Teachers at Deutsche Akademie never put too much burden on our shoulders, they don’t assign lots of homework. In fact, I think they give as little as possible taking into consideration that most people work or have families and other priorities. Ok, that’s fair! But are we fair to ourselves? For instance, when I only have one exercise to do, that’s all I want to do and nothing more. I have no motivation to do a few extra exercises or learn new words. It’s not part of the assignment and I subconsciously become lazy. I put off learning new words for days thinking „…ok, i’ll learn them tomorrow“.

I know many people may not like this suggestion, but I wish we could be pressured a bit more.  It would make a difference in my learning experience if I knew I had to take a short quiz on words or preposition or other things.  I would like to propose this to my teacher but not sure how my classmates will react to it. I don’t want to be the „bad guy“ but I need pressure to study harder.

When I first came to Berlin I couldn’t make up my mind about buying the so called BahnCard 50. That is, you get a 50% discount on all of the tickets you buy to ride Deutschebahn.  It’s a great deal, if you are a regular traveler. Train tickets can be really expensive, especially ICE (fast trains).  I thought it would be unfair to live in Berlin for a year and not try to visit other places in Germany. Buying a BahnCard 50 was definitely a good decision and it proved to be totally worth it.

It’s very easy to apply for it. You can order it on line by going to www.bahn.de or you can visit the train station for example in Zoologisher Garten and purchase it there. They take your photo right there and after you pay they’ll give you a temporary card (and also some bonus 20 euro discount card) and then they will send your card to your address.

I highly recommend it to those who travel a lot. It really makes the prices of the tickets reasonable.