...And Another from Germany


Guest Wind-Caster
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Guest Wind-Caster

Hello there,

Just a few words about me: I am from Northern Germany and I am interested in religious issues. I think these forums are a good place for changing ideas and talking about things (not only religious related) and for learning about Mormonism. Another intention from my side would be to improve my English, and as I have never been in English countries these forums instead seem to give me a good chance for developing my knowledge and to see how things are going there on the other side of the Atlantic.

A Happy New Year in advance! And with respect to English: please teach me nothing wrong unless it would be American. ... where is the smiley gone?

PS... I'm missing my profile picture here in this post. It's been uploaded but it doesn't appear here. I hope the running and "wind casting" red dressed lady is not displeasing? Or has she perhaps dashed away? Who knows...?

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Hello there,

Just a few words about me: I am from Northern Germany and I am interested in religious issues. I think these forums are a good place for changing ideas and talking about things (not only religious related) and for learning about Mormonism. Another intention from my side would be to improve my English, and as I have never been in English countries these forums instead seem to give me a good chance for developing my knowledge and to see how things are going there on the other side of the Atlantic.

A Happy New Year in advance! And with respect to English: please teach me nothing wrong unless it would be American. ... where is the smiley gone?

PS... I'm missing my profile picture here in this post. It's been uploaded but it doesn't appear here. I hope the running and "wind casting" red dressed lady is not displeasing? Or has she perhaps dashed away? Who knows...?

I spent four years in Bad Hersfield...when there was a East and West Germany. Welcome and what city to you live in...I actually joined the Church in 1979 while living there.

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Guest Wind-Caster

I spent four years in Bad Hersfield...when there was a East and West Germany. Welcome and what city to you live in...I actually joined the Church in 1979 while living there.

Hello. To be honest, I'd just have to find out where Bad Hersfeld is - in Nort-Eastern Hessen. I live in Schenefeld, north-west of Hamburg. It belongs to Schleswig-Holstein.

1979 was a good time. I finished my job education that year and bought my first car. A Ford Capri (second hand), one of the typical well designed cars of that time. See the cars today... most of them look like eggs on wheels. abuzzed with electronic circuits so that you never can be sure who actually steers the car...

Well, this is only a place for short introducing, I think, but perhaps we can chat in one of the forums. See you, and thanks for your kind reply.

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Guest Wind-Caster

You're fine chatting here. It is an introduction forum but the questions are to learn more about you. So it's appropriate. :)

I see.

"La ignorancia es el alimento del odio y la intolerancia " ...Ignorance is the food of hate and intolerance. A true sentence. Do you know Spanish? I think in California Spanish is widely-used. I don't know about New Mexico or Arizona, but I think it is similar there.

Here in Europe only in Spain they speak Spanish... ;)

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Guest ghostwind

Welcome. My Grandfather was from Hannover. I lived in Bad Kreuznach for a few years.

Nice to meet you. I only was once or twice in Hannover, the capitol of Niedersachsen, but only for a short time. (I didn't like their electric tramways there called "Ãœstra"). I've never been in Bad Kreuznach and, to be honest, I'd have to have a look into the map to see where it is... you must know, Germany is sooo big, like Texas. I think it's also in Niedersachsen (not Texas, but Bad Kreuzfeld), situated in the Harz area. But I'm not sure. ("Bad xxx" in Germany always means a town situated in a fine area or landscape where the air is clean and the climate healthful and where some healthful springs are, cure hotels etc.)

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Germany does have a wide range of different culture. I lived there while my father was serving in the military. We went to an American school, but had local German teachers instruct us on the German language. I felt proficient enough for most basic conversations, but was discouraged when we went to Bavaria and my comprehension went down significantly.

Your English is very good. I wish some of the people I work with had theirs half as good as yours.

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Guest ghostwind

Germany does have a wide range of different culture. I lived there while my father was serving in the military. We went to an American school, but had local German teachers instruct us on the German language. I felt proficient enough for most basic conversations, but was discouraged when we went to Bavaria and my comprehension went down significantly.

Your English is very good. I wish some of the people I work with had theirs half as good as yours.

Thanks for the compliment, but it's not good enough (I mean my English and not your compliment, of course). I work on it. "Intelligenz, die wir uns in diesem Leben erworben haben, kommt mit uns in der Auferstehung hervor." Doctrine and Covenants 130:18-19.. Don't be surprised, but I have read many times in the holy scriptures of the Mormons / LDS, and I think everybody should work on his talents, and it is never too late.

It certainly must have been a discouraging experience for you in Bavaria... :o But don't be worried, you are not the only one who has some problems in understanding them... :lol:

But it's even nothing in comparison to Switzerland or some parts of Austria: I once was in Innsbruck / Austria. I was in a restaurant at main station and all the locals there (wearing Tiroler-hats) were speaking in a way that brought my comprehension down completely. And absolutely funny was that they asked me about my "dialect" (I speak "hochdeutsch", not a dialect).

I think there is not such a big difference in the US, only East, West and South with some local variations. So I've been told. But everyone can easily understand the other. I don't know about England (e.g. Manchester) or parts of Scotland. But I think German has the most various dialects.

PS I've just checked the location of Bad Kreuznach. I have found it in Rheinland-Pfalz. That's not so far away from Bavaria, but they speak in different dialects.

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Guest ghostwind

Willkommen! :)

I'm actually from Germany (who knew?) and there's a few more Germans on this forum as well...I'm just not sure about how active they are (this being said, I'm probably not that active on this forum as well...). I hope you enjoy it here! I always have, at least :)

Well, I think the greatest barrier is the language. As you are German, you know that school based English is very often not enough. Many people believe that English is an easy language, with many similarities to Geman. I wouldn't agree. I am absolutely sure that if the language educated at school beginning in the fourth class would be French instead of English, the results were better.

I know that English (and this implicates American English with more Francophonic words) is the language with the highest number of words / vocabulary in the world. Once I had a dictionary with 120,000 words, and the total number of words in English may reach up to 180,000 or even more. And many words have different meanings.

Second: The tenses. If you don't understand that English is the language where the exact handling of tenses in a correct form is necessary, because the complete language is structured by this (like in German the declinations), you wouldn't understand very much. I once was in the andvantegeous situation to absolve a half year's full-time English education twenty years ago (Commercial English) at Colon School of Languages in Hamburg when I was being unemployed.

On the other hand there are not so many members of the LDS in Germany, about 32,000 I guess. I would further guess that only one out of 200 persons in Germany speaks English in an acceptable way. That means only 160 Germans being a member of the LDS would speak good English. And this is only an expected number by myself. In fact I am afraid there would even be more who don't have reached the conversation level.

And, reading English and understanding about the issues is exertive, and even more exertive because many issues are completely different from German issues as a result of a difference in cultur (I mean American English, and I am only interested in American English, not British English at all, so I don't know exactly about issues being important or up-to-date in England). As a quintessence this might be the reason for the less involvement of Germans in these forums.

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