September, 6th – Leipzig
Five more days until my C1-English-exam. Since three weeks I train this language in daily classes. Reading and using english, writing, listening, of corse speaking too. My teacher Bill and I are a bit nervous about next saturday. „You should practise more writing“ – that’s what he said last friday. So I practised more writing…. The examples out of the book are already boring: discussing financial and politival decisions like immigration topics or council policy, some questions about universities and students choises… argh. So today I decided to practise my writing in the way to tell you something about my actual situation.
First of all: a big excuse to my english-speaking readers, all these mother tongue friends – I try to do my best! =)
Last time I had to write things like essays was in school. The year 2001. I remember myself being so excited and nervous about passing the „Abitur“. Especially in the german test I had the feeling that I completly failed. The result told me something else. I was surprised in any possible way.
Also later for my studies I had to write plenty of texts: meditations and worships, bible exegesis, historical texts, tests evry semester and at least my final thesis about the special topic „religious symbols out of advertising, their meaning and using for religious lessons“. To write formal texts was never easy. The biggest problem I have had was staying concentrated and focussed. If I had the chance to write for more days I often thought: „Hm, I could clean my windowds… I should do my laundry… what about mowing gras…?“ Nearly evrytime I had many better ideas when writing. 😉
In contrast to that: If I worte private, e.g. letters or cards or texts, articels or at least pages for the blog last year, I can stay focussed, words are flying out of my head and my heart. Never do I have to think about what to do instead. In a private way I look forward to bringing words on paper, talking about different topics, sharing thoughts…So crossed fingers! Hopefully next week sitting in the writing exam there will be a topic which I can understand personally. And answer the task thinking writing to you!
At the end some personal words, especially to my friends in NZ: In July I came back to Germany to organise private matters but also to get prepared for coming back to New Zealand and staying for a while. The borders of NZ are still closed and until today I tried six times to get the border exemptions, which I need to apply for a visa. Evry single time I recieved a denial, but I won’t loose hope, that one day it will be possible again for me to enter. I became part of two Facebook-groups sharing the same experience and I see people there without hope, with fear and a lot of insulting speech – what we all share is the feeling of being „de-parted“. Some of their families, some of their partners, some of their companies… all from a place we want to go to not only spending 14days holiday there. The actual political situation is in blur. Nobody can tell something about timeline, about ideas to open the country „just a bit“. In conclusion a lot of partnerships are in danger, a lot of members – especially families – got health issues, mental problems… I know: I am not able to change something. I need patience, endurance and courage. And I need evryday a lot of understanding for political desicions. Maybe like you…
For now I can learn English… and so I go back to my student’s book to practise some grammar – yeah =)
