In my last blog, I commented on how much fresh food you can buy here. For example:

A small selection of Germany's Great Bread Variety

Fruit & Veg Stall

Eastenders... eat your heart out?!?!

The rest of your shopping can be done at the supermarket like this one:

Our course Supermarket hotspot!!

Often supermarkets will have contracted in specialists like Butchers i.e. Vinzenmurr or Muellers (Bakery). This week, we have been creating dialogues with pretend “shop assistants” and asking for things in weight. Here it is all pretty straight forward enough as everything is in kilograms which we use in England too… until we got to the word that means 500g – half a kilogram: Pfund!!! (take your teeth out and say that ;-)

We went “window” shopping yesterday as a class to our local Tenglemann – see pic above – which was really nice to get out of the classroom for a while. I even asked for something that they didn’t have and again (it still surprises me) that the shop attendant understood me. We were supposed to cost up a shopping list for the weekend which was pretty fun but it really made me realise just how much I actually go food shopping – basically because everything is so fresh. Apparently, in other countries in Eastern Europe, this is the case too. I never thought my life would be like this:

Head in the stalls not the clouds.

Today, we started to look at comparing things i.e. making them bigger, smaller or longer etc.
For example:
Gross / Grosser / Grossten

It again is very similar to England with british endings being -er, -est. However, when it came to viel, mehr, & am meisten (aka lots, more, most), obviously , this is the exception to the rule in a league of it’s own. I guess again it’s one of those:

“You just have to know”.

To end this week, we spent much of our lesson playing games – memory games, to be exact, to help us remember past tenses and also food names. We also learnt the months of the year and their corresponding horoscopes. Through this last game, we were able to learn animal names too. Who says that you can’t have fun whilst learning?

As we moved on to learn names of foods, I have happened to notice since moving to Munich, that much of the food here is bought fresh. Bakerys, Butchers and Green Grocers are very popular  here especially as the staple diet for a traditional German family (especially in Bayern) is sausage and bread and fruit based Cakes, Tarts & Tortes. The Viktuelien Market in Marien Platz is just such a market which is particularly large and sells great fresh Fruit & Veg. Compared to England, which considers these markets a special “feature” – aka “Farmers Markets”, it really isn’t  that expensive either. I can now understand why many of the European exchange students that stay with my family in England, say that Europeans are much more healthy eaters from what they are offered at school and out & about town. If I remember correctly, England used to also be this way. Maybe, we should go back to the “good old days” and really reinvest in local produce. I personally have felt so much better for the change – despite all the cakes!!!;-)

Tree Sweets!!!

As we were learning the names of fruit and veg – I happened to notice that many fruits in German have the feminine Artikel – Die. It was very nice to feel that I was finally able to start putting things into “brain boxes” again and have a fighting chance of remembering them. As I tend to do the shopping at home, this will be very useful.

Coincidentally, chocolate also has the feminine Artikel. I am very happy about this although as we currently have a Hat-ful of chocolate (see below) stashed for a rainy day but I don’t think I will be needing to get any more soon, do you? Aahhh… “Die Schokolade”.

Chocolate hat stash!!

I end this week with a little bit of good news. Apparently, we’ve all been really getting to grips with the new tense much better than we thought. I personally do believe this for most in the class but maybe I have to spend my weekend with my nose in my books just a little bit longer than the others. That’s right – we have a test on Monday. Joy!!!

So as I have started to settle in Munich, life seems to be getting busier and busier. Last week, I not only started the second part of A1, I also re-started my bookkeeping course to get some extra qualifications. This has proven a little overwhelming hence the bit gap in blogs but today I seem to have a gap in the relentless treadmill of life and thought I’d let you all in for a peek;-)

Over the last week, we have been learning how to give directions, talking about city features (see previous blog) and in particular Berlin’s different tourist attractions. We’ve also learned how to say you’re going on holiday, the weather, where and when etc. It has been clear to see that we been building on all we learnt before especially with Akkusativ & Dativ grammar cases really making all the difference.

