Deutsch Lernen

I took the picture above in beautiful Dresden in early 2013. That was also the time when I took my first German language course. A four week intensive course- 5 days a week for 5 hours per day. It was great, total immersion in the language, not only in the course, but also being in the country I was forced to practice. I went from knowing nothing to being able to ask for things, form sentences, and order in a restaurant without help.

After the initial jump, things have started to slow down a bit. I get the feeling that the more I learn (I have been taking weekly lessons), the worse I am getting. My German teacher says that is because I am forming more complex sentences now, so it feels more difficult. I hope she is right. But I can't help the frustration I get with trying to express myself in another language. Us English speakers really have it easy, because so many other cultures speak our language, we can get lazy, and have no necessity in speaking another language.

With German just being able to pronounce some of the sounds is a frustration, they are sounds we don't use in English, specifically the ü, and ö, sounds. So getting confused looks when you say für and no one knows what you mean! Or not pronouncing the ü strong enough so one word sounds like a completely different word all together. Learning a new word, then 5 minutes later forgetting it completely.  I can understand much better than I can speak now, which means being able to understand someone, then having to smile and nod back at them because I cannot find the right words to say in return. So frustrating! I do try though, and in a lot of cases am able to work around the missing words with other words I do know.

I am still working on it, despite the frustration, in the hope that one day, I will be fluent. One of the most interesting things about learning a language and also listening to people that learn your language, is hearing the differences in the way that words are used. Sometimes people use English words in a way that I wouldn't have thought of. Also, they way Germans use words and expressions is again completely different than I would have thought of, but makes complete sense! What are your experiences with learning German or another language?

Bis nächste mal..