When we first moved here, I had some basic knowledge of German which I hoped would help me make myself understood in everyday situations like ordering food in restaurants and grocery shopping. Some days, it went okay, other days, I couldn't make myself less understood had I tried to. My nightmare example (and one which Paul loves to bring up!) was when we had been here for two weeks and needed to buy some special rubbish bags, Züri-Sachs, which are the only acceptable bags to put into rubbish containers. (A Swiss friend told me that the people in charge of emptying containers have been known to open 'non' Züri-Sachs to see if there was anything (an address on an envelope or so) that could identify the 'sinner'!). And though they are expensive, they are quite sturdy. Anyway, I'm digressing...
So, we went shopping in the local supermarket, and I decided to ask for these rubbish bags. I'd forgotten that they were called 'Züri-Sachs', and I didn't know the German word for 'rubbish'. What do I do? I decide to talk about bananas. I think the conversation went a bit like this (in 'rubbish' German): 'You know, when you have a banana, and you have the, you know you eat it, and you have the yellow bit, and you want to...' Including a strange demonstration using a real banana. The cashier looked blank - and slightly scared, before she was saved by the lady behind us, who luckily spoke some English and explained to us where we could buy the bags. Paul found this pretty amusing and I felt like a pillock having told him that I spoke some German...
Not long after having almost been arrested for threatening a supermarket worker with a fruit weapon, I signed up to an evening class in German (which I wrote about here my-weekly-german-class-german-at-work.html) and it was okay. I enjoyed the first semester the most as the group was great fun and highly motivated, but the second semester, the group had expanded along with my pregnant stomach, and I stopped going after a couple of times.
Luckily, it turns out that you don't need to attend German classes in order to learn German, instead, if you put yourself in one / some of the following situations, you're very likely to improve your German automatically (Some knowledge of the language is desirable.)
- Get pregnant. (This mostly applies for the female part of the population, though I think there was a story about a man who carried a baby. I don't really want to think about that too much...)
- Sign your child up to a local nursery.
- Become a victim of a crime.
- Join a local gym.
Ad. 1) In Switzerland, all women have a gynaecologist who follows them throughout their pregnancy. This means no visits to your GP, no special trips to the hospital for scans: That's all taken care of at your gynaecologist. I found a local lady, who, according to her receptionist, spoke great English. Unfortunately, she only showed that skill, when Paul came along with me. For some reason, she was hell-bent on sticking to German, when I turned up to my appointments on my own.
Ad. 2) Choose a local nursery where the person in charge is from Brazil and only speaks Portuguese or Swiss German. The staff speak some English but I prefer to conduct any communication in German as that leads to fewer misunderstandings. Stefan is slowly picking up Swiss German words, and has started saying 'ufe' for 'up'.
Ad. 3) In October last year, my purse was stolen (without me realising; I wasn't mugged) so I went to the police to report this. The friendly police person, who took on my case, didn't speak much English, hence I was interviewed and replied in German.
Ad. 4) Another quick way to learn German is to join a local gym and do some of their group fitness classes as they are all conducted in (Swiss) German. And you can always see what the other people are doing, if you're not entirely sure of what the instructor's saying. (But there have been times in Zumba, when I've happily been doing a full body turn and everyone else is jumping on one leg.)
Having a small child is also a great way to get to practise your German, as particularly older people often stop to compliment you on your cute child. (At least that's what I think they do, I make sure to do a lot of smiling and saying 'Danke!')
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