Letters A-D, Words & Rearrange The Order.

If i had taken the 8:27am bus i would be an hour and half early for my appointment. And the next bus would come 2 hours later. So i decided to walk the distance and that took me a good 40 minutes - probably the only exercise i've done as of late. Unless you count scrubbing the walls and cleaning a certain somebody's apartment who shall be left unnamed, for 10 hours over the weekend and now i suffer a very sore arm and shoulder - but that's a whole different story.

Anyway, i make it to the Volkshochschule, otherwise known as VHS [Adult Education Centre] earlier than expected. Which gives me time to take a few breaths before i'm supposed to meet with the woman. So i get there and i introduce myself, remembering to structure my sentences correctly and not slur my words.

She begins by asking me a few questions about my background and what level my German is. Then scribbles on a form my answers. She then asks me which areas i want to concentrate on and so i tell her my grammar and basically everything. Then before i know it, she passes me a written test and ushers me to another room where i can do the test in private.

I'm told i have only 30 minutes and when i'm done to just come back to the office.

The first few questions i don't hesitate but as it gets closer to the end i'm having trouble.

THINK. CHRISTINA.... THINK!

Some i haven't got a clue and i wasn't going to waste my time trying to figure out. The pressure to beat the clock is at the back of my head. I'm hoping they're not too strict on the time because 15 minutes into the test i'm not even half way through. I can already feel the vein on the side of my head pulsate.

Stress. STRESS.


I'm 5 minutes over time.
.
.
.
I've had enough.

I end up not answering a few questions because i honestly had no idea.

So i knock on the door and hand over my test. I take a seat in front of her and she then busts out a transparent sheet with all the answers to the multiple-choice, words and letter ordering. At this point, i'm hoping i at least pass.

43 out of 65.

Not bad. It's a helluva lot better than i thought i'd get. I was aiming for NOT FAIL.

My results mean i can register for the Deutsch-Intensivsprachkurs IIIa class [which is a whole level higher than i thought i'd be in - my guess was i had to start at IIa, which is basically like at the beginning. Ia is for those not able to understand a single word].

So here it is, i start on the 23rd November and the course runs until March 2010. Mondays to Fridays, 9am - 1pm. And for 100 hours it costs 156 Euros.

I'll be going back to A2 and by March i will have reached B1. And will be able to do the test that certifies that i know enough basic German and can go onto B2 - which is the minimum one needs if he/she wants to get a job. And then it continues onto C1 and C2 - which is like super, crazy hard, i'm not going to even think about that!

...

So then i took the bus back since it started to rain and i wanted to check out the bus route anyway. When it got to my stop, the bus driver was super nice and asked if i wanted him to drive a little further. I told him the street name and he said that he ends up driving along that street anyway and that he'd just drop me off there. So that saved me a 2 minutes walk.

So there it was, TheSuperNice bus driver dropped me off at the front of my house. How cool is that? Seriously, this kind of thing would never happen in a big city. In fact, i've never had a bus bring me directly to my door step.