Another month has come and gone and I have completed B 1.1! I’ve had such a great time learning German at DeutschAkademie. I’ve met many wonderful people from all over the world and I can have a conversation in German (I was put to the test yesterday speaking to my sister’s flatmate who is German, over Skype from London)! In five months, my understanding of the language has improved greatly.

To celebrate the last day of class, we all brought food to share after we completed our test. I’m looking forward to having the next month off since I’ll be travelling, but I’ll be back at DeutschAkademie in November. I hope you enjoyed reading about my impressions of Berlin and DeutschAkademie, as I certainly enjoyed writing about it!

Some food and drink to finish off a great month of classes.

Alles gute!

Tschüss!

Sara

Today we wrote our last test and we finished off the week by learning about how to construct a relative clause with relative pronouns in the Dative case. It was a much harder concept to learn for me. Since it was also our last day of B 1.1, we finished by playing a popular game in our class where we all write down the name of a famous person or character and then trade ideas with each other. Without looking at the name we are given, we have to guess who we are in German of course. It makes for a fun way to wind down the week!

Our final test of the month!

Cheers,

Sara

My husband and I live in an apartment in the Tempelhof area and close by is a great park. I remember the first day that I saw it after moving to Berlin and I was taken aback not just because of its size (386 hectares), but because it is very open. There are few trees, it’s very flat…and there are two runways in the middle of it. Tempelhof Park is the site of the former Tempelhof Airport that closed in 2008. Basically, there is a lot of room for people to participate in many outdoor activities such as running, cycling, rollerblading, kite surfing, having a picnic or barbeque, and festivals. The history of the park extends back to the beginnings of the city of Berlin, but its history around the time of the Second World War and the Cold War is particularly robust. While going for runs in the park, I had no idea that National Socialist and then later, Western allied activites all took place here.

If you are interested in learning more about the history of the city, I highly recommend that you read about Tempelhof Park. I also highly recommend that you visit, because it is such an interesting landmark of Berlin.

The lookout in the park was closed so the view from this vantage point does not do the park justice. To get an idea of its size, I’m standing at the Tempelhof entrance in the neighbourhood of Tempelhof. The buildings at the far end of this photo are in Neukölln and everywhere in between is the park!

Cheers,

Sara

We are approaching the last couple of days of our B 1.1 class, but there is no slowing down yet! In the last few classes we have been learning about adjective declination in the comparative form. Therefore, the adjective ending depends on whether the sentence is comparative or superlative, the gender of the noun, the sentence case (nominative, accusative, etc.), and whether a definite, indefinite, or no article is present. This is one of the many reasons why German can be more complicated for people to learn. By practicing this concept with speaking exercises in class, I’ve gotten better with adjective declination, but it’s still a slow process of going through all of the conditions. I’m very thankful that I’m learning this at DeutschAkademie and not on my own!

My declination charts from class.

Cheers,

Sara

Since I’ve gotten to know Berlin better, I’ve come across streets in different neighbourhoods that many people go to for some unique shopping and restaurants. There are three streets in particular that I like. First is Goltzstraβe in Schöneberg (U7 Eisenacher Straβe). This quiet street has quaint cafes, vintage furniture, local clothing, and home accessories stores. Second is Oranienstraβe in Kreuzberg (U1 Görlitzer Bahnhof). This street is covered in graffiti and has a lot of bars, restaurants and stores. I came across a vintage home accessories store with a great selection of items for all areas of an apartment near the corner of Oranienstraβe and Oranienplatz. I would also recommend Bar 39 on this street. Lastly, I like Bergmannstraβe in Kreuzberg (U6 Mehringdamm). I went here today with a friend for lunch. It’s a busy street with many restaurants, cafes, more unique home stores (can you tell I like to decorate?) and there is a large second-hand clothing store in the area called Colours. Although each of these streets are different, they all have character and are a pleasure to walk through!

Our view at lunch from the restaurant on Bergmannstraβe.

Do you know of any unique streets for food, drinks or shopping?

Cheers,

Sara

Besides Oktoberfest celebrations happening this weekend in the city, another large event took place; the yearly Berlin Marathon! This was an event that my husband and I really wanted to see. My Father-in-law has run four marathons, my husband is a good runner, and, well, I’m working on it! We were up early, but got a great spot standing close to the Brandenburger Tor. Here, we could see runners and wheelchair/handcyclist racers approaching the finish line from far back! The competition sees 40,000 participants come to the city to run the race. Now I know running just over 42 km is an incredible feat, but once I saw the event live, I gained a newfound appreciation for these runners‘ capabilities. The fastest runners complete the race in just over two hours, but the average runner can take 3-4 hours to complete it! The day was even more exciting because a new world record was set at 2:02:57! It was a beautiful day for an exciting event!

