(Not So) New German Girl: Nine Months Down, Three to Go

March 20th marked the nine month “anniversary” of my arrival to Munich. And on this date, last year, March 28, 2010 I started this blog – Diary of An American Au Pair slash New German Girl. It’s been one year since that first post and nine months since I first arrived and guess what? I’m not so new anymore!

How can I explain to you just how much my life has changed over the last nine months? You’ve been reading this blog (I hope) so you have an idea of how far I’ve come and the things that I’ve seen but how could I really explain it to you in words? I’m not even so sure that I can do that for myself. What I do know, is that the girl that I was when I left California is not the same girl that will return in June. I have changed, my life has changed, and my eyes are wide open. I may not have seen very much of the world but what I have here – I absolutely love and to be quite honest, I wouldn’t ask for a do-over even if you paid me.

The months leading up to my German adventure were busy, busy, busy. Of course I had Germany on my mind but I was so preoccupied. I was trying to finish my Capstone and was looking forward to my college graduation. I was organizing all of my material possessions, moving out of my apartment, walking away from my numerous jobs and co-workers, saying good bye to friends and loved ones, and preparing myself for the unknown. When I first arrived, after nearly 13 hours of travel with swollen feet and a weary smile, it didn’t feel that different. I couldn’t understand how to get through the airport, not because of the language – everything was written in both English and Deutsch – but because Franz Joseph Strauss airport is a ridiculous mess of signs and signals and moving sidewalks. Eventually, I found a taxi in some shady back corner and I gave my address to the driver and although he barely understood me – I was hopeless back then – he managed to finally understand and we were driving away. My adventure was right in front of me. It was about to begin.

Nine Months Gone By (I Could Have Cooked a Baby By Now!), My Impending Adulthood, and All the Things and People That Make My Life

I can’t believe that it’s already the 1st of March, that’s it already spring. Where the hell has this year gone? I started this blog almost a year ago. It’s been almost nine months since I started this adventure in Munich. Time goes by so fast. This time last year I was working diligently on my graduation capstone and was taking care of Baby D five days a week. It feels so far away. So much has happened since then and my life has changed in every way possible. I have been so blessed to have this experience and I wish that there were more than just three months left to enjoy it. Unfortunately, that is all that I have left – 110 days, just a little over three months. There is still so much that I can do in that time – I’m going to be traveling this spring (budget-willing!), visiting Barcelona, Spain and, hopefully Verona and Venice, Italy. I’m going to Cologne on the 11th of this month. And in May, I’m going to Berlin to visit friends who live there. There’s another beer festival coming up in March – the Starkbierfest – which means that the dirndl is coming out again and my girlfriends and I can feel like real Bavarians. I’ve fallen short on my Munich bucket list but I’ll pick up on it again – I have a lot of stuff to catch up on that I haven’t even posted yet. Bear with me. I’ll get through it eventually.

Life has been good. Things in Munich are wonderful, I have no complaints. My social life here far outweighs my au pair responsibilities. Last weekend we completely exhausted ourselves partying. One going away party after another and two 6 am returns in a row. Club nights, bars, beer, tequila. We take it all in stride and we look out for each other whenever and wherever we can. I spent all day Sunday in bed watching How I Met Your Mother. It was glorious. Then my lovely friend, Ana, fed me a delicious pasta dinner and we talked for hours about everything going on in our lives. I love weekends here – I live for them. I will miss this when I go home to live in my mom’s basement and start my grown-up life. I will miss this last chance that I’ve been given to really just be young and carefree. It doesn’t have to stop after this but it will. I’m making that choice. I’m choosing to grow up and take on a more responsible adult role. Which is fine with me. But, for now and in spite of my near and not so distant future, I choose to enjoy the time that I have left here and to just live my life as it comes.

My favorite picture of the week:

My best girlfriend, Fionnuala. I LOVE HER.

Other things I’ve done in the last week or so:

• I watched 127 Hours about the guy who cuts off his arm. Incredible.
• Called my mom, twice, over the course of five days and talked to her for over an hour both times. I miss her. A lot.

I can’t wait to hang out with my mom and Ruby Tuesday.

• Earned 80 EUR on the side. It’s a secret! :) And then spent it all. Another lesson learned. Sigh.
• Played at the spielplatz with the cutest twins in all of Munich.

Das ist alles. Danke. Tschüs!

Deutsch oder Spanisch? Das ist die Frage.

I have a confession to make.

I have been cheating on the German language with Spanish. I know, I know. It’s really weird. I’m in Germany, trying to learn all about the German culture, but I’m learning Spanish instead. (Actually re-learning since I’ve already spent four years of my life studying it.)

I decided that, after spending (and surviving through) seven months in Germany and being completely immersed in the language, and with only five months left of my time here, it doesn’t make much sense for me to go on to a German language course. I’m not going to use German later in my life (unless I happen to come back to Germany someday) and I didn’t want to spend my money on it. I know enough to get by, it’s fine. I’m not worried about not knowing the language. It was a decision that I made a few weeks ago and, so far, I have yet to regret the decision.

After finding out about LiveMocha.com through a Blog Carnival a few months ago (I got 30% off LM prices for participating!), I looked into it as a resource for online German language lessons. I didn’t go through with it – it would have cost me more than I could afford at the time – but I kept Live Mocha in the back of my mind for future reference.

As part of my preparation for my return to reality in June, I’ve been researching the jobs that are available in California and that’s when I made up my mind to get back into Spanish lessons. 95% of all the jobs that I’ve come across in the area of education or child development have a bilingual requirement. And if it’s not a requirement, it’s a suggestion and that means that if I am bilingual – I’ll be chosen for the job over someone that isn’t. So, therefore, I thought… I am going to do this again. I studied Spanish for four years over the course of high school and college but I never became fluent. I can’t speak it and I can barely understand it. So, hopefully, over the next few months while I have nothing to do during the day I intend to continue with my Spanish lessons and hopefully gain enough fluency practice to be able to use it when I search for jobs this summer. German Schmerman!

I’m finding that LiveMocha is a really, really great program. I am very satisfied with it. I think that the success of LM comes from the fact that it’s based on social learning – you join a community of people who are all learning a language. Native speakers of the language you are learning help review your lesson submissions in writing and speaking and then, in return, you do the same for those who are learning your native language. LM translates their critques to your lessons but I find that the further I go through my lessons, the less and less I need to translate. Within the review submissions, the reviewer can provide audio comments so that you can hear how it is supposed to sound in a native tongue. I find that I can’t get enough of it. Last night I spent about two hours straight just going through the English language lessons of people from all kinds of places – Brazil, Portugal, the Middle East, Mexico – and I couldn’t stop reviewing. I’m not a master at the English language but I like to think that I have a pretty good idea about what’s going on. I don’t know the details but I love helping people correct their grammar or provide them with audio so they can hear the pronunciation. It sounds crazy but it’s kind of instilled in me the desire to be an ESL teacher. I think I would LOVE to do that. I’m going to look into it the more that I learn and interact with LiveMocha and get better at Spanish. Fortunately I already have a BA in education and have taken courses in Spanish, linguistics, and teaching so becoming an ESL teacher would not be very difficult for me. I am very excited to have a goal ahead of me that I can see!

I was talking to one of my best friends about this and I mentioned that Germany is opening all kinds of doors for my self-renewal. I feel like I’m this brand new person with a big, wide open heart for the world and all of the possibility within it. That’s corny, I know, but I have really embraced the self-discovery of this whole experience and I am so excited to live my life everyday from now on.

Vielen Dank, Germany!