How To Learn German FAST! My Story

Hey guys, welcome to my channel.

Today is another interesting topic.

I'm going to talk about German language.

As you know my native language is Russian

and I speak English pretty well,

I guess.

And I also speak German.

ich spreche Deutsch

for the German who watch my video.

My story with German is very compicated.

When I was 12 years old,

we had to choose a second language at school.

So my first language was English

I started to learn it when I was four.

But then I had to choose a second language.

I had to choose between French and German

I don't really like how French sounds

The choice was pretty obvious but

I also didn't really like German language

because I didn't get why would I need it.

I totally understood why I needed English

because English is everywhere

I wanted to go to States or UK to study

but why would I need German?

But my mum was like "You have to learn German"

because education in Germany is free.

I don't remember how old I was. I think I was 12

I thought I start studying in five years

I'd be able to learn my German

but she was like "Go ahead and learn it"

So I went there

I wasn't interested at all

I spent three years at school learning German

And I couldn't say a word.

I knew some basic phrases like

Ich hei?e Marina

All the basic stuff

if you learn German

When I realised

I might actually need German language because

higher education is free in Germany

if you know German, it's easier to find the program

They actually have 3 programs in English as well

If you know German the choice is wider

And you can work during your studies

You wouldn't be able to work with your English

in Germany.

I started private classes

with my friend's mother

That was better but she was so kind to me

and told me "I know you so busy at school

It's not a problem you haven't done your homework"

It was like that till I was 17

and when I was 17 I went to Russian University

I realised that if want to transfer to the German University,

I really need to start studying German now.

I went to Goethe-Institut

which is an amazing place

because they have small groups,

they have amazing teachers.

And once I was in a group

This is when I started studying

because when I was alone

with a private teacher I didn't have any competitors

and I'm very competitive.

When I saw people speaking better German than me

I thought I really need to move forward

And here is my first tip

what I did to learn new words.

I listened to Tokio Hotel

I know many people hate this group

sorry, hate this band

They think they are for teenagers

they used to be for teenagers

and they used to be so mainstream

so everybody would hate them

but I loved them

I loved every single song

I would transate everything and I would learn words

and I was so proud of myself

when I understood their new songs.

This is what really motivated me

to learn German.

And when I started to watch German series

which is like German for beginners

this is actually German TV series

it's not really for foreigners

it's just about a family in Germany

and ther's a girl who's like 15

she falls in love with her stepbrother

something like that

And I was really excited about those series

I learnt a lot of new words

because I watched it in original

with subtitles

My German was A2-B1 by then

And when I turned 18

I realised the only way for me to start speaking German

would be to go to study German abroad.

I already went to the UK

two years before that

I knew how the sytem worked

I went to the local agency in St.Petersburg and asked them

how much would it cost me to go to Germany for 2 weeks

to learn German.

They calculated everything and said like

2 thousand euros.

I was like really, so expensive.

I started to Google everything myself

And I actually found my school

Which is BWS German Lingua

It's in Berlin.

I went to Berlin

I googled my school

I realised that the price is much lower

then the price that the agency offered

It was 650 euros for 2 weeks.

I stayed with an amazing family

I booked everything myself

it was very difficut because

I had to do all the bank transfers

I had to fill in all the application forms

and it took me 2 weeks to figure everything out

but I was able to do it

this is actually how the idea of Linguatrip

the booking platfrom for all language courses abroad

this is when it came to my mind

this is when I realised I want to do this business

back when it was just an idea

so I booked everything myself

and I went to that German school

and I stayed with an amazing German family

they didn't speak English with me because

they didn't know English

they only spoke German

and it was amazing

because the first word that I leant was Haferflocken

which is porridge

because I eat porridge for breakfast

and I was trying to explain like

Can I have porridge?

She doesn't speak English

and I was like okay

I googled it and it was Haferflocken

This way I learnt a lot of basic words.

that I had to know

but I didn't know

but because I had to communicate with my hostmother

and I've leant all of these words and they were useful

When I went to school

this is where the best part started

because they didn't have any Russian speakers

When you come to a language school

and you realise

50% of your class speaks your own language

this is not really full immersion.

My class was 19% Swiss, 10 % Russian

We had 9 people from Switzerland.

50% of them was speaking Italian,

50% of them was speaking French.

I was the only Russian.

I made a lot of friends.

I made friends with Swiss guys,

with Italian guys,

and we went to Berlinale together,

which was a festival

like film festival.

We did a lot of things without teacher

because he would take us to excursions

And this is when I fell in love with German history.

especially Berliner Mauer

which is a German wall

Berlin wall

when they separated Berlin into two parts

separated families

Very tragic story.

I was very interested in all of that.

I went to all of the museums,

and talked to a lot of people.

And so 2 weeks.

Just 2 weeks in Berlin.

I left in ahead B1 level.

I was at Goethe-Institut

Then 2 weeks passed

I came back to Russia

My German was so fluent

I came back to my group

and said "Hey, I think this is too easy".

But guys at Goethe-Institut told me

"We need to re-test you

in order to evaluate your level now".

They test it again and my level was C1!

If you know it's like B1, B2 and then C1.

So I jumped over one level

just in two weeks.

They all were amazed with my progress.

They like "really, you just went to Germany for 2 weeks".

I was like "yes"

And this is what full immersion does to you.

I had a lot of words in my brain

I had a lot of things which I knew

But because I didn't have a chance to practice it with native speakers

I wasn't in a stressful situation

when I had to use everything I know. 0:08:06.346,0:08:05.923 This situation happened in Germany

because nobody would get what I am saying in English

And this is when all of the words started to come out

and everything started to form

real language

And I was so happy I did it.

Because in two years I got accepted into German technical University

of Dresden.

And I studied maths in German

And I was amazing.

Well,

I wasn't amazing in all of the subjects

But I got very good grades for trigonometrics 0:08:41.906,0:08:39.325 I guess if you're watching this video, you learn German,

you get some of my words.

When I was studying the University

I went back to my host family in Berlin

and talked to them and they were amazed by my progress

Because when I came to Germany to study it was even faster.

My recommendation number one.

Listen to the songs in German

find the band that you like

and translate all of their songs.

Second - watch YouTube bloggers in German

I'm watching Nilam

You can just google her

She's German, she's amazing.

Her German is very easy to understand.

I watch her every now and then

in order to brush up my language.

Third - find TV series in German

I really recommend Deutsch fur Anfanger

Amazing TV series.

Just watch them in original with subtitles.

And fourth go to Germany or Austria or Switzerland.

Whichever accent you like.

BTW Swiss accent is so difficult, I don't get it.

Go there at least for two weeks to study

And you can go to my school, I'll leave the link below.

So you can check out the prices and book it if you want.

Thank you guys for watching this video

Please share your experience of learning German

I'd be really happy to hear your tips because

I'm starting to forget my German now

because I mostly use English for my work and life

Please share your tips,

please tell me if this video was helpful

Subscribe to my channel

I'd love to see you in my other videos as well.

Have a good day, bye!