Having just about slotted that into my mind, we have been adding what they call MODAL VERBS where you put the main verb at the end of the sentence (again why my husband must wait til the end of sentences to translate). In light of this, sentence structures are now regularly flying all over the place, we’ve added prepositions i.e. where things are situated / placed – both in time and space and today we started on making verbs Past tense. I feel like my brain is leaking words and I’m hurriedly trying to stop up the gaps because I need to use everything more and more each day. Learning how to ask where someone has been or is going on holiday, seems to have come at a great time, as I’m definitely feeling the need for one soon.

On the upside, yesterday I hosted an evening for my friends from church and was able to describe my flat, both comfortably and confidently completely in Deutsch to a German friend who is blind. Now I really know the benefits of why our teacher had us running around our classroom practising our descriptive sentences and asking each other questions.

I may have mentioned before that I love travelling all over the world and visiting old buildings. I also love walking and hiking but having only just got married this year, we’re not planning anything quite so exotic. So I’m thinking a local haunt will have to do. I have regularly heard and thought about visiting Schloss Neuschwanstein (aka Sleeping Beauty’s Castle) in Allgau and Schwanberger See as few local attractions I haven’t visited yet and aren’t so far. Maybe these would be a good weekend trip.

In August, we are planning to go to East Germany to visit my husband’s family. Being a “country bumpkin,” there are lots of lovely lakes and woods where my husband comes from so I think a bit of a wander around will be called for at some point during our time there. RESULT!!

This does all seem very hopeful as Munich has getting used to quite regular and spectacular thunderstorms over the last week or so but I’m hoping for the traditional blue & white sky that is represented in the Bayern flag and not that last pic!!

So hello there!!! I’m back due to popular demand (really just my teacher saying my writing was good) and thought I’d share some thoughts every now and then of how the next course (A1-2) is going.

So, the first thing I have noticed now is how much I think in German alongside English. It’s actually been hard to write this blog and now before I go to sleep, I’m often muttering bits of grammar which I must say must pain my husband with all the mistakes I make but today impressed the In-Laws!!!Woohoo!!! I was even able to have a good conversation with them for 11 minutes without help!!! (Check out my German accuracy???)

Over the weekend, my husband and I attended a wedding at my church and was delighted with (what is fast becoming) the “Typically European” wedding games. One of the games was where the couple had to throw darts at balloons to win the money in them. Testing Teamwork I think?!?! There, I had the opportunity to practice all the German I knew and although I got decidedly tired earlier than normal, everyone was very impressed with how much German I knew in such a short time (THANKYOU DeutschAkademie!!!). Apparently, they all understood me  too and even said I didn’t have an accent – I took this as a compliment though not sure where I was supposed to get one from.

I started asking what people did for jobs/professions too and found that this was just in line with what we started with this week. Today, I ran around Munich to see if I could spot people in action; see if you can guess what people are doing or who would work here.

Now, we have 6 more students in our class from Poland, Greece, Mexico and Romania. They are all lovely and we have a few more guys now too. Today, we found out that they haven’t taken the A1-1 course at the DeutschAkademie and so the last few days our teacher has been going over the Dativ/Akkusativ Grammar again. I am very pleased about this as I’ve actually really struggled to get back into the learning process. I think knowing that I had finished one course must have flipped a switch in my brain or something and it’s taken a good couple of days to get back into it. As the oldest in the class now, I take that as my excuse as the others, despite not knowing a few things are actually doing really well. I hope tomorrow’s test proves otherwise and that Age, really is nothing but a number.

Resisting temptation in face of adversity

As you can see today, the first test was actually resisting all the goodies above. We all brought little chocolates and sweets and I made the cake which everyone added fruit to which made it very nice. It is also one of my classmates birthday tomorrow and as we found out that in German tradition, it is not good luck to celebrate the birthday before the actual date, we kinda made it a celebration of the end of the course too.

