practise it, which makes sense. It is my goal for this week to begin practising more.

In terms of sights in Berlin – well it really depends what interests you! I love film, so my favourite museum is the film museum – I would definitely recommend that! I also love animals so I enjoy going to the zoo and the aquarium/reptile/amphibean house. I love the kanals and the parks very much as well. There are always a lot of swans in the kanal,  especially around Kottbusser tor. A lot of people feed them so whenever they see a person they begin swimming towards you!

Montag.

Today I feel very exhausted after an extremely busy weekend with my friends! Amy left on Sunday and Serena left early this morning. I was so tired that I considered not going to class, but then I remembered that if you miss a lesson it can be very hard to find your place again, so I made up my mind to go!

We are doing something called pronominaladjektives, which I find very difficult. The lessons are quite varied, sometimes I find that after a bit of effort I have a fairly good idea of what is going on, other times it is super hard and I feel like I’m just taking guesses! This was one of those times, though I think it would’ve been easier if I knew all of the prepositions by heart. I can see that this is something I will need to revise!

Life in Berlin is a lot of fun, I’ve said that before but since I’m supposed to write about my Berlin leisure activities I thought I would begin with this fact! My favourite leisure activities are meeting with friends, walking with Lukas and going for fruestuck/kaffee in a cafe and just soaking up the atmosphere. I have been here for almost 7 months and I often still feel excited just walking down the street as it is such a beautiful city!

My favourite places to walk with Lukas are along the kanal near my apartment and in Hasenheide park, especially in the Hundt park! Lukas is very shy in the hundt park, he mostly stays by me. I think maybe the other dogs are speaking German? Either way, he seems a bit confused by them and doesnt play much. Maybe dogs do speak in other languages too!

Today I am very excited because some of my friends from the UK arrive for a visit! One of the hard parts of living in a different country is missing your friends back home. My friends are called Serena (from Italy) and Amy (from Wales). They both love Berlin so they are very happy to come here – this is another very good thing about living in Berlin, people always want to come and visit you! In the 6/7 months that I’ve lived here, I think each month I have had a visitor of some sort.

Here are my friends – this is what they do to relax! Amy is carving a pumpkin :)

I’m now planning activities for my visitors – I want them to get an authentic taste of Berlin and see how much is on offer! My plan is to take them to some of my favourite places to eat, both restaurants and take-aways, and to some of my favourite bars and to some museums. This weekend there seem to be a number of performance/cabaret nights in Berlin, so we will go to see some of these as well. I also insist that we drink Roetkappchen (Sekt), which is a very popular drink in Berlin, very expensive in the UK but very cheap here! As I live in Kreuzberg I am very fortunate because most of my favourite bars and places to eat are right on my door step! There is a cafe just up the road from me that does amazing fruestuck, a great sushi restaurant in Kottbusser Tor, a great place for falafel in Schoenleinstr and a great bar in Neukoelln. I feel very lucky to live here!

In terms of the online Deutsch Kurses, as I have no internet at home I haven’t had the opportunity to use these much yet. But I do recommend looking on the internet if you are having trouble doing your Hausaufgabe, or simply want to practise :)

Another day at Deutsch Akademie!

I like that we use games in the group sometimes…it does somehow make learning easier! I just hope it all sticks. As the course progresses and things get more complicated, I sometimes begin to feel overwhelmed by how much I still have to learn! For a long time my main difficulty was the grammar, so I worked on this in particular. But now that I understand the grammar better I realise that my vocabulary is not so good! So now I need to remember to try and work on both in equal amounts. One of the things I find the hardest to understand is the cases: nominative, genetiv, akkusitive and dativ. This is something that isnt so much of a part of English. I’m hoping that when my understanding of the vocabulary increases and I get used to reading German sentences, that things such as case will begin to come more naturally. At the moment I find myself looking it up in my book to remind myself!

Like I said in my previous entry, everyone is very friendly on the course. My main friends in Berlin are the friends I already have here, and Lukas of course! I met my friends here when on visits and through acquaintances – I used to know a few people from the UK who lived here. These days my friends tend to be mainly French, Swedish, German and American. At the moment I only know 3 other English people in Berlin! My personal experience is that it is not hard to find a sense of community in Berlin, which of course is a very positive thing!

Today I panicked because it took me a while to understand the lesson due to missing one yesterday! This is a good hint: try not to miss lessons, pariticularly as you progress up the levels, as sometimes a lot of very important stuff can be covered in one lesson! Fortunately later on in the day I started to pick things up :) I must try not to miss any more!

Its a very satisfying when things finally start to make sense, it makes all the times when you don’t have a clue whats going on seem worthwhile!

My collegues on the course are all learning German for a variety of reasons. For one young man it is because he wants to study in Germany, for another woman it is because her husband is German and she lives here. Some people on the course speak 5 or more languages! Most speak more than two. I think I am the only one who as yet only really speaks one! (English!) This is unfortuately very typical for an English person. Though I also learned Finnish for a while as my mother is Finnish.

