Minutes before i was about to step out of my front door yesterday, a rush of panic came flooding in.
My heart felt like it wanted to rip itself out of my body and make a run for it. The air suddenly got very thin and i had trouble breathing. I looked down at my hands and they were trembling. So i immediately lowered my head, positioned my hands on my knees and took deep long breaths in.
I eventually pulled myself together and convinced myself everything was going to be alright. And within minutes, i was at the underground train station and i was back in my element.
But before that, weeks ago i had received a confirmation letter to say i was registered and "Almuth..." was going to be my teacher. I had never heard of that name before and was slightly disappointed as i imagined the person to be male and Turkish. I'm not sexist or racist, i've just come to the conclusion that [most] female teachers are more patient.
I feel the same about my gynaes, i prefer them to be female. For obvious reasons, we have the same ummm... bits?
So there i am, in class and a woman walks in.
She puts her books on the table then leaves the room. At which point, in my head i'm wondering who she is. A part of me was expecting a tanned, half hairy man with a big gut and an uninterested facial expression to walk in.
Paranoid that i may had been sitting in the wrong class for the last twenty minutes, i turn to the other three women sitting in the room. They are flipping through their text books and doing last minute homework. I ask them in German whether i'm in the right class, followed by the course name and they reply with a short but informative, "Ja".
I breathed out a sigh of relief when i found out that the fifty or so year old woman who had just left the room was in fact our teacher. I later found out from my sister that "Almuth" is an old school German name.
Anyway...
Eventually the class filled up, and including myself, there were a dozen of us. Apparently, there were more in the previous course but many dropped out because they found the course too expensive. At VHS, 80 hours costs 179 Euro, which is helluvalot cheaper than most other schools.
As for the people, there are ten women and two guys. Minus the teacher, i'm probably the third eldest. The average age seems to be twenty-four and the eldest being in her late forties. There are two university students, a few housewives, a handyman and many Au Pairs.
We began by introducing ourselves. Since i was one of two new students, i ended up going last. I had practised the night before with J and made sure i structured my sentences correctly. When i was done the teacher said i spoke very well and wondered why i was put in her class and not in a higher level.
She went on to say that i may be too good for this class and as the other students agreed in unison, i could almost feel their stares piercing me from all angles.
When i explained to her and the rest of the class, i had taken a break and my grammar was actually not that good. She then added, that i could always change courses if i found the class too easy.
But although the level is not that hard, neither is it super easy.
I would much rather be a little more confident in what i'm learning than be thrown into another class where there's a higher chance that i'm repeatedly lost and stressed.
So as the morning progressed, i realised once my classmates figured out i'm not as perfect as they had originally thought, they weren't as shy and were in fact, were really friendly towards me.
But what i was most surprised about was the wide spectrum of nationalities in the class; Indian, Japanese, French, Greek, Mongolian, Turkish, Colombian, Ukrainian, and myself, Dutch/Singaporean.
I dunno if it's just me but something weird happens when an Asian comes across another Asian looking person. It's as if an invisible bond occurs even though not a single word has been exchanged.
Weird, huh?
So anyway, before the class ended, i mentioned to the extremely tall Polish guy with the exceptionally large head who sat next to me, i had troubles remembering when to use the correct articles in Nominative, Accusative and Dative. He then was kind enough to lend me some of his past notes so i could copy them at home.
And after a very noisy train ride home with twenty-five ear piercing screaming children sitting beside me, i spent two hours rewriting my notes and doing my homework.
Yes, the nerd in me was in full force.
So for the moment, i'm going to try and keep a low profile. I don't want to be in anyone's face and neither do i want anyone to think i'm a smart arse.
And just like everyone else, i'm far from perfect.
My heart felt like it wanted to rip itself out of my body and make a run for it. The air suddenly got very thin and i had trouble breathing. I looked down at my hands and they were trembling. So i immediately lowered my head, positioned my hands on my knees and took deep long breaths in.
I eventually pulled myself together and convinced myself everything was going to be alright. And within minutes, i was at the underground train station and i was back in my element.
But before that, weeks ago i had received a confirmation letter to say i was registered and "Almuth..." was going to be my teacher. I had never heard of that name before and was slightly disappointed as i imagined the person to be male and Turkish. I'm not sexist or racist, i've just come to the conclusion that [most] female teachers are more patient.
I feel the same about my gynaes, i prefer them to be female. For obvious reasons, we have the same ummm... bits?
So there i am, in class and a woman walks in.
She puts her books on the table then leaves the room. At which point, in my head i'm wondering who she is. A part of me was expecting a tanned, half hairy man with a big gut and an uninterested facial expression to walk in.
Paranoid that i may had been sitting in the wrong class for the last twenty minutes, i turn to the other three women sitting in the room. They are flipping through their text books and doing last minute homework. I ask them in German whether i'm in the right class, followed by the course name and they reply with a short but informative, "Ja".
I breathed out a sigh of relief when i found out that the fifty or so year old woman who had just left the room was in fact our teacher. I later found out from my sister that "Almuth" is an old school German name.
Anyway...
Eventually the class filled up, and including myself, there were a dozen of us. Apparently, there were more in the previous course but many dropped out because they found the course too expensive. At VHS, 80 hours costs 179 Euro, which is helluvalot cheaper than most other schools.
As for the people, there are ten women and two guys. Minus the teacher, i'm probably the third eldest. The average age seems to be twenty-four and the eldest being in her late forties. There are two university students, a few housewives, a handyman and many Au Pairs.
We began by introducing ourselves. Since i was one of two new students, i ended up going last. I had practised the night before with J and made sure i structured my sentences correctly. When i was done the teacher said i spoke very well and wondered why i was put in her class and not in a higher level.
She went on to say that i may be too good for this class and as the other students agreed in unison, i could almost feel their stares piercing me from all angles.
When i explained to her and the rest of the class, i had taken a break and my grammar was actually not that good. She then added, that i could always change courses if i found the class too easy.
But although the level is not that hard, neither is it super easy.
I would much rather be a little more confident in what i'm learning than be thrown into another class where there's a higher chance that i'm repeatedly lost and stressed.
So as the morning progressed, i realised once my classmates figured out i'm not as perfect as they had originally thought, they weren't as shy and were in fact, were really friendly towards me.
But what i was most surprised about was the wide spectrum of nationalities in the class; Indian, Japanese, French, Greek, Mongolian, Turkish, Colombian, Ukrainian, and myself, Dutch/Singaporean.
I dunno if it's just me but something weird happens when an Asian comes across another Asian looking person. It's as if an invisible bond occurs even though not a single word has been exchanged.
Weird, huh?
So anyway, before the class ended, i mentioned to the extremely tall Polish guy with the exceptionally large head who sat next to me, i had troubles remembering when to use the correct articles in Nominative, Accusative and Dative. He then was kind enough to lend me some of his past notes so i could copy them at home.
And after a very noisy train ride home with twenty-five ear piercing screaming children sitting beside me, i spent two hours rewriting my notes and doing my homework.
Yes, the nerd in me was in full force.
So for the moment, i'm going to try and keep a low profile. I don't want to be in anyone's face and neither do i want anyone to think i'm a smart arse.
And just like everyone else, i'm far from perfect.
2 comments:
I'm glad to hear that your German class turned out to be OK in the end. As for myself I think I would have used that panic attack as an excuse to stay at home ;)
hahaha... yea, had it not been for my yearlong break, i probably would have used it as an excuse too. But i know i hate missing days just cause i end up having to catch up on so much more.
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