Confusion at the Duck Pond

Adelaide wanted some extra time to work after lunch, so I took the kids to the park for a few hours. This was our third day in Germany, so I haven’t had much practice speaking German again.

A little background, after Adelaide and I graduated from BYU, we moved to Germany and worked there for 2 ½ years. Adelaide and I both became business fluent in German. We loved it. Now, four years later, we are about in Deutschland!

The last 6 months, we have been in Brazil and Portugal speaking Portuguese. I didn’t think I would have much trouble switching over to German, or so I thought.

We were having a great time at the park. Darian made some new friends on the merry go round. There was even a little duck pond at the park. We didn’t bring any bread to feed the ducks, but Darian quickly made friends with a little girl about his age and her mother had pretzels for them to feed the ducks. I asked the lady how old her little girl was in German. That came out pretty easily. Then we chatted a little about how nice the city is, how long she and her family have lived here, and how long we will live here. After my first two sentences, my German skills started falling apart. Portuguese words kept popping into my head, and my grammar was crap.

I think she understood what I was trying to say. I think I understood what I was trying to say…

Well, now I realize I need to get to work on my German. It won’t come back as simply as I hoped for. Not like riding a bike.

Here are my action plans.

•  Talk to Adelaide & the kiddies in German (so hard to do, mostly because it is so easy to just speak in English)
• Watch some TV in German
• Practice grammar and vocabulary daily with the Duolingo App and the Memrise app.
• Talk to as many Germans as I can when we go out.

We are here for 5 more weeks. That should be enough time to get a good refresher. I am excited for it.