I didn’t really have any plans when I decided to go to Los Angeles with Stefan. I knew that I wouldn’t have a work permit anyway, and honestly, I had no idea what to expect. So how could I make plans? I was asked again and again what I would do then. My environment seems to be very worried that I don’t know how to keep myself busy. But I stuck to wanting to get to know the country and the city first. The only thing I decided to do was to attend a language course. In fact, it wasn’t that easy to find one if you don’t want to just spend $4000 bucks. And we are talking about a few weeks here, not a year. Eventually, I did find an affordable course. It was online only, but what the heck. 

Only plan: English lessons

On June 1st it should start, from Monday to Thursday for two hours each. I really don’t feel German very often. But when I was sitting at the table with my notepad 10 minutes before class started and logged in and the teacher wasn’t even in our virtual classroom yet, that was one of those moments. I don’t even want to go too much into the lessons, it was very often slow going and even though we were in a language class, very few people really wanted to talk. I was secretly very glad after half the time that I only signed up for a month, but I strongly felt that I learned more after an evening with our neighbors than after a week of English classes. 

Yesterday was finally the last time with the final big unittest, for which I needed about 20 minutes.

I don’t know if I have to make a conclusion now and I don’t want to say that it is useless to attend a language course. But languages have to be spoken, and that works best in everyday contact with other people, so if you already have enough language skills, then you should try to lose the shyness of speaking as soon as possible. And you should not make plans for other people.