With such a lovely atmosphere and all the food to look forward to, we actually all readily agreed to complete our tests before we ate the food. We did the longest first which was the first 4 lessons together that enabled us to really review almost all we had learned. It had the format of the official tests you get at Goethe Institute (Formal Examination Institute). This is with reading, listening, writing and speaking parts. We all did really well too with only a few things wrong but obviously food is a great motivation. There was such a nice feeling between us, so when our teacher sneaked in another quiz for us to do together, it really boosted our confidence when doing the Lektion 6 test – on Dative, city features and dates. I did okay on that too and when we did the speaking practice, I personally was much more confident and happy to do it. I actually think I can maybe share what I said today which was basically introducing myself by saying my name, how old I am, where I come from and what languages I can speak – I’m not promising anything but I’m in the mode of “JUST DO IT” now, so here goes.

Ich heisse Grace. Ich bin 28 Jahre alt. Ich komme aus England, Grossbritannien. Ich wohne in München. Ich spreche Englisch und ein bisschen Deutsch.

Phew!!

So having completed this part of A1, it really was mixed feelings today. Sad, because we had all had a really nice time together and had really supported each other in our learning and not everyone was continuing but happy because we all felt we had really achieved a lot and so it was quite a positive end.

Getting by with a little help from my friends!!!

So I now move to the next level, with enthusiasm and confidence – “Gung-ho” even as they say in England. Yet my husband shared a common word – “Aufpassen!!” [Take care] as I start the next course. He referred me to a famous author – Mark Twain who actually wrote an essay on his opinion of the German language. Just Google this if you’re interested further but to be honest, it is nice to know that others have struggled too but I’m happy to say that I am feeling very hopeful right now and truly believe nothing is impossible especially if you can “Get by with a little help, from my friends”.

Good luck in the future to all in my classmates who don’t continue now. I wish you all the best and very glad I got to meet you all. Thanks for all your support in the lessons.

A final Tschuss & Gute Nacht.

So as we come to the close of A1-1 course, a time of reflection is imminent (aka Evaluation Form time) and today is no exception. It was a wonderful surprise today as I traipsed the streets of Munich hunting for a mouse repellent plug, that I actually had the vocabulary to ask shop attendants for what I wanted in German!!! I found myself regularly rehearsing (obviously silently) what I wanted to say, as I hunted one down in each of the 5/6 shops I visited, but sadly at the last minute ask them if they spoke English. Of course, the joy of Munich and I guess most of Germany’s cities is, that many do speak and understand English well. This really does us foreigners no favours. Surely, this is why I took the course and yet although I have come quite far (our teacher said she was proud of us today so I guess I have) I’m still not quite feeling the confidence yet. I wonder what it will take? I plan to do the next course with Deutsch Akademie (A1-2) in the next 4 weeks but don’t they say, that confidence comes if you “JUST DO IT”.

I actually think our teacher had this in mind as we practised the new case – DATIV again today. She gave us another little box to help sort yesterday’s newest artikels with the theme: distinguishing between DATIV and the wonderful AKKUSATIVE. If I heard correct, then I think the general difference is WO – refers to DATIV and WOHIN – refers to AKKUSATIVE or in English – Where is the action taking place and Where to/ will the action take place. For example, Cycling in the park

Wir gehen im Park radfahren vs Wir fahren in den Park mit dem Fahrad

or

Lying in bed

Mein Mann liegt im Bett vs Mein Mann geht ins Bett

I have to say that the exercises were good and I surprisingly managed to get more than the majority correct. I guess I can go into tomorrow’s test at least patting myself on the back for today’s attempts.

I hope we get our results tomorrow too as half my class is leaving – sniff. Let’s hope we all do well and can go out with a bang. I think a surprise is due but will have to let you know tomorrow in my final installment. Who knows, I may just prove just how much Deutsch vocab I really know.

In our second lesson this week, we looked at dates again. I think our teacher realised the tongue-twisting nature of the words were a little bit tricky for us and gave us lots of speaking practice again – YAY!!! We also looked at what words indicate position of an item i.e. under, over, in, on etc. and then started on the wonderful case of Dativ.

