Suzanne Goes to the Library: A Children's Story

If you don't speak or read German, I provided a translation following the German version. I wrote this little blurb as an exercise for practicing my written German. It's based on a true story, and is probably the extent of my skill when I don't have much time, a dictionary or online translation help. If you are a reader who actually speaks German, I should warn you it might be painful. It's pretty rudimentary, but enjoy!

Suzanne Geht zur Bibliothek--Eine Kinder Geschichte

Suzanne mag lesen. Normaleweise lies sie auf English, aber jetzt wohnt sie in Deutschland. Das heisst dass, sie muss auch gut Deutsch lesen. Aber wo soll Suzanne Deutsches Buecher kreigen? Natuerlich, sie hat keine von Amerika mitgebracht, und will nicht viele Buecher kaufen. Suzanne brauchte eine Bibliothek.

In Magdeburg, Deutschland (wie die meisten europaeische Staedte) sind alles zusammen Nah. Suzanne kennt einen Bibliothek, und sie war nicht weit weg. Ein Tag nach Arbeit, geht Suzanne zu dieser Bibliothek. Sie fand eine Bibliothekerin, die sieht freundlich aus. Suzanne roch ein wenig wie Elephanten, aber die Bibliothekerin sagte nichts ueber es.

"Es tut mir leid, das mein Deutsch nicht gut ist. Ich moechte einen Bibliothekausweis," sagte Suzanne.

Die Bibliothekerin laechelte, "Prima! Ich brauche nur einen Pass und eine Poststueck."

"Gut" Suzanne laechelte auch, "Ich habe alles mit."

"Suzanne Christine Akerman--ein richtiger Deutscher Name!"

"Ich habe das gehoert. Brauchen Sie noch etwas?"

"Nur einen Unterschrift und fuenfundzwanzig Euro, bitte!" erklaert die nette Dame.

"Gerne" sagte Suzanne.

"Viel Spass!" rief die Bibliothekerin waehrend Suzanne weg ging, Bibliothekausweis fast gehalten.

"Mache ich!" sagte Suzanne, "mache ich."

Ende

Translation

Suzanne Goes to the Library: A Children's Story

Suzanne likes to read. Usually she reads in English, but now she lives in Germany. That means she has to read well in German too. But where should Suzanne get German books? Of course she didn't bring any from America, and she does not want to buy a lot of books. Suzanne needed a library.

In Magdeburg, Germany (like most other European cities) everything is close together. Suzanne knew of a library and it was close by. One day after work, Suzanne went to this library. She found a librarian who looked friendly. Suzanne smelled a little like elephants, but the librarian didn't say anything about it.

"I'm sorry that my German isn't very good. I would like a library card," said Suzanne.

The librarian smiled, "Excellent! I just need a passport and a piece of mail."

"Good," Suzanne smiled too, "I have everything with me."

"Suzanne Christine Akerman--A real German name!"

"So I've heard. Do you need anything else?"

"Just a signature and twenty-five Euros please," explained the kind lady.

"Gladly."

"Have fun!" called the librarian as Suzanne walked away, library card in hand.

"I will!" said Suzanne, "I will."

The End

In addition to writing ridiculous snippets like the previous one, I have been reading children's books that I checked out from the library to help me with my grammar, spelling, and punctuation. I can very easily read books along the lines of "Clifford the Big Red Dog," but was more impressed with my ability to muddle my way through some small chapter books. When was the last time anyone was excited about me reading chapter books? Probably second grade.

Because our kindergarten is very small, we don't have access to a school library and therefore are always short on books to read to the children, especially English ones. So the added advantage to my translation ability is that I can read books that are originally in German if I am able to translate them into English fast enough to make the story compelling. (It's not so interesting if my translation sounds like, "Okay, then Simon...yelled, and he...uh, ran to his Mom. She--I mean they--no wait she, took his books and...I don't know what she did. She did something with his books.") My latest triumph was an impromptu naptime story translation of a book called, "The Queen of the Colors." The only hitch was that I skipped a word describing the color yellow because the best direct translation I know for the word "zichig" is bitchy. They don't really use the word bitchy in English children's books, so I decided not to use it when translating either. Is yellow a bitchy color? I hadn't noticed.

I am not the only one improving my language skills in Magdeburg. The children at the kindergarten have progressed beyond what linguists call the "silent" stage, where the students aren't actually silent, but respond entirely in German. Most of the children have moved on to throw in English words and phrases, but by no means always correctly. Lately when I ask the children if they've washed their hands, they protest, "Ich war schon wash your hands!" which means, "I already did wash your hands!" Similarly, after lunch I occasionally hear, "Darf ich brush your teeth?" (May I brush your teeth?). The instinct when hearing something like this is to correct the child, but this ends up being even more confusing. "No, you may brush YOUR teeth" is enitrely unhelpful to the new English speaker. I am impressed with one girl in particular who is always spouting whole thoughts in English, sometimes with perfect grammar and in context, for instance "That is a good T-shirt!" or "Erika's Momma is outside." Sometimes she and the other students nearing this stage remind me of cave men, "Me no eat broccoli!" The best thing to do in these situations is praise the child for attempting sentences, even when what you feel like doing is laughing.

