English lesson in German

On Monday I had my first English lesson in German. This class starts at 19.00 hour in the other fachhogschule here in Freiburg. (Yes they manage to have two social work schools in one city). Luckily I had been there before because the nights are very dark here. There where a couple of students waiting. I started talking with one girl. She was a student in one of the lessons I attend at the katholische fachhochschule as well. She told me that they all had noticed me in the class but had now idea how I was. It is the German mentality that they don’t come up to you and ask. But okay we where talking now.
We decided to sit together in the class. The lesson started of in German but the Professor soon switched in English. We all had to read a few lines from a text book about English for social workers. I can already talk and write in English but the specialist language fro Social work is not on off my skills up to now. The textbook (whish we don’t have to buy) that we are going to use is full of specialist language. During this course we are going to learn to express our qualities as a social worker in English. The Germans also learn how to pronounce English without the funny accent. (Okay maybe the Dutch need to learn as well ;-)
I had to talk to the person next to me in English (the girl I just met) about the situation where I helped someone. About half the class (the class is 40 people) was not able to tell their story in English. I was surprised about this. They where allowed to talk in German. So now we have a homework assignment to write our experience down in English for next week. I did learn a lot during the class. Not only that Germans can’t speak English ;-) I got to now a few people and I learned some technical language details on Social work. The professor teaches very well so it is great to be in this class. But I did get reminded by someone to start talking in German again as soon as the lesson was finished, to bad…

The next day I went to school again (katholische fachhochschule) Now I new some people in the class. This gave me a better feeling than sitting on my own in a classroom with 100 people (yes really and only students from the 3rd semester soziale arbeit). During the break I went for coffee again. Then the guy behind the bar said “your from the Netherlands right” (hmmm they always know) He was a exchange student with the Groningen Hogeschool (university) last year. He could also tell me that there was one other Dutch girl at the school. I gave him my email address and asked him to give it to Marjolein (the Dutch girl). Than he pointed out that I needed to listen to the music. He was playing BLOF in the canteen of the school. What a small world it is. Today they where playing Marco Borsato in the canteen, they really must love Holland?!
Greetings jose