We watched the movie with the Nazi antagonist before we heard of any real conversation in German. People seem to get the impression that German is a harsh and aggressive language. From that, we developed a stereotype of the language and thought they are scary and forceful but in reality, when we hear natives conversing with each other, it sounds pretty nice with their sing-songy tones and flows quite well.

Well, sometimes it also depends upon the dialect and the accent they use. To be honest, it is rather a pleasant language to speak as it is logical when it comes to its grammar and the actual words.

German is not a difficult language to learn. The basics of the German language are similar to that of the English language. Since English and German came from the same family of the Germanic language, the similarities between the two languages make it easier to understand.

 There are many words that are extremely similar which includes the word for the different days of the week, months of the year, some seasons, some relatives, and many others. The words Januar, Februar, Montag, Freitag, Hund, etc are likely to be guessed since they are practically similar. These are the words in English for January, February, Monday, Friday, and dog (hound). There are also words whose meanings are less obvious like Sauerstoff which appears to be completely alien but it has a literal meaning that directly translates to oxygen. In many cases though, even where words are similar, they can come across as being intimidating. This can be because they are written using many consonants and they sometimes use a long, compound word that looks like a short sentence in English but just a single word in German.

Compound words are formed when a few words are put together. In German, they use many compound words which seem difficult as they look like a continuous sentence. The Germans don’t use those words often, instead, they shorten them. If you ever find a word that looks like a sentence, try and guess if you could understand it. Their vocabulary is often formed by joining terms together into one. German is said like it’s written. They follow regular patterns in terms of how sounds are written, this makes it fairly easy for beginners to have a good go at speaking right away. There may be some stuttering at longer words though. 

Learning a language takes time and commitment, you need to have enough motivation, and working hard is all it takes. And if you feel confused about where to start, there are some tips to help you learn to speak German really fast. Let’s be real. Chinese people will find it harder than an English native speaker to learn German.

It may also take a different time depending on many factors like your prior experience and exposure to the language, your resilience, how much work you put into the learning process, motivation and so on. You are not going to wake up one day and suddenly be fluent in the language, that only happens in movies. But, if you practice every day for a period of at least three to six months, you’ll probably be able to handle a daily conversation with a friend and doing things like getting into a cafe and making an order in German. So, if you are fluent enough and know the basics of English, it is very easy to learn German.