learn german

Now that I’m headed to Germany in a little less than a month for a short vacation, I need to start working on this daily. Everyone says German is closer to English than other languages, but it seems more difficult to me. I don’t have to be fluent in a month, but I would like to be able to get around without feeling like a garish American. I have always had such positive experiences in Germany and I like the people so much, it just seems right to be able to say more than “Guten tag” and “Danke” in their language!!

I bought a German dictionary and phrase book at the Friends of the Library sale… I couldn’t resist at .50/each. I also found a CD that has a lot of basics on it. I figured it would help with pronunciation and recognition of various sounds. It’s how I started picking up Italian before moving to Italy… so maybe it will work for German too.

They say that German is a lot closer to English than any other language. I haven’t seen any real signs of that… but, here I go anyway.

I want to learn German, because I loved everywhere I’ve traveled in Germany… Munich, Nuremburg, Berlin… and I want to go back… Dresden, Koln, Rothenburg… and the Germans were so friendly—I’d love to be able to speak their langauge to them.

Also, I like disproving the ugly American stereotype… ;-)