German: the language of love

So, the other day, I was helping Andrew study for his first German vocab quiz. He kept saying the article die (sounds like dee) as die (as in roll the die or die, irregular verbs, die!). He couldn’t remember the word for table (der Tisch)

I was helping him with pronunciation when Andrew commented: “Wow, you sound just like my German teacher.”

Six long, arduous years studying German. Vindication. At last! It was so worth it.

After a while, Bob called him over and whispered something in Andrew’s ear. Andrew’s eyes went wide, he held a hand over his mouth to keep in the giggle.

“Go tell that to Mommy,” Bob said.

Andrew marched over and said, “Ich liebe dich.” Then, “What? What did I say?”

He was still laughing because he’s twelve and anything that sounds even remotely off color delights twelve-year-old boys.

I told him: “You just said, ‘I love you.'”

So he said it again. And again. And Bob observed: “German, it’s such a beautiful language.”

I gave Andrew my sage advice for pronouncing German words: “When two vowels go walking, the last one does the talking.” That’s worth at least two years of German right there.

Andrew was suitably unimpressed. So I added, “Inch by inch, Russian’s a cinch, yard by yard, Russian is hard.”

“Ich liebe dich,” was all he said.