NORWAY II

Going to a country where you do not know tha language at all can be quite challanging! But when I heard the norwegian language for the first time i was really amused. The pronunciation sounded quite funny and cute to me! But what surprised me the most was that i could even understand some words. I did not expect that! And when i tried to read it, I could even get much more.
I was told that the norwegian language has the same origin as german and thats why german speaking people can undrstand some words! But still, when the norwegian spoke fast to each other it was really hard to follow and understand anything. So it was clear for me that I have to visit the norwegian language class for foreigners which was offered by the university. But I have to admit that it would have been fine to speak only english in norway because EVERYONE knows it. Even little kids and elderly people! That is because norway has such a small population of only 5 million people what makes the language quite unimpor-tant and forces norwegians to learn english. For example, many movies are not translated to
norwegian so the younger people are forced to watch them in english which actually is a really good way of learning a language.
But since I was living in norway for 6 months I still wanted to learn the basics so I decided to apply for the language course and luckily I was accapted. My motivation was that i can have some short conversations and small talks with norwegians and also be able to read all the signs for instance. So I was really motivated when I visited the first class. As I already said it was not to hard to follow the grammar since it is almost the same as in german. But i realised fast that there are still a lot of words I could not even guess what they mean. So I had to learn them all by heart what sometimes was really tiring. But with the first sentences we learned I could already talk to the cashier in norwegian what was really motivating to learn more.
But it was still hard for me to be consequent and speak norwegian to the people. So I have to admit that a spoke more english than norwegian, of course. I also met a lot of international students and at some point you just speak english to everyone, even to german speaking people sometimes! So by speaking a lot of english in university and also in the dormitory I could learn a lot, especially from the norwegians good english and improve it which I am really happy about! In general it was easier than I thought to have everything in english, also lectures at university and even presentations. I got used to it really quickly. To conclde I think that the exchange helped me a lot to improve my english and also to learn some norwegian
also. But the most important thing for me was to meet new people from all around the world and I am really thankful to be able to communicate with all of them!

Fabio