Movies About or Around Europe: "Goodbye Lenin"

"Goodbye Lenin" is a funny and moving portrait of one son's efforts to keep his mother from finding out about the collapse of East Germany in order to save her from a life-threatening shock, starring Daniel Brühl as Alex and Katrin Saß as his mother. 

We meet the family in Alex's childhood, as his father disappears from the family life into West Germany. After losing her husband, Alex's mother, Christiane, devotes her entire life to socialism, becoming active in community life and "marrying the party." As protests begin to spring up in 1989, however, Christiane witnesses Alex participating in one, and suffers a heart attack. She then lapses into a coma for eight months, the Wall comes down, and the worldview she devoted herself to collapses with it. When she wakes up, the doctor says another shock could kill her, so Alex decides he and his sister should bring her home and create the past in the apartment. This starts out as a fairly simple matter of redecorating, but becomes more and more complicated as the world continues to change outside the apartment. Eventually, in his love for his mother, Alex goes so far as to help make fake news reports to explain away phenomena such as a Coca Cola advertisement being hung on a nearby building or the presence of West Germans in their neighborhood.

The movie's fake newscasts are some of the most interesting and inventive parts of the movie, as Alex begins to create an alternate history of his country, with the help of a film-savvy friend.

While Christiane is kept in the dark, the viewer is treated to a movie about a country and its people in transition - some are overjoyed and excited, others, mainly the older people, are worried or angry about unemployment and the loss of old routines. Here are, in fact, two links to fairly recent articles about dissatisfied East German citizens - one is an opinion piece in the Guardian, the other a feature in Der Spiegel:  http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2009/nov/08/1989-berlin-wall  http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/homesick-for-a-dictatorship-majority-of-eastern-germans-feel-life-better-under-communism-a-634122.html

I had a very limited knowledge of East Germany, or in German, the Deutsche Demokratische Republik, before watching this film, but the movie made me curious to learn more. It's amazing to think that such a huge transition happened within my lifetime, and within the lifetimes of Germans who are the same age as me. Since I currently live in a divided country, it's of particular interest, though the gulf between North and South Korea is certainly much wider than that between the two Germanys.

Christiane is perplexed as West Germans move into her apartment complex.

I highly recommend this film both as an introduction to this interesting time in German history and as a human drama. The acting is good, the story inventive and creative. It is the kind of movie that makes you think about what you would do in a similar situation and puts you in the shoes of someone from a different culture and time. It's also a great family film, as long as you don't mind some brief, non-sexual, male nudity.

The film made me curious to visit some sites in Germany which might help me learn more about this historical period. Here are some places I might try:
http://www.ddr-museum.de/en  (A museum in Berlin dedicated to the history of the DDR)
http://www.museenfuergeschichte.de/de/7/Zeitgeschichtliches-Forum-Leipzig.html?mid=20  (another museum on the DDR, located in the former East Germany. You'll have to translate this page if you don't read German!)
http://coldwarsites.net/country/germany  (A page which links to a variety of sites within Germany)

Finally, here are some photos taken in the last days of the DDR and an interview with the photographer:
http://www.dw.de/photographer-captures-colors-of-gdr-life/a-16864700

Good and Bad Ways to Study German

Comedian Trevor Noah has some advice for how not to study German at the end of  this video clip. For people who are currently studying German, this could be dangerously hilarious. I actually laughed so hard that I cried.

For people who are interested in studying German without accidentally listening to Hitler's speeches, here are some better ways to access German listening (and other) activities on Youtube:

1. Easy German: Easy German offers a variety of listening exercises involving subtitled interviews with Germans on the street. In the clip below, an interviewer asks interesting questions, such as "What is typical of Germany?" The answers to "Are you proud to be German?" were most interesting to me, because most of the older interviewees seemed very cognizant of Germany's national socialist past when answering the question. Find more by searching for "Easy German" on youtube.

