These are all different ways of saying the SAME word: Hello.
One of the main goals in doing an exchange is to master a foreign language. Coming from the USA, the only language I was forced to learn through school was English. Don't get me wrong, English is an amazing language, and I have learned in the past month that English IS the World Language. Almost EVERYONE can speak it. Meetings with exchange students are in English; my German Langauge class that I am taking with 7 other exchange students (all from other countries) is conducted in English; English is even used on signs in the Hannover Zoo!
English is EVERYWHERE.
This being said, it makes it very convienent to have spoken English for the past 16 years, as not I can still communicate quite well, reguardless that my German is just so-so. But I want to be fluent in German!
In almost every country(if not every) English is taught beginning in Elementary school. In Germany, they begin with English in FIRST GRADE. Crazy, right? The kids in my grade started learning English in the 5th grade. Still crazy! Anywho, I'm a bit behind in this language factor.
Learning a language is HARD. Even harder is sitting in school everyday, trying your hardest to understand what the teacher is saying. Being fully emmersed in a foreign language is TIRING. I'm tired ALL of the time; I know it's not from lack of sleep because I sleep ALOT. From 10-6:15 to be exact. Thats 8 hours and 15 minutes! 15 minutes more than what the doctors recommend!
The language is probably the most frustrating thing here.
I miss understanding people.
I have taken German for 3 years through school. Before I came to Germany, I knew I wouldn't be able to understand everything, or communicate as well as I can in English, but I figured after one month or so I would be able to understand almost everything.
That is definately NOT the case.
I have been here for a bit over one month, and right now I understand about 60% of what people say to me; that is only if they are talking directly with me. I need to concentrate to understand. I can't half listen to a story and still be like "OH MY GOODNESS THAT DID NOT HAPPEN." (This is how all other countries think we USAians talk with eachother :) )
Jokes are another thing. It takes me a good 5 minutes to understand a joke. Then I start to laugh.. Makes the situation a bit akward sometimes..
Most of the times when I don't understand, I simply nod and say "Ohh ja." And smile. I smile SO much here. It's like the one way I can communicate without anything being lost in translation.
My inadequecy of German Language always makes for a good laugh though with my friends. It ends up to be quite entertaining in the end. I CANNOT say the German "CH" and "R." Whenever I attempt a word with these letters, I sound silly. Which really sucks, because the word for "I" is "Ich.." It's a bummer. Also, many of my friends have the letter R in their names.. My goal is to come up with a nik-name for them that doesn't include the letter R.
As I learn more and more, I feel constantly successful. Day after day I can understand and speak more than the day before. I can carry on a somewhat normal conversation now, and I am beginning to understand movies and TV in German! (I watched Karate Kid a couple weeks ago at a friends house. It was in German. I understood it. SCORE. I felt extremely proud.) By the end of this year, I hope to be fluent in German. I hope that when I half listen to a story, I can pick up what happened, and when I hear a joke, I can laugh at it while everyone else is laughing.
I applaud those who are multilingaul. It is tough. The different letters each language has, the different sounds the language has, the different meaning words have in another language, it's all so.. complicated.
Anywho, that's all for now.
I love Deutschland if you were wondering. Despite the fact I don't understand everything.
Tschuss for now!
Ash<3
