A rose by any other name just as sweet? Leider, in Koeln riecht sie suesser.

Since arriving in Deutschland I have struggled to come up with Bayrische Ohren (ears). The southern accent and dialect–swallowed vowels, dental consonants, relaxed lips and tongue, and short, throaty (I know, right!??!) ich-lauts–prove overwhelming to my education in strict Hochdeutsch. More often than not the words fly by indistinguishably, and I can’t even decipher the separation between words I already know, let alone identify new ones. It gets to the point where I don’t even know what to look up in my dictionary because I just can’t weed through the thick pronunciation. By the same token, it often takes me saying something two or three times for them to understand me. This can often be an embarrassing situation and has really hindered my desire to speak out.

On my way to Brussels, however, I switched trains in Koeln and found myself (ploetzlich!) in a wonderland of perfekt Hochdeutsch. Bright vowels, loose jaws, crisp consonants, excessive tongue movement, hissy ich-lauts… and not a trace of dialect. Individual words! Whole sentences that made sense! It was so yummy to hang on the sound of every glorious little word. Even the idiomatic expressions were much easier to decode and assimilate, because I could actually hear their components loud and clear. Who cared if I didn’t know a word here and there! I could repeat that whole sentence back and had something concrete to look up in my dictionary. Bitte, sagen Sie diesen Satz noch einmal? Mir war soooo schoen. Ach, sweet relief.

So, in turn, I raise my glass to the stalwart exchange students who prevail against the linguistic terrors of the American south. You have my deepest respect and admiration.