2. GermanPod101 - There are a lot of free listening and vocabulary lessons from this site available on Youtube, which I'm really getting a kick out of. It seems to be a pay site which offers a lot of content free to lure people in. Who knows - maybe at some point when I'm done with all the levels on Duolingo I'll bite. Here's one example; many others are available at various levels:

3. Get Germanized - Wow. This guy is funny! A mixture of  vocabulary lessons and cultural tidbits, Meister Lehnsherr's Youtube channel is so entertaining that it will likely capture your attention, whether you're studying German or not. Granted, he's not for everyone. His lessons - including the  one below - can contain crude humor or language. However, I very much appreciate his down-to-earth tone and inclusion of everyday language, as in this slang lesson:

So there you have it, three ways to study German on-line without being called "black Hitler"! :) Happy studying!

My Language Study Routine

Every day I study languages. Yes, every day. I've found that the best way to keep studying is just to keep studying. When you let languages lie for even a few days, the start-up process can be rusty. So I made a rule with myself to study just a little each day. A little can be as little as 10 minutes - 5 minutes per language - or as long as 2-3 hours on days when I have a lot of time or I'm enjoying myself. But as long as I get that 10 minutes in, things keep moving along. Here is a bit about my daily study routine:

1. DUOLINGO Every day I go to https://www.duolingo.com/ and put in at least 10 minutes. I will never stop raving about Duolingo, because it's just that good and it's free. The system is simple. The lessons are bite-sized, so they're very good for people who are "too busy" to study a language; yet they are also thorough - covering reading, writing, speaking and listening, as well as grammar, vocabulary and expressions. I study French, German and Spanish, but there are also courses in Italian, Portuguese and Dutch, as well as courses to learn English and a number of courses currently in development. Here are some pictures from the site:

The Duolingo progress bar gives you your level, your experience points, the words you've learned and a chart showing the amount of progress you've made on a day-to-day basis. At the top of the screen (not shown) it also gives your "streak" - the number of days you've studied in a row, and in another part of the screen the number of experience points you have compared to your friends on the site.

Another screen reveals the lessons you've already learned as well as those you still need to learn or strengthen. Along the left side of each lesson are strength bars. When the left side begins to turn white, it's time to practice that lesson again.In this section I have no strength bars yet for Verbs Present Tense 2, but I'm as strong as possible in the other lessons.

The first time you learn a word, especially a noun, it's often accompanied by an easy, multiple-choice visual aid. It's also spoken. You always have the option to hear the pronunciation for any of the words.

"Type what you hear" is one of my favorite practices. The turtle on the bottom slows the sentence way down when needed. In addition to these practices, there are also: Translate from German to English and English to German, multiple-choice questions, and, if you have a microphone, pronunciation exercises. I make up for my lack of a microphone by always speaking every phrase/word as I go. Duolingo also has an "immersion" section where you can earn experience points through translating text which I believe comes from real websites that need translating. This can be useful sometimes, but I find it's more useful with languages I'm already pretty proficient in. I have learned interesting tidbits about history and art through translating from French to English, however.

2. READING The second part of my language study is reading. I don't do this every day, but some days I read in French or Spanish. I always read out loud. I think it's important to read out loud because it builds on speaking skills and calls attention to words which I need to look up pronunciations for later on. I also go to my dictionary every single time I'm not sure about a word's meaning. Now this is something I specifically tell my students not to do in their English classes. I encourage them to read for the gist, so they don't spend weeks trying to read one book or even one chapter. The thing is, though, I'm not on a time schedule. I actually do have weeks to spend reading one chapter, and the point of my reading is to learn new words and phrases. So I look up every single word or expression, and then I either write them down in my notebook or I write the definition into the book. Then, time permitting, I go back at the end of my reading session and re-read that section out loud, but this time I understand all the words and can cement them into my brain in context. I've learned and/or solidified a lot of vocabulary in this way, and my reading rate is improving. I recently finished reading a graded reader version of "Cyrano de Bergerac" and am currently working on "Harry Potter a l'Ecole Des Sorciers" as well as an article in French Marie Claire.Eventually I hope to add some German reading into my daily routine.

 I just finished this French graded reader, remarkably nabbed at a Kyobo Books in Busan. I'm currently working on "Harry Potter" in French. I confess that it's a friend's book which I forgot to return, and he already left Korea.

I was excited to find this French "Marie Claire" at the Kyobo Books in the Seomyeon neighborhood of Busan. Actually, I see French magazines there quite frequently, although they can be a bit pricy. Still, it's worthwhile, because the language in magazines tends to be more conversational and includes a lot of colloquialisms.