In an entirely different realm, I am also teaching some animals a few things, though more slowly than I had hoped. The way my hours are split between the kindergarten and the zoo is not ideal for training animals, so I usually can fit in only one session a day with an animal. In spite of this, I do now have a rat that performs a few silly behaviors like jumping through a hole, rolling a small canister with her nose and climbing a rope etc. Next she will be doing a demonstration of "fetching" an object with a particular smell, to illustrate how keen a rat's sense of smell is.

The second rat is...special. I have never had an animal fixate on ME quite so heavily before, and I don't know what I did wrong, but this rat feels much more rewarded by being ON my person than she does by receiving actual rewards of food. This means that for a while, she would only perform behaviors that resulted in her ending up somewhere on my body. It was not productive. Each time she earned a treat, I would hold the tiny piece of cornflake or dried fruit out to her, and instead of taking it from me, she would race up my arm. I am still in the process of trying to work around her obssessive behavior, but it took a little creativity. Instead of having her perform the same routine as her "sister," I created a routine where this rat does get to end up on me after each behavior, which is very rewarding for her, if a little strange. So when she demonstrates her climbing ability, she starts on a low bench and climbs up a rope that I dangle in front of her, so when she reaches the top, she is standing on my hand. She can also perform this without a rope, climbing al the way from the ground to my shoulder. The audiences are equally impressed with this.

The next successful behavior started out as a disaster, and I think the rat really trained me on this one instead of the other way around. Because of the neurotic need to be touching me at all times, I couldn't stand over the rat while training her--instead of pushing the canister like she was supposed to, she would latch onto my sweatshirt and climb up to sit on my head. To negate this, I started standing back from her a little, so she could not reach the sweatshirt to climb. She started jumping. At first she only jumped a very short distance, but before long, I was standing across the training room and the rat was taking flying 4-foot leaps toward me with reckless abandon. This is only a really cool trick if you WANT the rat to do it. If what you want is for the rat to retreive a small wooden stick, launching into the air and landing with a tiny thud on your chest is less desirable. However, springing across the arena to a trainer is pretty engaging to an audience, so I decided Sasha won that battle. She doesn't roll anthing, and she gets more applause for the behavior she taught herself than any that I actually taught her. And sometimes when she's supposed to be retrieving a small wooden stick, she still flings herself at me spontaneously, but so far I've caught her every time, and she seems to trust that I will continue to do so.

Another animal that I have been working with, Eddie the llama, turned out to be much smarter than I gave him credit for. When I explained to the lead keeper what I wanted to train Eddie to do, he said, "Go ahead and try" but didn't have much faith in Eddie (or maybe it was me he didn't have faith in!). I wanted the llama to recycle. My idea was for the speaker to drop pieces of paper in the arena, as if littering and for Eddie to pick them up and put them in a recycling container. It sounds like complex for a llama, but I am so thrilled with Eddie. He learned to pick up the paper from the ground in a total of five fifteen-minute sessions. Putting the paper in the bucket took a little longer, but not much. Who knew llamas were so eager to send messages to audiences about keeping the environment clean?

April trilogy part 3: Berlin Blog

After the smashing success of our trip to Prague, it took little coaxing to convince me that another excursion was in order. Don was using my apartment in Magdeburg as homebase--a free couch to sleep on and a calm place to recouperate before the next adventure, and Berlin was next on the list. On a (still!) sunny Friday afternoon, I hopped on a train to join him in the bustling capital city.


Don was on his fourth day in Berlin by the time he met me at the station, so he had already visited all of the required landmarks and museums like the Reichstag, Checkpoint Charlie, Kaiser Wilhelm's church, the German Historical Gallery etc., and since I had also been in Berlin before, there was no pressure to visit all of the main attractions during our weekend. Instead we were free to roam--somewhat aimlessly. Don had booked what is referred to as a pension, essentially the European equivalent of a boarding house. This place was a hit--located beyond a secluded courtyard, and featuring high vaulted ceilings, burnt orange decor and (gasp!) a CLOSET.

First on the agenda after dropping off my backpack at the pension was dinner. We chose to eat at an Indian restaurant because I had not yet tried this type of cuisine in Germany, and it turned out to be a fantastic decision. The restaurant looked very much like the Indian places do in the U.S., with pictures of Indian royalty and Hindu gods and gold detailing on the walls. We had nan, chicken tikki masala, and some sort of lamb dish, all of which practically melted in our mouths. By the time our stomachs were full, the sun had set, but it was a warm night and we weren't quite ready to return to the pension where little packs of gummi bears that said "Schlaf gut!" (sleep well) waited on our pillows. Berlin is an active city even at night, so there was plenty to see: high-end shoe stores and clothing botiques selling items for more than a month's salary, cafes where elegantly dressed couples sipped cocktails on the verandas, asian markets selling goods ranging from lychees to life-size geisha statues, and little kiosks offering menus of cheap doenners (that's the big meat revolving on a stick) and pizzas to the young people out on the town.