Dates were still pretty fun to say again and I found I was finding them easier to distinguish. Practice, practice, practice right? We had fun and games with learning the positioning of things with a Hot-Cold game. I.e. Is the ball on the table? Cold. Is the ball behind the cupboard? Hot. Etc.

However, this morning, I ended up playing the same game as I heard sounds from behind my computer table/cupboard. I have to say I’m still yet to find out the source for sure, but me thinks it can only be a small rodent that has sneakily got his foot in the door. However, I think our rodent friend may find our house to be severely lacking in fruit for his labour due to my OCD for cleaning and complete phobia that has led me to get one of those high-pitched plugs today to drive him crazy and away from our home– QUICKLY. Ah, another joy and facility of cities.

MPS - Mouse Positioning System

Having had so many instances over the last few weeks, where we’ve been wanting to make sentences that need the Dativ case, I think many of us were pleased to finally get to use it (officially). I thought I would be one of those people but I think my brain went into the “GO-SLOW” gear at this point. A distinct feature was when I was hearing the words, knowing they made sense but not being able to do much with them and finding them just hanging around my mind like an unfocused fog. Yet, everyone else seemed to pick up super quick. I’m not sure whether this is because of my age, recent personal stresses and general busyness or just general slowness but it really was quite a worry at the time. However, hope shone through when our teacher gave us the guideline that this case is generally used for movement, it seemed to insert a little box into my brain to start throwing all the DATIV stuff into. I was so grateful for this, as we have our final test for the course on Thursday and this gave me some hope of at least knowing the words. Sorting it all out can come later – yeah? Any further tips or ideas to get this one, would be very welcome.

Token random thought? Have been thinking recently that I have been struggling with quite a lot of the course. I wonder just how much my age is affecting my learning?  Is learning for the mature person only for the super smart and in school full-time? Discuss.

We started this week learning the names of city facilities like Hospitals, Train stations, Pharmacies, Cinemas etc. We also learned how to say where we lived in the city, how long it takes us to get to school and by which form of transport.

Even though, I live in the east of Munich on a fairly direct route to the city centre, it actually takes me about 30 mins to get to class.

DeutschAkademie is on centre left of map - My home is right.

Many of my classmates live outside the city and it takes them only half of my journey time. I think they all drive which obviously really makes a difference.

I can drive but only just got my license this year and as I learnt to drive on the Left (the “right” side, if you ask me) of the road, I think it would be pretty scary for all if I was let loose on Munich’s roads straight away. It took me a quite a few visits here to know which way to look before I even crossed the road.

It actually took our class a long time to get through Munich’s many city facilities and features. It has several hospitals (one of which I have visited twice already but that’s a long story), many cinemas including one called “Cinema” which has many films in English or it’s original language in Nymphenburger Strasse and a very good Theatre district which many of my classmates have visited already. The Pinakothek in Odeonsplatz region is highly recommended although I am yet to visit.

We’ve also started to learn how to indicate a specific date and numbers like saying the 4th floor or the 10th May. You also only add a couple of letters to the numbers like in English but I am finding it a bit of a tongue-twister to pronounce. My birth date is particularly fun and also when the month is referred to in it’s numerical form i.e. dreizehnten zehnten aka 13th October.

Again, this is definitely one you need to listen carefully too as it could really be the difference between making or breaking an appointment otherwise you really need the line… “Alles, nicht klar!” – (All is not clear!)

From the start, I just want to make an official correction to the last blog I wrote. I pointed out that in German, they use the same word for getting up and getting off (e.g. a train). Unfortunately, this is actually not the case as my husband tactfully told me last week. The word just sounds the same i.e. Aussteigen and Aufstehen

Obviously, when you start to learn a new language, these sort of mistakes happen often and in my search to find out why, I’ve come to realise that words are pronounced here using your tongue in the front of the mouth. This does mean that many of the words sound the same. As I don’t have enough vocabulary to differentiate them, at least from the context – my mistakes are inevitable. My deepest apologies and note that this may be the last time I instruct anyone on Grammar or Pronunciation – at least not for another, … hmmm… decade????

