Kari kan heel goed duits!

As you perhaps gathered from the subject line (or not), I have started up Dutch class! I went to the first one last night. I have to work myself back into it, but I think once I accomplish that, it'll be a lot of fun. I am in desperate need of a dictionary though, and I think I'm only going to find German-Dutch dictionaries...not exactly what I want, but they'll work. I wouldn't even know where to tell my parents to start looking for the ones I bought back in the Netherlands. Besides, I send them on enough wild goose chases through the jungle of boxes and Rubbermaid totes I've left in their basement. I've leave them alone this time.

One thing I realized last night while sitting in my first Dutch class--I am really really good at German! In fact, that's what my subject line says: Kari speaks German really well. Now, normally, I am quite humble about my German language abilities (just ask my roommate Rosalie--I'm always saying that I'm not that good), but I shouldn't necessarily be. My big question is, how did I get so good at German? I'm having a hard time remembering in detail how I learned German in the first place, which I'd like to do so I can apply the strategies to Dutch. I probably just memorized everything I heard...a tactic which certainly produces results.

The Dutch class consists of eight people. Our teacher apparently isn't a native, although she's soooo good that I (and several other classmates) mistook her for a native speaker! I think she said she's Austrian, but her German didn't seem native to me, which could simply be because I had it in my head that it wasn't.

Today is Fat Tuesday and there is a little party for the Webster staff at 5pm, which I get to take part in even though I didn't wear a costume to work today. My boss is dressed up as Pippy Longstocking, complete with freckles and all. Too bad I don't have my digital camera with me today! We are going to eat traditional Faschingskrapfen, which are essentially donuts filled with either apricot jelly or vanilla pudding. The apricot jelly donuts are available all year round now, but when my boss was a kid 30 years ago, you could only get Krapfen during the carnival season. Some businessman or woman found out s/he could make a lot of money by offering those Krapfen all year around! I personally don't like apricot jelly, and I find that the American version of a creme or pudding filled donut is much better than what's offered here, but I will eat them. When in Rome... :)