The runners ran through the Brandenburger Tor to the finish line.

Cheers,

Sara

Oktoberfest is a traditional Bavarian festival that began just over 200 years ago as a celebration of a royal wedding. Now it has become the world’s largest festival with millions of litres of beer being consumed during its 16-day run! Celebrations also take place in many other cities outside of Bavaria. On Saturday, I went to Alexanderplatz with some friends to experience my first Oktoberfest. Now I know it’s not like the celebrations in München (I’ve heard they are huge and crazy!), but there was a large crowd, lots of local food and sweets, and of course 1L beers! I would recommend going to Alexanderplatz if you want to experience some great German culture! The Oktoberfest celebrations at Alexanderplatz run until 12^th October.

One of the Oktoberfest stands at Alexanderplatz.

Cheers,

Sara

There is no shortage of things to do in Berlin. I’ve already talked about my enthusiasm for markets in an earlier post, but I have another favourite place that I like to visit in the city. Museum Island (Museum Insel). Yesterday, I spent a cloudy afternoon visiting the spectacular Neues Museum! It’s one of five museums that make up Museum Island (there is also the Altes Museum, Alte Nationalgalerie, Bode Museum and Pergamon Museum). Inside the Neues Museum are numerous exhibits with stunning artifacts that showcase the development of early civilizations from the Stone Age to Egyptian, Greek and Roman times. The newly-opened third floor as some great information about early Berlin too! It’s so interesting to learn about how other civilizations lived thousands of years ago!

Tip: If you are going to be living in Berlin for more than one year, buy a museum pass. It costs 50 euros and you get free admission into 11 city museums including all from Museum Island for one year. It’s already been worth it for me! I spend so long wandering through the exhibits and looking at the artifacts that it’ll take me many more trips to complete all of the museums!

The front of the Neues Museum on Museum Island.

The huge lobby of the Neues Museum!

Cheers,

Sara

Fridays are test days in my class. Although writing a test is usually everyone’s least favourite thing to do, it’s a good way to review the lessons that we have learned that week and we immediately take it up in class. However, to change the mood after writing a test today, we played a vocabulary game! It’s exactly like the game Scategories if any of you have played it. We were given a bunch of categories such as Stadt, Land, Beruf, Adjektiv, etc. Then, a letter from the alphabet was chosen and we had to write down a word that began with that letter for each category. It was a fun game (there are some competitive students in my class!) and a great way to end the week.

Last test of the month! There were even a few questions about the history of Berlin!

Cheers,

Sara

Now, Berlin is nice and all, but there are a number of smaller cities and towns that can easily be visited in one day. Recently, I went on two trips with my husband and his parents to Leipzig and Lübbenau.

Leipzig is approximately 2 hours away by bus. Here, we visited the Zeitgeschichtliches Forum, an exhibit that focuses on the political history of the GDR, and the Stasi Museum, which is housed in the former Leipzig headquarters of the Stasi. Both were really insightful. We also visited two churches. First we visited Nikolaikirche which was built in the 1100’s and we were lucky enough to arrive as the organ was being played. The second church we visited and the highlight of the trip for me, was Thomaskirche where composer Johann Sebastian Bach is buried (the story of his burial is quite interesting). We stayed to hear the St. Thomas boys choir sing in the church and it was a beautiful performance.

Beautiful Thomaskirche on a cloudy day.

Lübbenau is about an hour by train from Berlin (Tip: if you are travelling anywhere between Berlin and Brandenburg, you can purchase a single ticket called the Berlin-Brandenburg-Ticket, which allows up to five people to travel together for one day and it costs 29 euros). We headed to Lübbenau to see the Spreewald via a two-hour trip in a traditional wooden punt boat down the rivers in the forest. It was exactly like what you would imagine if you were in a gondola in Venice! Our ferryman pushed the punt down the rivers while talking about the land and its history. We even stopped halfway through the tour to get a sausage at a restaurant in the middle of the forest. Of course, our ferryman only spoke German, so it’s good listening practice for those learning the language! It’s amazing that people still continue to live along the water today. The old small houses along the edge of the river banks and the surrounding area were so charming. It was definitely a trip worth taking.

Cheers,

Sara