The next day began as every day should, with clear skies and pastries that are just crispy enough on the outside, decadently soft on the inside and speckled with chocolate chips. At the small bakery around the corner from the hotel, these fresh baked items sold as "wuppis," or if you've been waiting all week to eat one on a Saturday morning, "whoopie!"s. We checked out of the pension and headed toward the famous Alexander platz for no other reason than we felt like it; Berlin has no real city center to speak of, so if you're just looking to browse around the city, anything ending in "platz" is a safe bet for interesting sights. On the subway we sat by an old couple who smiled at the rapid English we were conversing in and kindly stood up to let us by when we abruptly bolted toward the exit, while Don exclaimed, "Oh my God, there's a German flea market! Let's go!"

Having visited only a handful of American flea markets and exactly zero German ones, I didn't know what to expect from the rows of tables spread with goods for sale on this Berlin boulevard. The wares ranged widely from table to table, first one selling old tea sets and silverware, next one selling old military paraphernalia, and next one selling what must add up to hundreds of pounds of comic books. Sometimes the items ranged widely at an individual table as well, with antique doll clothes arranged neatly adjascent to a box full of pairs of binoculars, followed by lighters with pictures of scantily clan pinups from the '60s. I won the award for finding the strangest object, a Frankenstein-esque pen constructed from the foot of a deer with the ball point coming out of the ankle so that the hoof stuck up in the air and waved around while one attempted to write. Don bought two small pins, some sort of propaganda leftover from the communist GDR days, depicting Karl Marx.

After this pit-stop we did make it to Alexander platz as per the original plan. The open-air market featured local Berlin artists selling their paintings, hand-bags, and jewelry, as well as the usual freshly made baked goods, meats, and fresh fruits. One artist seemed to be supplementing his painting income via paparazzi photography, and though the pictures of Angelina Jolie drinking tea and Baldwin brothers with confused expressions did not interest me, I was surprised to find photos of the dalai lama (who knew HE had paparazzi problems?) and pictures of Obama from as recently as two weeks before. We made our way through the market and found a famous building designed by I.M. Pei, which I'm sure has a name that I just can't remember, next to a giant souvenir shop where you could buy tiny pieces of the Berlin wall.

When our stomachs started growling we stopped at a cafe on the river and watched the tour boats floating by while we enjoyed thick slices of Italian bread still warm from the oven. Our waitress spoke to Don in English, but to me in German, though I'm not exactly sure why. With our bellies once again full and our feet rested a little, we continued the walking tour and found ourselves at the Sony Center, which a travel website explains as follows: "Seven steel and glass structures and a light-flooded plaza spanned by a spectacular roof offer space for a modern lifestyle: Entertainment and events, cafés and restaurants, working and living in the middle of the German capital." Not to downplay the magnificence of the place, but "pretty fancy mall" might also be an accurate description.

At the time we entered the Sony Center, a crew was preparing for the premiere of the movie "17 Again," rolling out the red carpet and all. I wondered if the paparazzi artist would be there to capture Zac Efron in a half-squint as he stepped out of his limo. We paused at Leggo Land long enough to take picture of seversal Leggo creations including a life-size giraffe and a replica of Einstein's head at least five feet across. We browsed a few shops and took a picture or two of the Berlin Bear mascot statues (these bears can be spotted in all corners of the city, painted in any variety of dress from German soccer jersey to clown suit) before walking to the Brandenburg Gate. Having no particular schedule or agenda, we were content to walk, but if we'd had the desire, we could have hired a horse-drawn carriage or the Ben-and-Jerry-mobile (a cross between a scooter and a golf cart with ads for ice cream on the sides) to take us there.

We reached the east side of the Brandenburg Gate and took the mandatory photos of the Gate itself and Victory Tower (celebrating the Prussian defeat of the Danes; in 1938 Hitler ordered moved to its current position--how do you move an entire 200 foot tall tower?). Since it was a gorgeous day, we also took a long walk around a park large enough that we were concerned we might lose our bearings, but fortunately we did not. With the sun and our energy levels dropping, we stopped at a very German restaurant where we sat outside and tried pea soup, schnitzel and of course some of the local beer. The waitresses at the very German restaurant were not themselves German, but rather of some nationality from a little farther east (Hungary perhaps?)

Next we stumbled upon an independent record store near the train station. This was a real record store, the kind that actually still sells records. They also sold posters and calendars featuring celebrities, some of which were hilariously outdated. Anyone looking for a 2005 Clay Akin calendar, or maybe a Meatloaf poster? I know where you can find them. Our last stop before the train departure was an asian gift shop that sold its own amusing wares, including school supplies with strange phrases like "smile cabagge" and "love strawberry."

I dozed and read a little on the uneventful train ride and once back in Magdeburg, I fell promptly asleep next to Sophie. On Sunday my routine returned to the usual--I went for my jog in the morning and spent the afternoon in the sun at my regular cafe, perservering through a New York Times crossword puzzle and a fluffy pastry. Sunday is always a welcome intermission between adventures.