Germany, thinking about making it official!

[Sysman]

1) The weather - it has to be the worst in the world. So dull and cold that even Britain's weather in comparison looks like a mediterranean one.

2) The general lack of humour - of course that does not apply to anyone but I'd say that it's more common that you find lack of it there. For me humour in life is important.

1. It must depend on where you are. I had a couple of beautiful summers in Bavaria.

2. The last time I worked in the UK I found a lot of humour dependent on private jokes and watching a lot of telly. Yes I do miss British humour, but not that much. I am able to see the funny side of things anyway, so I suppose I don't depend so much on others' input.

You are of course setting high standards with your sig:

've seen much of the rest of the world. It is brutal and cruel and dark, Rome is the light.

[Gonzo]

I thought that German was one of the easier languages for English speakers to learn - our language is ultimately decended from theirs, is it not?

Not quite. Both are descended from the same source though, the language spoken by the people that were living in what is now northern Germany about 2000 years ago.

I don't think that it is the rules that make German difficult though, just the pronunciation. Having said that, I have always understood that English was tricky to learn as a second language because we change the vowel sounds at the drop of a hat and the same word can mean a multitude of different things.

[Sysman]

I thought that German was one of the easier languages for English speakers to learn - our language is ultimately decended from theirs, is it not?

It is and it isn't I'll dispute Sasguru's assertion that's it's impossible to become fluent as an adult, for I've seen folks do it.

Swiss German on the other hand is a different kettle of frogs. You are supposed to learn High German first, but you rarely hear it in everyday life, which makes it harder to get any decent practice*. In our line of work most Swiss can speak reasonable High German and will gladly do so at meetings and presentations when foreigners are present (though things do deteriorate when the discussion gets heated), but you will get the odd person who either won't or can't.

* in contrast in Germany, every bar seemed to have someone (usually an oldish guy) with good German grammar who took a pleasure in helping you learn it.

[Sysman]

Not quite. Both are descended from the same source though, the language spoken by the people that were living in what is now northern Germany about 2000 years ago.

An ex-gf said she found it quite easy to understand Chaucer's English. But English was subject to the French influence as well.

I don't think that it is the rules that make German difficult though, just the pronunciation. Having said that, I have always understood that English was tricky to learn as a second language because we change the vowel sounds at the drop of a hat and the same word can mean a multitude of different things.

Aother thing making English difficult to learn as a second is the sheer size of the vocabulary and the number of idioms. A German professor I used to know reckoned it was possible with enough study to become perfect in German as a second language, but almost impossible to do that with English.

[VectraMan]

Not quite. Both are descended from the same source though, the language spoken by the people that were living in what is now northern Germany about 2000 years ago.

I don't think that it is the rules that make German difficult though, just the pronunciation. Having said that, I have always understood that English was tricky to learn as a second language because we change the vowel sounds at the drop of a hat and the same word can mean a multitude of different things.

I've been learning German and French, and I can never decide which is easier. Obviously English is mostly a mix of the two; if King Harald had won in 1066 we might still be speaking something closer to modern Dutch or German, but being ruled by French speakers for a few hundred years changed all that.

But I think, compared to French, it's much easier for an English speaker to pronounce German, and much easier for an English speaker to follow spoken German, because they basically speak like us. German grammar is terrifying though (well it seems that way when you're a beginner).

I've always liked Germany, and can imagine living there one day. But the food is terrible. Perhaps the best place would be near the French border so you can nip across to France to eat, but still have the quality of living, housing etc. of Germany.

[Moscow Mule]

One of my mum's friends moved to Munich with her German husband about 20 years ago. She seems pretty fluent to me.

With total immersion in a language, you don't have much choice but to become fluent.

[doodab]

I thought that German was one of the easier languages for English speakers to learn - our language is ultimately decended from theirs, is it not?

Well, there are a lot of German words in English (or words with the same origins) but we did away with most of the rules that make German hard to get right, so although you can pick up a basic level of comprehension fairly easily, to speak & write grammatically correct German is a lot harder. Certainly harder than French or Italian as far as I can tell.

Conjugation of verbs is a bit more complex than English but won't kill you, the bit I find hard is the declination of articles, nouns and adjectives.

There are 12 kinds of "the", "my" etc in German corresponding to different genders and cases of nouns. There are also several corresponding sets of rules for changing the endings and vowels of nouns to match the case. You need to learn the gender, and which set of rules to use, with each noun although there are some rules for which rules go with a particular noun. Then there are three of four sets of 12 endings for adjectives, which one to use depends on the article associated with the noun in question i.e "the blue x" and "a blue x" and "blue x" each have their own 12 ways of saying blue.

Unless you get these details right nearly all of the time it will be obvious that it's not your native tongue.

If you are learning German, this magazine is quite good: http://www.deutsch-perfekt.com/

[VectraMan]

One of my mum's friends moved to Munich with her German husband about 20 years ago. She seems pretty fluent to me.

With total immersion in a language, you don't have much choice but to become fluent.

What exactly does "fluent" mean though?

I recently worked with an Indian chap who'd been here over 30 years, and had learned English before that. But you could tell talking to him that he wasn't a native speaker, just in the small subtleties of the way he spoke. I wonder if it's ever possible to learn another language well enough to truly sound like a native speaker?

I guess that's a particular problem with English, with all our many duplicate words and weird exceptions to rules.

[Sysman]

One of my mum's friends moved to Munich with her German husband about 20 years ago. She seems pretty fluent to me.

With total immersion in a language, you don't have much choice but to become fluent.

Very true. The practical problem for us lot in IT is that we are dealing with English enough that achieving total immersion is very difficult.

[VectraMan]

There are 12 kinds of "the", "my" etc in German corresponding to different genders and cases of nouns. There are also several corresponding sets of rules for changing the endings and vowels of nouns to match the case. You need to learn the gender, and which set of rules to use, with each noun although there are some rules for which rules go with a particular noun.

In French you can kind of get away with not knowing the genders as it doesn't really matter that much, but in German you really can't. I find that's the hardest thing, as genders for nouns is a totally alien concept for English speakers. And I guess it's the computer programmer in me, but I find logic and rules less of a problem than sitting down and learning list of words and genders. And none of it makes sense: a skirt is masculine, a tie is feminine, and a girl is neuter.