Germa-Deutsch-No, Just German.

I've realized recently that one of the most commonly asked questions of me is "How's your German?"

Answer: Pretty good. I can understand the vast majority of what is said to me, and can carry on everyday conversations. In class, I can follow along what is being talked about, and can generally glean the main points from texts. Some days my German is awesome, other days I can barely even form a simple sentence.

But lately, what has been really, really cool is actually thinking and dreaming in German. The only problem is (especially with the thinking) is that I often get confused and will say stuff in both languages. For example...

"Jaah, wir sind nach Hamburg gegangen, which was total toll."

And it's not even like I don't know the German for that, but both languages just get confused.

Oh, and another cool thing. There are two Mexican exchange students in my school, and I've realized that I've started translating what they say in Spanish into German. Cool, no?

My writing skills in German, though, are still pretty bad. My teachers allow me to do a lot of my work in English, and sometimes have me translate it later. One good example of this was from today in my Deutsch class, we read "Kleine Fabel" (Small Fable) by Franz Kafka. Our teacher charged us to write a story with a similar message in the end (Please don't ask me to explain what that is)... so Vedashree and I, somewhat aided by Marcos (Veda is from India, Marcos from Mexico) wrote the following story (I'm posting it because I thought it was pretty good):

He stared around the room... that bleak, concrete cell that he had been stuck in for the past sixteen years. A knock on the solid metal door was followed by a flash of light, accompanied by the warden bringing his evening meal -- the usual; a hard stale roll and tasteless soup. The warden ssettled himself on the one chair in the room and quickly fell asleep, leaving the door open. The beam of light beckoned him to venture outside those cold concrete walls. The thoughts ran through his mind:
"Should I run? Should I risk the little life I have left for a breath of fresh air? Or shall I remain in my place?"
Half-standing, he began to move torwards the door. Suddenly, the warden woke, and seeing him moving, said,
"What are you doing?"
He sank down on the bed, resigning himself to his fate.
-end-

Surprisingly, once it had been explained in German, it got quite a lot of feedback. Apparently, it had some sort of "deep meaning", which I found hilarious, considering Veda and I wrote it in five minutes or so.

Well... that's all for now...

So yeah. Tschüß and such.

LG
Signe