Is there still a German Thread?

[BeatrixBurgund]

We've moved back to Germany after 8 years in Switzerland and Scotland, and with the kids in school, I just know I'm going to have lots of questions about the Bavarian education system.

And I'd love to catch up with all the folk I used to chat with (even if I can't remember their usernames!). I'm on a namechange - it's MmeLindor here!

Not where we live welsh we live about 28km from Frankfurt in the Taunus region and Rewe doesn't deliver there.....yet. I might have to write some letters.

Where did you end up?! That's annoying, do we need to start a campaign?!

You can grocery shop on Amazon.de I think - might be worth it for big heavy items that don't go off. Also, is there a bio-box type think in your area - Flotte-Karotte or some such? That might be an option too.

No online shopping where we live either TeaAddict - we've tried every possible option over the last 10 years, there really is nothing workable. We've tried the Amazon grocery option and it is absolutely dire for a full shop - fine for the odd thing but you absolutely cannot do a full family grocery shop that way - everything is separately and multiply packaged, things come in 5 or 6 separate deliveries, half the stuff is damaged and has to go back, the postman turns murderous and they only have dry goods anyway.

There are companies who deliver frozen stuff only which are quite good and long established - I think Bofrost and Eismann deliver everywhere, even tiny rural villages without public transport (us :o ) However prices are three times higher than Aldi, plus a delivery charge on top, and it's only frozen stuff...

Almost every village has a bakery delivery van which stops once a week, but you need to ask around to find out when and where - we lived here years before I noticed that for about ten minutes at ten past ten on a Tuesday morning there is a baker selling fresh bread etc. about ten meters from our front door - she doesn't do anything to let people know she stops there, no fliers, no tune or beeping horn, just parks there for ten minutes once per week - people just know... :o

Obviously everywhere has a choice of at least 3 breweries who will deliver your choice of dozens of beer varieties as well as bottled water and soft drinks and juices to your door, and you don't even pay until after you've received your essential liquid sustenance :o

Some butchers will deliver - you have to go in and ask, and obviously there is a minimum order which isn't small, but realistic if you freeze meat or for Christmas ...

However if you want milk delivered you're probably stuffed.

Loads and loads of areas even fairly close to (but outside) big cities are still not covered by online grocery shopping though, and won't be any time soon.

Ooh I lost this thread, hi all.

We use Rewe online delivery fairly often. I find it quite good but nothing like Tesco/Asda/Waitrose delivery. The most infuriating thing IMO is trying to cart massive bottles of drink everywhere. As a tip though, we find Tri Top syrups to be quite a good alternative to squash. Much more expensive here but still cheaper than buying endless bottles of fruit juice. Or buy the cheapest Apfelsaft (NOT Nektar) and fizzy water to make Apfelschorle and be properly German. :)

You can drive a banger on the autobahn, why not? It's not a requirement to drive at 200km/h. Just stick to the right lane which you should be anyway.

My German is still pretty shit but I get by I've been pushing myself more recently though. I'd love to get to a B1 level and I have a renewed enthusiasm. Am feeling a bit disgruntled though by DH's complete lack of effort - which is unfair because he does make effort, he just mentally blocks himself and doesn't bother trying to use it which is how you get better :( I reckon as soon as he takes a course in it, he'll be fine but he hasn't done that yet.

I do two massive shops at the start of each month at Aldi for store cupboard and frozen stuff (would do it all at once if I could push two trolleys and had a bigger car boot) and then shop for fresh stuff in one meduim and 3-4 small shops per week. We live seven miles from a supermarket so I couldn't do it without a car, unless I pretty much spent all day cycling to the shops and back. I stop at Aldi or Edeka on the way home from work usually. We've gone German in terms of bread so it needs buying most days. With a family of 5 and no school meals my weekly shop has to cover over 100 meals, so yes, I spend a lot of time food shopping and making food

I actually once added up how many hours a week I spend on food shopping and putting away, as I do absolutely all of it and was explaining to DH that no, I bloody well will not ever work full time unless he takes on some of the food shopping, putting away, meal planning and cooking, because feeding everyone adds up to more than a full working day per week. Since then he has suggested that we could employ somebody on a minijob basis to do our food shopping and cleaning :o Sounds lovely, although somewhat ridiculous, but people wanting that kind of work don't seem to exist where we live - we have tried multiple times to find a cleaner and it's impossible to hire anyone to do a few hours cleaning in an ordinary family house once per week!

