Since the previous post on my German-learning journey (and 2-week break in Malaysia), I tried out a few things and had my first complete German interactions in the past week!
Where I left off last time was that I was not sure how to continue my German learning journey. In the meantime, I continued with smarterGerman on their B2 course which I have already previously purchased just to keep up the momentum – which I found some surprising results.
Learn German in English
It was not until I started courses at Müncher Volkshochschule (MVHS) that I realised that my German learning up until then (with smarterGerman and Michel Thomas method) had been in English, which is apparently contrary to most of the more traditional courses.
Where I could notice the difference of learning German in English, I was not disappointed.
For example, in the smarterGerman course, it was explained that words like “davor” “damit” does not mean much apart from the fact that we are going to encounter a slightly longer and complicated sentence. I recognised that these words appear when there is a “Verb mit Präposition” (“Ich habe Angst vor” “beschäftigt mit“), which we spent quite some time getting drilled at the MVHS B1 course thus causing hyper-alertness when I see these words.
The explanation completely put me at ease, and I attribute it to just having it explained in English in a few minutes. (Perhaps for native Germans, it would be difficult to explain this in the context of language learning without explaining Verben mit Präposition.)
Interlude: Is B2 where I should be?
In the past weeks, I also had the chance to meet and ask acquaintances and colleagues who can now speak German socially about their learning experience. They are all on B2 level and they said it helped that their (German) other half’s friendship circle speak German. I also read from somewhere that when you are at B2 level, it is expected that you can pretty much live your life in German.
OK, B2 it is then, probably. Which means my goal is closer than I thought (i.e. C1).
Conversation practices
I decided to try attending a “brunch and boardgame” event in Munich organised by a local language school, and then a few days later, the Munich Sprachcafé (not limited to German speaking, other languages are available too).
I dreaded going to the events and could give many rational reasons why I should not go. My inner voice said, “It is not that I don’t want to speak German, but look, the weather is bad (it really was!) / I am not in a sociable mood and for sure that would ruin it / surely it won’t be as useful as having a conversation tutor / I am already a few minutes late, that means it will be harder for me to join any conversations so what’s the point?”. I still had this voice whilst I stood outside the meeting places.
But deep down I knew I was just scared, full stop. They were new situations, and perhaps since my move to Germany, I have associated “new situations” with great fear given my inability to communicate.
I have always followed this philosophy much of my adult life: “We must travel in the direction of our fear”.
So I sucked it up and went.
It was so worth it.
I met people who reached B2 level in 11 months, who learnt German just by watching TV series and reading in German, who despite being on A2 level for 4 years but were determined to communicate. They were inspiring. And the native Germans who are learning another language or simply enjoy boardgames and are happy to speak with the rest of us German learners.
Most of all, everyone was kind. And supportive.
There were situations where we asked each other the seemingly most simple things like, “How should we say ‘Where were you all?’, is it ihr or euch or sie?!”, or collectively looked up words we didn’t know, or asked each other “Was bedeutet X (what does X mean)?”.
On both occasions, I had full conversations that started straying from the basic topics taught in German lessons. It was very fulfilling, because I was out there having conversations, meeting new people, and we understood each other!
“… Vorstellung?”
On Saturday, a friend and I went to shop for home office chairs. We ended up at an ergonomic furniture shop in city centre. Unbeknownst to us, it was one of those shops where you get a full consultation for your needs and recommendations. As soon as we stepped in, someone attended to us and given both of our German language level, I was secretly hoping that he would go away after we gave a simple answer of “we want to look at chairs and try them out”.
Of course that did not happen.
Instead, we spent a full hour looking at the chairs that they sold, trying out different configurations, learning about the different paradigms in ergonomics, occasionally switching to English when our German failed, and finally, got ourselves two solid recommendations on the chair we want to buy.
The funny thing, now to think back, was that I did not remember or understand the question he asked me in the beginning. I heard the word “Vorstellung” and recognised it but took about 5 seconds to try to remember its meaning as it was a new word I learnt only a few days ago, instead of parsing the sentence, and I said, “Nein (No)”. He could have asked, “Do you need an introduction?” or “Have you already gotten an introduction to (insert subject here that I did not catch)?”.
(The word “Vorstellung” means “performance”, as in, “Tanzvorstellung” / “dance performance” which was the context I learnt the word. But I also vaguely remembered it could also mean “introduction”.)
At least he knew how to read the slight confusion on our faces!