That’s it, I have a goal. No, nothing to do with Fußbal.

I’ve been thinking recently what is the driving force that pushes me to try my best in learning German. Well first I am extremely attracted by cultures, and the language is a powerful expression of a certain culture. When I am in a new environment I feel the need to learn how to be a local. And communicating with people in their mother tongue has always given me  many smiles and small satisfactions. Plus, I got to know how much people appreciate even the smallest effort you are doing to be part of their Nation, no matter if you are visiting for a week or planning to live there.

Every year since 2005 my father and I have been attending an international trade exposition held in Nürnberg at the beginning of March. If you exclude the complex hand-gesture-mix-of-french-italian-german-turkish-bulgarian-language “spoken” by my dad (which works pretty fine in many occasion), I am the only means of communication with the international world. And that occurs of course in english. I gave it a try, last year, to use-combine-shuffle the few words and german expressions I knew at that time… pretty disastrous! I even remember a man asking for information about our company and after my explanation in my broken German he yelled at me… I always thought German was a harsh language in sound, but I don’t really think he only said: “Thank you very much for the information, have a good day.”

Therefore I have a goal now. By the beginning of march 2012, at the Nürnberg Messe, I have to be able to sustain a fluent conversation in German. Without being yelled at! Too tough you say?

Filippo