Edeka delivers in some areas allegedly, but Edekas are franchises I think, not a chain as such, so they do their own thing to a degree and none of the ones around us deliver.

TheCuriousOwl I didn't learn German at school at all, and did a one month course a when I first moved in with German DH (in the UK), then he wouldn't practice with me because I was too slow and he spoke fluent English, and I did my teacher training and then started a new career as a secondary teacher so learning German was the least of my priorities, so forgot a lot... Then we moved here all in a big rush about 5 years later, when I had a toddler and was heavily pregnant, and I could only manage a few set phrases... We moved to a rural location where the old chestnut about everyone speaking English absolutely isn't true - nobody has ever replied to me in English here when I've spoken German to them. I got by one way or another though.

I did my B1 test to get my citizenship after living here 9 years and got almost full marks for listening, reading and speaking but only just scraped the writing, unsurprisingly given the fact I've picked my German up rather than ever formally studied or learnt it. I have no talent for languages and a really strong accent, but the main thing is just to try, I think :o I work in an all German environment and the Greek cleaning lady is the only one who ever speaks English to me at work :o (she speaks 5 languages!)

I'm starting an apprenticeship in September - the oldest Schulanfänger in town - I dread to think how illiterate my assignments will make me look, and anticipate spending a lot of time with a dictionary but I'm viewing it as a free German intensive course as much as a vocational qualification, and am very much hoping that 3 years of 16 classroom hours per week meant for native speakers will raise the standard of my German substantially - I hope to get near C1, but we'll see...

5more have you looked on Betreut.de? We found some babysitters/housekeepers/dog walkers on there, you have to pay €30 for a membership to contact someone, but they also have to pay €30 to put their ad up so it works out okay as you avoid timewasters.

I have noticed a difference where DH will flounder and go "Uh ah um Entschuldigung, mein Deutsch ist - I don't speak German" which of course prompts people to speak English to him unless they don't, whereas I go "Langsam bitte?" and they just switch to using really slow and simple German unless they are so thoroughly Badisch that this is an alien concept, at which point I just give up and revert to sign language

Tell me more about the apprenticeship? :) I'd love to do something like that!

Oh, 5more I have apprenticeship envy, would love to hear more. Toi, toi, toi

Where did you end up?! ha ha ha I know!!
Wehrheim, north side of Bad Homburg.

Ha ha ha ha, that made me chuckle!
I probably should have checked out the Rewe delivery towns in addition to all of our other search criteria

This is what I'll be doing Bertie and Finally

www.akademie-schoenbrunn.de/berufliche-schulen/heilerziehungspflege/ausbildung-heilerziehungspflege/berufsbild.html

I'm already working just as Hilfskraft in the job I'll carry on doing to satisfy the work experience part of the Ausbildung - you can do it over 2 years full time and just do a minimum amount of work experience which you get a , but I'm spreading the classroom part over 3 years and doing more (paid) work hours. I bloody love the job so far (been there 3 months) I found it by accident because when my youngest started Kindergarten and I decided I'd better start working properly, not just teaching VHS classes, I got a convenient local job at the care home a couple of miles away, and after a year they wanted to send me to an Ausbilding in elderly care, and I thought why not, as they were going to pay for it, and I'd be earning a lot more for the same work (with a bit more responsibility and medical stuff but a lot less physical work) by the end of it... When I went to the open day about that I heard the talk about Heilerziehungspflege and it sounded far more interesting, so I set about switching route :o I'm very glad I switched, I really like going to work now, where the care home was OK but physically very hard and far less varied and interesting, and a there were a lot more odd co-workers...

I am worried I'm going to find this far harder than I found my degree or my masters though, even though it's only the equivalent of a BTEC or something!

oh Wehrheim is nice though TeaAddict the Freibad is lovely have you been there yet? Crazy that Rewe doesn't deliver there, its not exactly in the middle of nowhere!

