My “German Wave” Story
Okay, “German wave” is the literal translation of “Deutsche Welle” (DW) and is my another futile attempt to be witty. Deutsche Welle is to Germany what BBC is to Britain – country’s biggest media venture. DW, apart from providing very objective news coverage of Germany, Europe and the world, also provides tons of German learning resources through its website. If you ask me, their German-learning resources are the best in the business. “All good things in life are free” they say. While it may not be true for water any more, it is true for the DW resources. I can’t tell you how thankful I am to them, not only for my German language skills but also for my cultural integration into Germany and Europe (and my eventual becoming a citizen of Germany).
First and foremost, DW resources include elements of all kinds – reading, listening, and watching, expose you to different aspects of society – sports, arts, politics etc and cover all levels of knowledge – very beginner (‘A1’ level) to very advanced C2. On top of that, the content includes, at least for the intermediate or advanced levels (B1, B2, C1, C2), different accents and dialects of German. One day they might be showing you a video about the history of the coffee culture in Vienna in the Austrian accent (which I find much more amusing that the standard German aka “High German”) and the next day you might be hearing an audio about the Carnival culture of Cologne in the almost-impossible-to-understand Cologne accent (which is also difficult for native Germans to understand, if my German colleagues are to be believed). It not only builds your language skills but also brings you closer to the history and culture of the German speaking regions of Europe.
After playing around with all those German teaching YouTube video channels, I came across the DW resources. (In hindsight, I should’ve stumbled upon DW much earlier because they are so “obvious” and so easy to find on the internet) I subscribed to the RSS feeds of different contents – some that would be a bit easy for me (A2 level or so) and some that would challenge me (B1 to C2). In a week, I would receive around 5-6 new “episodes” (not counting the daily news in 5-6 minute audio). This included 1 “word of the week” (~1 minute audio), 1-2 general interest “video topics” (~6 minute video), 2-3 “top stories” (~2 minute audio), and 1 language-specific topic, e.g. on pronunciation, phrases and sayings, puns etc (~8 minute audio). Each of these included an audio/video content and a set of exercise questions (and a calculated score at the end). Sure, I would sometimes do very poorly on the score but I loved each and every second of it. And honestly, my general knowledge of European history, culture and politics improved much more exponentially than my skills of German language. A win-win!
Now, I have earned a B2 certificate in German (and I could’ve achieved a C1 with no extra effort) and a lot of the credit goes to the DW resources. I love them so much that I still continue to subscribe to them even almost 4 years after taking my German test. What’s not to love. With DW, I learn about the oldest mountain train of Europe (in Switzerland), the debate about repatriation of artifacts “looted” during the colonial times, an artist who uses (literally) kilos of paint on his paintings, the new trend of buying readymade “tiny houses”, a dancer who defied the complete disability of her legs and other brilliant things. Who can say no to such knowledge!
So, that was my story of using DW for the win but there are a lot more resources and help for German learning from authorities and organizations. For example, pretty much every city or decent-sized town in Germany has a VHS – Volkhochschule, an equivalent of community college in other countries. VHSs are the place to further your education and learning even when you are working full time. VHSs offer courses on painting, photography, Yoga, sailing, dance, and many others but first and foremost they offer German language classes. The fees are nominal and the classes usually take place in the evening after work hours or on the weekends. The only catch is that they must have a minimum number of people signing up to offer the class. I tried joining such German classes in my town back in 2013 but was disappointed. The group gathered for the class was much higher level than me and I simply couldn’t follow their German conversations. But you might get lucky.
Apart from that, every town is likely to have a library with minimal monthly/annual/one-time fee. And they usually carry tons of German learning books or general books in German language ranging from children’s comprehension level to very advanced. You just have to be motivated enough to explore. And don’t feel any shame in picking up a kids’ book. If you ask me, learning something new is the noblest act of them all (unless you’re learning to kidnap or murder someone) and everyone has to start from the beginning. I remember a 60 year old sitting with a group of 6-7 year olds in the beginner class of Indian classical music. You have to tip your hat to people with such wonderful attitude towards art, learning, and life.
