Friday, August 23, 2019

Die Freude und Herausforderung auf die Deutsche Sprache By Ryan Erker


I have made the decision to try to learn to speak German. Why am I trying to punish myself and most of those around me who are within hearing distance? Good question. I am attempting this partly because one should always know how to curse in multiple languages. 

Unfortunately for me, learning to speak German is like trying to do a waltz on a sheet of ice. Impressive if successful, painful to watch (or in this case hear) if disaster strikes. So far, disaster is striking at least for an hour a day. 

It was Mark Twain who wrote in his widely read travel book, "A Tramp Abroad", about "the aweful German language- Surely here is not another language that is so slipshod and systemless, and so slippery and elusive to grasp." I hate to admit that I disagree with the man who gave the world Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. 

Like most things that come from a Teutonic State, there is an order to the language. Sure, they capitalize all nouns, have three different classifications of words (masculine, feminine, and neuter), and the translations to English sometimes do not make sense but there is a certain beauty in a language that makes everyone sound so angry all of the time. 

Honestly, all I really want to do is hear a Mozart Opera preformed in its original German and be able to understand it. Well, that and travel to Munich while Oktoberfest is in full swing and work on our international relations with a Frulein dressed in a dirndl while drinking a local beer. A guy needs to find his motivation somewhere. 

By Ryan Erker

Ryan Erker 390480

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