My trusty dictionary (also bought at a bookstore in Seomyeon) and my vocab notebook. I prefer to use a paper dictionary because I like to study in bed and because they tend to offer more varied/subtle definitions than on-line translation.

When I finish all the lessons on Duolingo, I'm going to attack this big book of grammar I found at Fully Booked (sadly closing) in Busan. Pictured on the right is my dream read in French. I've always wanted to read "Madame Bovary" (one of my favorite novels of all time) in the original French. Now that I'm studying every day, I think my dream is achievable.

I was also lucky enough to find these Spanish and German readers at Fully Booked. The Spanish reader I've nearly finished. The German I haven't even begun yet, but I bought it because I was all excited that I could understand the title. ;)

3. FOREIGN FILMS   Watching foreign films is another way I work on language learning. It tunes my ear much more than using online lessons, since the speakers have different accents and often talk more quickly. There's also a lot more use of colloquialisms. I didn't learn the German expression "Genau" on Duolingo, but I sure heard it a lot in "Generation War" and "Die Welle." Similarly, the use of "genial" as "cool" in French didn't really register for me until I heard Julie Delpy use it three times in one conversaton in "2 Days in Paris." There's no way I'm ready to understand without subtitles yet, but I still feel there's value in this input. There's also value in getting a window into the cultures of other countries, although it's important to beware of reading too much into what we see through that window. Imagine if someone randomly selected 10 American movies and tried to understand our whole culture based on those!

One of these days I'm going to get around to re-watching this German classic "Run Lola Run"/"Lola Rennt." I'll be reviewing a lot of movies in the blog, too. I hope to get into the French New Wave films one day soon, for example.

4. OTHER METHODS There are a lot of other language-learning methods I'm eager to try in the near future. I came across these French podcasts recently, for example: https://nativefrenchspeech.com/en/articles_kind/Episode%20of%20podcast.They're a bit fast for me, but they offer transcripts as well, and when I have a little bit of time or when I'm going to do some house-cleaning I think I'll give them a try. Memrise can also be useful, though the lessons are user-created and therefore vary in quality. I'm also considering putting together a French club, or perhaps a foreign language club, in the fall. It'd be nice to gather some people together to speak in French, German or Spanish. Fortunately, my husband is also studying German through Duolingo, so I am able to exchange some conversation with him. For a variety of language resources for quite a few languages please see also this page:  http://www.openculture.com/freelanguagelessons I haven't had time yet to mine its riches, but there seems to be a lot of worthwhile stuff on the site.

In the end, no matter what tools you use, I think studying a language successfully simply comes down to a combination of desire and going slow and steady. If you study a language you truly enjoy and permit yourself to study just a little every day, I think you'll find success. But what if you hit a roadblock? It's important not to concentrate on how much you don't know. As a language learner you will hit points where you grow frustrated (endings of words in German make me a little nuts, let me tell you), but it's important to remind yourself how much more you know than you did before. Instead of thinking: "I can't say X in German" think "I can say Y." Yeah, I can't use the past tense yet, but I can order dinner, and I can tell someone I'm going to Austria. Could I do that one year ago? No. Hence, success.

Are you studying a language? What is your study routine? What are some web-sites and methods you'd recommend? Please share in the comments!

German Words I Have Fallen in Love With

It was a funny thing. After a lifetime of not even considering learning German, in the summer of 2012 I fell in love with German at first speaking. You have to know how to pronounce German to love it, I think. It has what I would call a great "mouthfeel." Every language leaves its own impression on me, and when I speak German I feel deep, emotional and powerful simultaneously. I also feel smarter, oddly.* My vocabulary in German is still pretty limited. I can have some quite basic conversations - mainly involving what I would and would not like to eat, describing certain things and briefly introducing my job, country, etc. I can also say some pretty random things like "Ich habe sieben Enten" which will certainly come in handy if I ever have a farm. But here are some of my absolute favorite words in German, so far:

Der Vogel - the bird. When I say this word, I feel like it catches the spirit of a bird, somehow. Pronounce it here:  https://www.duolingo.com/comment/369803

