New Horizons.

Well, hello there! Haven't seen you in a while! 

I've got to say, it's been busy between finals week, moving out of my old apartment and into my new one {for the summer}, and catching up on some reading and sleep. This last week was ridiculous because it was the first week where I had no obligation to do anything, so I didn't really know what to do with myself. So I read, tanned, and slept mostly. But today was an exciting day! Pourquoi? 

Today was the first day of my German language class!

Some of you might be saying, "Dude... why the fuck are you taking another language? Isn't one other than English good enough? Isn't English good enough?"

I won't go into the details of the obvious gaps in the intelligence of those who think in this particular manner, but I will explain why I'm taking another language. 

1) Because I can.

2) Because it's required of my major {Linguistics}.

3) Because I love languages {Hence, the Linguistics major}.

I mean, who doesn't want to learn what is {to that individual} the unknown? Different cultures? Customs? Languages? The latter, I feel, is the gateway to finding the true customs and ideas of other cultures foreign to our own. 

So, why German? Is it because I think it'd be cool to sound angry whenever I spoke {not necessarily true, I'll explain later}? Because I want to learn how it is Germans on average are extremely organized, precise, and professional? Because I want to learn those ridiculously long words Germany is infamous for?

Okay, one of those is false. I am really afraid of those long words. Par exemple:

donaudampfschifffahrtsgesellshaftskapitänsmütze.

Yes. That is a real word.

Why would you do that to someone? It literally took me a solid 10 minutes without a break to finally pronounce it without stuttering or hesitating. Do you want to know what this little beauty means? It's the law for a captain of a steam boat that sails on the Danube River in Germany that his hat must be of regulation size.

Who in the name of Zeus has a word for that? 

Apparently the Germans do.

Here's another fun one! You know that law called the speed limit that you usually ignore? Well in Germany, they decided to make that one difficult as well: geschwindigkeitsbegrenzung. How would that fit on a sign? I can't make this stuff up!

Back to the point that German speakers sound angry all of the time.

For us English speakers, it seems like they're always angry. This is mostly due to the phonetic sounds that appear in their language and are absent in ours. This occurrence is also a reason why people believe it to be an "ugly language". Why? Just because it has different sounds than yours? Americans celebrate the beginning of the oppression and killing of the population of Native Americans by gorging themselves on a pound of turkey, and plates of mashed potatoes, yams, cranberries, and whatever else they can slather butter on. Don't judge. 

Another thing: they're not always yelling. Why do people think they're always yelling? You don't just go up to someone {in any country, for that matter} and yell out "GUTEN TAG" when they're 3 feet from you.

I love America. I really do.

Are the feds gone?

Anyways, besides that I learned basic things like introductions, inquiries and such. The learning process will go that much quicker because I have this class for 3 hours Monday through Friday. Yay?

Yay.

It's about time I learned another language! I think I've secretly been dying for this. I would question if something is wrong with me, but I'll leave that up to someone else for a final decision.

Now that I'm going for another language, I can't help but think about what is next on my list. I know that I want to learn as many as possible, so the logical thing to do would be to weigh out my options as to which is the most useful to me {or will be in the future}. I can't say what that is now, because honestly I've not a clue. For now I want to stick to latin-based languages, but who knows? In a year that could totally change.

As I wrap up this post, I will just leave you with a photo that will possibly haunt your dreams.

Angela is watching you. Always.

À bientôt!

xoxo