Needless to say, I didn’t quite do my best on the last test and am feeling quite sorry for myself – but I’m off home this weekend to ” My land of hope and glory…” for a bit of home cooking and Mummy & Daddy love. There’s nothing quite like it, wouldn’t you agree? Normally after 6 weeks, I return but it’s been 8 weeks now since I saw them – me thinks, I am well overdue.

In the last class, we learn a bit more about “Trennbar” verbs (aka separating verbs) including the one for “Washing up” and “Tidying up”. This was very useful especially for instructing the “Ol’ Man” (husband that is). He does tend to be very good when helping in the house and I really cannot sing that Katy Perry song whole heartedly. I even have evidence – see below.

Does he wash up????.. yes he washes up... Does he clean up? Yes, he always cleans up.

We also learnt how to say when and where we go out in the evenings. I learned that Pubs and Bars are popular in both cultures but here they are called Beer Gardens (Biergartens). Also, parties and clubs open and close later here too – like 4/5 am. Most of my class are younger than me and don’t tend to leave their homes to go out until 10pm or later. This truly reminds me of my student days and just how long ago that was. I’m now the one heading for my coat and calculating the fastest U-Bahn home round about the time they plan to go out. How did I become so old without noticing? Could it be that even with a young looking face, it’s all about what’s inside that counts? You really should never judge a book by it’s cover.

So today, we had the joy of a Substitute teacher. Normally in England this is a…. “DOSS” lesson which generally means you don’t learn much. However, not so in Germany… not so!!!

We actually learnt quite a lot today. At first I thought our “SUB” was going very fast, but we all kept up AND she was nice enough to go over the grammar of possessive artikels and akkusativ artikels. I’m still not quite sure what that means, but we have a test on it tomorrow. Needless to say, most of the lesson was on this and it was very technical, but after today, I actually think there is hope for us all. I think our normal teacher would’ve been very proud of us. (I guess we’ll find out on Monday for sure).

Now, I shared previously that Germans like to combine words to make “UBER” long words and to be very precise – today I found out they even have a verb for eating breakfast – “Fruehstuecken” – I guess we call it “Breakfasting” or “to have Breakfast”.

"One chooses to breakfast alone this morning"

However, today we also learnt how to separate verbs. Apparently, there are specific verbs that have to be chopped up when you put them in a sentence. This gives the effect my husband often says is quite tricky when he’s translating for me and I’m badgering him with questions. He actually needs to listen to the end of the sentence before he knows what to translate. The verbs that are used don’t tell you what is happening until the end. For example….

Aufstehen – to stand up
Ausgehen – to go out
Anrufen – to call/ ring someone

In a sentence….”Ich stehe am Sonntag um 10 Uhr auf”
In English this literally means… “I stand on Sundays at 10am up” Great huh?!?!?

In light of this and for some time now, I’ve been having some really confusing moments with my husband. He speaks really good English but there has been a few things that I’ve just thought… “WHAT?” so I thought I’d just share them, as today the mystery was solved.

My husband often used to say to me….“When do you want to stand up?” or “We stand up here?” Normally, he says the first question when he wants to set the morning alarm and the second when we’re about to get off the train. What he actually meant to say is:
“When do you want to get up?” and “We get off here”

Apparently, “Aufstehen” is used for both getting up in the morning and getting off a train. A bit random but I guess you do often see people sleeping on the morning trains and getting up and getting off all at the same time at their stops. I heard this weekend that this is particularly true in Japan.

So, a little word of warning for these new verbs.
1) If you have someone translating for you -please don’t interrupt – they may tell you the wrong thing.
2) Stand up and Get up are the same thing in German. They’re not being rude!!! Just go right on and “… strut your funky stuff now”.

Tschuss!!