Wichtiger - more important. "Wichtig" means important and is itself a great word. But "wichtiger" is awesome. It sounds like a great indie band or a cool animal that is half-witch/half-tiger. https://www.duolingo.com/comment/354592

Das Schlafzimmer - bedroom. Not only is this word sensible "schlafen" = to sleep, "zimmer" = room, but it sounds AMAZING when you say it. Every time this word comes up on duolingo I feel compelled to shout it out loud. It's true. Just ask Lee. http://www.forvo.com/word/schlafzimmer/

Die Mannschaft - the team. Yes. I know. This is a giggler in English. It's also a fabulous word, and it came in handy during the World Cup season! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0cuK6zb79E

Das Krankenhaus - Hospital - sick "krank" + house "haus". Let's leave aside, for a moment, the fact that it sort of sounds like "crackhouse" in English which makes it sort of funny. "Kranken" is a gorgeous sound. Say it. Feel it in your mouth. Pure heaven. Watch the sort of creepy video:

*As to other languages: French makes me feel romantic but occasionally quite moody; Spanish makes me feel like singing always - I think it's the most melodic language; Korean, sadly, doesn't do it for me. I feel less powerful when I speak it, usually, though its alphabet is very cleverly designed - a fact which cannot be denied. Italian, though my exposure has been limited - is fun, but I don't have time for it at present. Japanese - when I've tried it -  has made me feel light and precise. This is all purely subjective of course.

So I ask you - how do various languages make you feel? What are your favorite words in foreign languages (or in English)?

Duolingo

A big part of my recent drive to travel to Europe has been my renewed interest in European languages. About two years ago, working my first year at a university in Korea, with more time off on my hands than I'd had since moving to Korea in 2009, a friend told me about Duolingo https://www.duolingo.com/, a language-learning site where you could study French, Spanish or German. (These days you can also study Italian and Portuguese and they are working on several other European languages, including Dutch and Russian). All the unstructured time on my hands was contributing to a severe bout of depression, but the site was so cleverly designed to compartmentalize and reward language learning that studying on duolingo quickly became my main free time activity.

I found, too, that the French and Spanish returned easily. One day, to test the efficacy of the site for learners who were new to a language, I also decided to try German and quickly fell in love with its sounds. Now I'm studying all three languages, with a focus on French and German. I have dabbled in Italian and Portuguese as well, but I've found that three languages is quite enough to be studying at once.

All this study really revved up my desire to go to France, but it also created a desire to go to Germany and Austria when I really hadn't considered those countries much previously. Finding that I could learn the rudiments of German, however, made me want to go to the country and practice and grow my language skills. I also began to look into the sites of Germany and Austria and soon realized that there was a lot more I wanted to see beyond "The Sound of Music" tour and Neuschwanstein. Now Germany and Austria are in my top 3 countries to visit alongside France. If I can only visit three on my first journey, those will be the choices.

I strongly recommend duolingo for anyone wanting to pick up or brush up on their language skills. It's not a perfect site. I'm finding as my studying deepens that the French lessons may occasionally get something wrong. (For example, watching a Rick Steves lecture recently I learned that if you ask for "le menu" in France, you are apt to receive an order called "le menu" rather than seeing your options. You'd better ask for "la carte.") Also, I'm pretty sure  from my limited investigation that the "idioms" section is not an actual set of French idioms, but perhaps a direct translation of American idioms that may or may not make any sense to French people. However, in terms of pronunciation and learning basic vocabulary, as well as access to a community of other learners offering advice, it's a great site and I like it much better than something like memrise.

For the past 23 days I've been studying both French and German (and sometimes Spanish) each and every day. Sometimes it's for as little as 5 minutes, but other days I study for an hour or more. I've also added in reading out loud in French (with much recourse to the dictionary.) I'm waiting til the 30-day mark, but at that point I may try to organize a little French club in town, or maybe a "European languages club", since I'd be happy to practice German or Spanish as well. Sometimes I feel a little guilty, since my Korean is almost non-existent. However, we may not stay in Korea too much longer, and I think that by the time I'd achieve something like an intermediate level it would likely be time to leave. Therefore, I'm studying for my future and for my dream of one day living in Europe. If we keep up with our European languages, we'll be good to go when we arrive.