13 Oct 2016

Today I Learned in Germany, 16 Oct 2016


1) In the US we have AAA, USAA and other auto clubs. We always had a AAA membership because if you had a flat tire, dead battery, etc., they'd come out and tow you, fix the flat or sell you a new battery.

Here in Germany, it seems to be the ADAC. We need to get a membership, but as with many things, we need to navigate the German web site to do it.  But breaking down on the autobahn seems really bad, and I think it's against the law or something.

I'm assuming they call the ADAC in this case.

2) Language lessons are going well.  I'm still aware that I have to learn genders of so many nouns, but that's just going to be practice and repetition.  Grammar is making a bit more sense, but I still have trouble putting sentences together in my head in German.

Reading is getting much easier, and understanding someone speaking German is getting better too, if only because I can pick out words and get the "sense" of their words.

In my language classes (1 or 2 per week, 1 hour + homework and self study), they use audio clips and have me answer questions about them.  I can gauge my progress by how many times I have to re-listen to the clips to get the answers I need.

I still have a little trouble with spelling.  SO MANY LETTERS.  And capitalization.  You capitalize all nouns.

There seems to be few "sh" letter combinations. Those that seem logical end up being "sch" combinations.

I'm also getting better at reading longer words SO MANY LONG WORDS by breaking them down into smaller words.  I'm told that my pronunciation is good.  We'll see.

And now, a shark-horse

3) Parking butt-in is a thing.  And so, backing into parking places is something I've practiced, and I've gotten better. The parking assist in my car is pretty awesome.  I actually hear the beeps from the appropriate speakers in the car when I'm close to something in that area.  Maybe that's standard for parking assist, but it's the first time I've had it.  I get a lot of false alarms though.  There's nothing like hearing the sensor go off doing 130 kph on the autobahn.

4) The "person on the right has the right-of-way" rule is getting easier.  When approaching an un-managed intersection (no signage, which is funny, because many intersections have an over-abundance of signage, maybe that's where it went), I rarely have to slow down if someone on the left is coming, and I have nobody on the right.  I know I have the right of way. I still worry that some american isn't going to know the rule, so I still slow down, but it's really frowned upon to do so.

5) In German, double letters (like in hallo) mean the sound from those letters is shorter.

6) In the US we had Consumer Reports as a common place to turn to for product reviews and testing.  Here, there are a number of them, but I use test.de. Are there others?

7) Parental Leave actually happens here.  I believe that either or both parents can take off work without fear of losing their job for as long as 14 months and the state pays for much of their salary during that time.

8) Voting when you are living outside the states is difficult to setup.  Or rather, it's not always clear HOW to do so.  We used this site to figure it out.



9) In downtown Karlsruhe yesterday we went to Charles Oxford for burgers and on the way to the tram, we saw this weird parade of characters dressed in costumes.  Robin stopped someone and asked what they were for, and that person said "Just because.  They're fairies from the city."  Honestly, I think he meant furries. It was creepy.  Don't do an internet search for furries. You'll be sorry.