In my early twenties I decided to give English another go because a friend and I wanted to go to New York. Well, we never made it, but I married my Berlitz teacher! He wanted to practise his German and, because of my terror of speaking English, I was the only girl who insisted on speaking German to him. He must have liked it; he very soon proposed and I must have said ‘Ja' because a year later I found myself in the UK for the very first time. Horror!!! The food, the language (Bristolian is difficult to understand at the best of times, tinned peas would stain potatoes green), sheer and utter horror.
Well, as I was still not speaking English to my husband, I had to practise it elsewhere. I read the newspapers very carefully and made notes of words that I found interesting. BBC radio and children's television provided further input. I tried evening classes, didn't do it for me, we were all foreigners, so it seemed quite pointless. I went to work. I still pity the poor people of Bristol that Christmas: I was manning the “Trim a tree” counter and to this day don't know how many wrong Christmas decorations I sold or how often I gave the wrong change. The Brits were still using Pounds, Shillings and Pence and there were twelve of those in one of those and 20 of those in one of those or the other way round. It was traumatic. Count yourself lucky that you didn't have to count in that currency. I was so glad when it changed soon after my attempt at ruining the British economy.
So I decided to teach myself how to type. Office work had to be easier. I hired a typewriter and began my glorious career as a temporary. It led to great things and one of them was that after several years of marriage I had no qualms about speaking English to my husband. Curiously enough, he preferred to carry on in German.
