One of the best things for studying in München is pretzel. 

I said that as an affirmative sentence, and I’m not the only one. I have met classmates who said the same about this twisted, heart-shaped bread.

The pretzels in München are called Brezn, and they are different from the soft ones from Auntie Anne’s. They are chewy like good European breads, and they are sinfully addictive when consumed with butter. All of my friends and family who have ever visited me in München got pleasantly surprised by a fresh-out-of-oven pretzel with half a centimeter thick butter in it.

You can eat them with white sausage, which is a specialty in Munich, or chew on it before your beer arrives in Oktoberfest. I grab a pretzel when I don’t have time to have lunch. People actually eat pretzel all the times. I see people gnawing on pretzels during rush hours on the train, for something quick and mess-less to eat. And I saw parents giving babies a piece of pretzel to chew on to keep them quiet and serene. 

Pretzels are quintessentially the bayerisch baby pacifier.

Lin

I’d like to share my experience learning German in DeutschAkademie in Munich.

I came in with a working holiday visa for a longer stay. For Taiwanese working holiday visa, one can stay in Germany for maximum a year. And to obtain the visa, one must have an employer or a language school to write a letter or provide a proof to the German Institute in Taipei before coming to Germany. Since my goal is to learn German, I looked for a good language course.

I found DeutschAkademie by a quick Google Map search. It has great ratings from Google Maps. One month of intensive classes at DeutschAkademie costs a bit less than 285. When I emailed them, they replied very efficiently, but eventually I choose another school for the first month because they accept credit card payment and DeutschAkademie would only accept cash or bank transfer, which are both hard for someone who is not in Germany yet.

From the second month I tried DeutschAkademie and never went back to another school. And here are several reasons why I stayed:

1. Cost-Value: Compared to schools that use fancy e-Whiteboards for teaching, DeutschAkademie uses only traditional whiteboard. However, with the help of recordings and teachers’ explanation, I found the setting sufficient and effective.
2. Hours: The program at DeutschAkademie is 3 hours per day, 4 days a week.
3. Teachers: All of my teachers in DeutschAkademie are young, but they are passionate in class, and not any less professional in terms of teaching.
4. Classmates: the students in DeutschAkademie are in general quite young. Probably because the tuition is more affordable for students and young professionals. That gives a very different atmosphere in class and in break time.

I will talk more about the teaching techniques in the next post. If interested, you can follow my other posts. J

Lin

▲ DeutschAkademie is located in the center of Munich, accessible by both S-Bahn and U-Bahn. And it has very good reviews.