And if all those efforts weren’t enough to make you learn the language, the German authorities bring out their ultimate weapon. They make it so hard to get by in Germany without knowing the language that you feel like either leaving the country or learning the damn language at any cost. With the exception of airports and some other international venues (e.g. those trade fair grounds aka “Messe” in Frankfurt, Hannover and such), there are barely any English-language signs anywhere in Germany. So, you are bound to pick up the basic German words or phrases from them. In all fairness though, a lot of signs are pictorial, following the standards defined by the European Union so that people from non-German speaking EU countries can also follow them. Then all or most of the documentation, from the cityhall, your employer, the tax office, your bank etc, is in German too. Google translation does help and the helpful translation from your friends or colleagues does too but you can’t always rely on them. You can’t expect to have a German-speaking colleague nearby all the time. And also, one little mistranslation by google and you might have completely changed the meaning of the whole thing. A friend of mine told me a horror story where he almost died after being given some extremely strong medicine by a doctor because of one mistranslated word. If that doesn’t get you to learn German, I don’t know what will!
Jokes and sarcasm aside, another big aspect of the German-speaking countries helps you massively in your endeavor – the people. They sincerely appreciate it when you make the efforts to learn their language and speak it at the risk of sounding stupid. They compliment you left and right for your language skills. Though, it’s not a good sign when they compliment you. It means that you still need a lot of improvement. It’s when they stop giving compliments do you that you are speaking at a decent level. (Confession: this idea is not entirely based on my own experience. I also saw it in a funny comic – ItchyFeet.) Also, the people are quite generous in offering to talk to you in German. At first, I thought they were just acting in self-interest (because then they don’t have to come out of their comfort zone and speak a language other than German) but then I saw how patient they were as I broke all bones of German words and grammar while talking with them. They, in my case my colleagues at work, not only sit there trying to somehow grasp the meaning your broken speech, but also provide corrections and teach you some nice phrases. Only once in a while does a relatively immature German person mocks you for your poor language skills (to your face, that is). Generally, the people encourage and help you in all possible ways. Remember my colleague who gave me the Harry Potter audio books? Afterwards, he also shared my pain by saying -“Yep, Harry Potters ruin books for you; It’s so hard to find anything that is equally good!”
There you have it, the biggest steeping stones in my journey to German level B2-C1. But there were other little stones too that helped me.
PONS books are great for beginners by the way. I used the PONS book up to level B1 as my starting point. Half the book is in English and the other half in German. Quite a creative idea, I would say! The book follows interesting stories of 4-5 people, their daily work and personal lives to teach you different aspects of German grammar. It comes with a CD with audio conversations among those people. Sometimes you listen to those before doing an exercise, other times, you read. In the end, it helps with your overall improvement. Once I was a middle level in German, I used an advanced book from PONS which focuses on the grammar and provides more depth into the concepts. If you ask me, this book was instrumental in me achieving a good score in my B2 test. For the first time, I knew how to end the adjectives for different genders and cases and which verbs take which specific preposition.
Apart from PONS books, I also watched some episodes of the most popular kids’ show in Germany – Sendung mit der Maus (“Broadcast with the mouse”). Yes, they are quite kiddish but it was amazing how entertaining and informative they were! In every episode, they teach the kids how something works. For example – how do motion detection sensors work or how come cheese has holes in it. Honestly, I would teach my nephews German just so that they can watch Sendung mit der Maus!
Finally, now that I am at a good comprehension level in German, I continue to consume some German-language content out there. The daily 100-second-news on Tagesschau is the first thing I do in the morning. And once a week, I receive new episodes of two brilliant podcasts I subscribe to – Geschichte aus der Geschichte (“Story from the History”; a history podcast) and Spektrum der Wissenschaft (“Spectrum of Knowledge”; a science podcast). Also, I continue to borrow German-language books from my local library. Though, I still stay away from “heavy” books (either literally or metaphorically) not because I am not skilled enough to read them but because my German-reading is still not very fast and I would be stuck reading a heavy book for months!
Thank you for being patient with my wordy rant and good luck with your German learning. Tchüss!