Everyone on the course is very friendly, there is a nice atmosphere. I tend to be one of the oldest though, at 29! One of the girls in my previous course was only 17! I wish that I had begun learning languages earlier when my brain was a bit more receptive. Oh well!

Here is a crossroads near where I live. I personally really like the grafitti in Berlin!

Hello!

This Monday I was unable to go to Deutsch Akademie as I was feeling unwell – each time I feel unwell these days I worry about schwine grippe! Fortunately it wasn’t schwine grippe at all, I was fine after a day taking it easy :) I also spent most of the day studying my German so as not to get behind.

I think what I like best about my German classes in Berlin at the Deutsch Akademie is that the classes are small and the teachers are very attentive. I have a lot of difficulty learning languages and I also feel shy about speaking in front of a group. Under these circumstances, it is really helpful to be in a small group – its much less intimidating! Its also helpful to have an attentive teacher. I imagine in larger classes you wouldn’t get as much individual help. The current teacher I have has been my favourite so far. She is very good at explaining things and you don’t feel stupid if you need to have the same thing explained more than once!

What motivates me to learn German on a daily basis is the desire to understand what people are talking about! There are also a lot of things that would be easier if I knew German…like dealing with problems for instance! When my heating wasn’t working in my apartment I found it hard to get it fixed, and the reason I still do not have my own internet connection despite living in my apartment for 5 months is because I havent figured out the necerssary German! So this is something I hope to do soon.

As I wasnt at Deutsch Akademie today I have taken a picture of my coffee break at home!

Hi again!

So its the end of the first week of lessons. I was very happy to find that today was one of the first days in a while where there was no rain! The weather this week has been particularly inhospitable, we even had the first snow! Though it didnt settle, it just turned to mush instead. I’m told that it is early for the first snow, that it usually begins to come toward the end of November. So soon its going to get very cold! I bought a new pair of boots today to keep my feet warm :) I know from having visited Berlin in the winter that it gets incredibly cold.

One of the things I like about Berlin in the winter is that when you are order take out food, they often offer you free tea as well! Its also a chance for conversation as well. I’m glad that I am at least at the stage where I can explain basic things about myself. My favourite take out food in Berlin are the famous Falafels (I also like the halloumi version) and Gozlems, which are less well known and are essentially a crepe filled with cheese/spinach/potato or meat. I’m a vegetarian and my favourite is the spinach. I live in Schonleinstraße which is a Turkish area, which means I have easy access to the lovely Turkish food and also the excellent Turkish market every Tuesday and Friday! I’m planning on going tomorrow, I hope its not raining!

Here is Lucas in the park – no rain as you can see!

Today is the 3rd day of the course. The day started off with rain, which then turned to sleet, hail, snow and then back to rain again! I was tempted to just stay indoors where it was warm and dry, but I managed to get to class. There seemed to be a lot of complicated grammar today with long names…I wonder if I’ll ever remember it all, but then I seem to manage the exercises. I notice that, after being in Berlin for a while, there are some things that I recognise from hearing people around me speak. I really need to practise speaking myself more.

I came to Berlin because I wanted a change from life in the UK and I wanted to try living in another culture. I’m not sure how long I will stay, but at the moment its indefinite. So I’m expecting that it will be for a few years at least! So learning the language is a necessity really. Already doing basic things like trying to get an internet connection in my apartment, and trying to buy second hand washing machine, and getting the heating in my apartment fixed has been so much  more complicated without speaking German. Its frustrating to struggle so much to get basic things done. So this is my motivation for learning German :)

I chose Deutsch Akademie initially as it offered good value for money. After I had taken my first two classes, I was also impressed with the quality of the teaching. It helps a lot that the classes are small, it makes learning a lot easier and the teacher has plenty of time to explain things to you, over and over if necerssary! In larger classes I can imagine that its easy to get lost if you dont understand something, and harder to get help when you need it.

I wish it wasnt so far away from where I lived, but as yet that is the only down side!

Here is a picture of my dog studying his German grammar ;)

Tuesday!

I am feeling more confident on the second day, on the first I was feeling bewildered that I’d forgotten so much of the vocabulary in the month I had back in the UK. But today things were coming back to me more, and things were starting to feel familar. Somehow it is always a surprise to me when I actually understand something. For my first 2 months of study I hardly ever knew what was going on. But since then I’ve invested in some grammar books and they’ve really helped. I still find grammar hard, but I’m able to make more sense of it than I used to.

Our group is made up of 9 people, including me. I’m the only English person – actually, in the 3 months I’ve been at Deutsch Akademie, I’ve never met another English person! One from Wales, but that is different of course. In my present group there are 2 Greek guys, one Canadian girl, 2 Spanish people, a guy and a girl, and 3 Polish girls. I’m one of the oldest, being 29. Though I think one of the Polish women is in her early 30’s. The teacher is very nice. Actually all the teachers I have had at Deutsch Akademie have been nice!

I’ve been encouraged to practise speaking German more….I hope my German friends are feeling patient!