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Showing posts from 2021

Short: Rätsel vs. Rätzel

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While working on a German article I came across the word "Naturrätsel" and when looking up the meaning I usually just read the word, hear it in my head and then type it out without looking at the original text. It's a small way to do ear training and spelling practice with German. After not finding the full word on LEO , I tried the main part of the word Rätsel. (Some German words are combined together, and the main word is at the end.)

Starting again...again

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So I think a one week pause break turned into a much longer month off. But it's the first of July (27th now) and a good time to start a post. A post about starting again. This is a topic not just related to writing a blog post, but on starting or restarting anything new. Maybe it comes when you got sick and took an endless exercise break. Learning German for me has been a bit of a stop and go process too.

Werde vs. Würde

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It's another verb comparison post! These things come up because most likely I have made numerous mistakes recently with the words, and this is in fact the case for werde and würde. Short Park-Baby Story Hello and welcome back! I hope you had a great weekend, I had a first successful time in the park recently with my 4 month old. The last time I tried, she lasted about 10/15 minutes and then I politely and apologetically said to the other mothers that I needed to go. And thankfully my little one felt fine again once we were home. The biggest difference between the two park visits was the stroller for the first time (which she's not the biggest fan of) and the carrying cloth. But enough about babies, let's get back to German!

Expanding your zone of comfort

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Have you ever been in a situation where you are trying to do something that isn't your favorite? Maybe it was speaking German for the first time in a coffee shop. And as your hesitation is getting the better of you, someone tries to help and says, "Just do it, get out of your comfort zone!"? Would that be helpful for you? Those were never words of encouragement for me. Sometimes, I would say, it even gave me a good reason to resist and stay in my comfort zone! But we know that trying new things, especially things that might scare us, are good for us to experience life. Okay, maybe it's good to hesitate if you want to jump from 2 stories into a lake without knowing how to swim, but that's not the fear/hesitation I'm talking about. (I realized that I wrote more than I thought, so I added a very brief tl;dr at the bottom.)

hören vs. zuhören

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This is a very short but hopefully helpful post! In German you have the verbs hören and zuhören, and it's good to know 2 things about these words.

When your German language book and Tony Robbins tells you to dream bigger.

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It's 4:49 in the morning and I woke up around 4:20am to feed my little girl who's now 3+ months old. Normally I would go back to bed and wake up when the sun is fully out around 7:30am. So why am I up when the birds are chirping at the sun to hurry up? I think it's a combo of my German language workbook and Tony Robbins.

Präpositionen mit Verben für Akkusativ

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This week is about prepositions with verbs, specifically with Akkusativ! Prepositions are words like: on, for, about, in. You use them before a noun to add more details. For example: I was born in New York. / Ich bin in New York geboren. She talks about birds. / Sie spricht über Vögel. This present is for you. / Dieses Geschenk ist für dich. So in German, with some verbs, you need to use specific prepositions. For the noun following the preposition, can be different German cases, but today I will be only using the Akkusativ case. Here's an example: This is the sentence I want to say in German. I think about the ball. Because I will be using denken (think), I know I need to use the preposition an ('about' in this example). Ich denke an the ball. Now, what German case does 'the ball' need? With denken, the noun the preposition comes after is Akkusativ. Ball is masculine, so 'the ball' is 'den Ball'. Ich denke an den Ball . So what do you do with a

AK: A glimpse into Austrian Worker Descrimination Rights

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Are there ways to handle worker discrimination in Austria? Yes! How did I come across this information? When my husband and I as parents received a really helpful list describing all the things needed to prepare for our new baby. Things like getting her e-card and signing up for the governmental care-giver support or Kinderbetreuungsgeld. (I plan to write about that another time). So AK stands for "Arbeiterkammer" or translated, "Chamber of Labor", and they (along with some other unions) have fought for things like: e ight-hour work day unemployment insurance five weeks vacation a year parental leave worker discrimination rights Unfortunately their website which has lots of information is only in German, but fortunately with Google you can translate the entire website into another language by: Go to google.com and put in the URL https://www.arbeiterkammer.at . The first choice will say next to it "Translate this page". Done! You will get the site in the

What's it's like to give birth in Austria.

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Hello, I'm back again after a very long pause. I took time off, for one very special reason... a baby girl! I had her in January and now that she is almost three months old. I thought it would be good to get back into this blog. So let's talk about giving birth in Austria! Some things that I've learned about what it's like here. Please keep in mind, this is information from 2020-2021. You have free visits to the OB-GYN ( obstetrician-gynecologist ) that include ultrasounds. You get a few free ultrasounds over the pregnancy and also regular check ups. If you want an ultrasound every time, you would need to pay more. If you don't pay for a private OB-GYN, you might have a quick visit, so it's good to write down your questions in advance. You get a Mutter Kind Pass (Mother Child Passport) that helps you keep track of your baby's health over the early years. The book is given to you by the OB-GYN and it starts getting filled out during the pregnancy. This book