5moreminutes that sounds really interesting, good luck with the course!

Anyone else have a child starting school this August? DD1 is going to a Grundschule with Eingangsstufe, she's only just turned 5 and is the only one going from her Kindergarten as that is in a different catchment area to where we live. She's at a Schnuppertag for the Hort just now though so will at least have met some of the kids going there.

Very interesting, 5more. Good luck!

I'm coming over in October! I have a flat/Airbnb in Aachen for 9 months in 3 month blocks (back for xmas and easter) and I can't wait!

My German is sort of AS level, I think, despite me having a German mother (who never spoke German to us) and 2 kids who got to A level. I'm hoping that total immersion will be the way to go - though my biggest fear is that I'll come back in June 2018 no more bilingual than I am now!

I will be living in a house with the owners upstairs - who speak English but I'm hoping will talk german to me and correct it when it's wrong - and a TV (hoping the soaps will help!)

I know the German's are great club-members, are there any clubs I should be looking at for not-great german speakers? Not sure about going to classes...

All the best 5more! You've done really well. That's really encouraging. Please do keep us informed of how it comes along.

welsh no we haven't been to the Freibad just yet. We returned the rental car a month ago and haven't quite made it up the hill to the Freibad. Need to sell the double buggy as DS1 (3.5) has been refusing to walk anywhere and thus been making me work overtime on outdoor excursions.
We came to Bad Homburg a few weeks ago to see the Petersson and Findus play in the Kurpark. That was brill. I'm trying to ease DH into the idea that we'll see Andre Rieu open air too one day hehee

bertie apfelschorle mit sprudlewasser Is my drink of choice. I could drink it all.day.long. I do hope that it's healthy

Hurrah ptumbi hurrah!!

ptumbi If you can stick to total emersion for stretches of three months at a time, I would think that you will really notice the difference. The language will sink i to that 'automatic' part of your brain, where you reply spontaneously, without even thinking about translating.

Any clubs that interest you would do it, I think. Good luck.

Well we are officially halfway through Grundschule and DS came home all proud because he got two 1s for his end of year grades and he got the highest mark in the class for the test! :) DH was not able to tell me any more information than that I work late on Wednesdays so I didn't see him before he was in bed but I'm sure he'll tell me tomorrow.

Busy day today everyone! I'm glad I keep checking in :-D

bertie great tips on fruit juices, I'm really going to miss my favourite tesco hi-juice unless I pack boxes of the stuff, though I like anything apple flavoured too so that will work! And congrats to your DS!

5 more good luck with your course!

Moving day is in just over 2 weeks and naturally DH has to be in Germany the first day the movers come to pack the house - unavoidable. German company but he checked and someone will at least speak English! Kids are going to MILs whilst it's all being packed up so that's a weight off my mind.

DS1 will be going to meet the head at the local school the week before term starts to decide if he is going to a transition school or the 1st or 2nd year. No kindergarten place yet for DS2 but we've registered at all the nearby places.

Anything from the UK I might want to stock up on as it will be going in the lorry? Baked beans, ketchup?

Teabags, ovex and calpol/children's ibuprofen.

The Ovex is the important one. BUY AS MUCH AS THEY WILL SELL YOU.

Ovex really, do they not treat for threadworms?

Incidentally I have had to treat us all for the unwanted bum guests and washing EVERYTHING so will do a second round anyway

Thank you!!

Marmite, jelly squares, crunchie bars, custard powder, squash were all prized treats for us, in addition to tea bags, growing up in Germany

Curiously, now that now that we live in the UK and they are all freely available, I never buy anything from that list. If i wanted custard, I'd make it from scratch. We do buy lots of things from the German bakery (mostly fruhlingsquark and marzipan haribo ) in Windsor. And the Christmas things from Lidl hardly ever last til Christmas. I suppose its all about the familiar tastes of childhood.

The German Bakery in Windsor did* the desserts for our wedding 10years ago finally*. Small world! The husband and wife owners are so sweet. Bless them that it's still going strong! (Think that they were in Kew back then though)

Utter post failure there.

Was meant for finally