Stammtisch

As you may know, I am of German decent. I was born there and in fact, am still a German citizen. I moved here when I was two years old with my mother, and every year or so I would go back to visit family. However, the last couple years I haven’t had the same opportunities, time or money to go visit. I had begun to notice that I was losing my ability to speak German. It became harder and harder to construct sentences, and I was losing my vocabulary. I was out of practice and it worried me. My German heritage is important to me and I don’t want to lose my ability to communicate with my family.

Just in time to save the day I found a fix. I met a guy from Munich at the last Club Entrepreneur meeting. Through casual conversation he had mention that he is a part of a group of Germans that meet and talk. They call themselves the Tempe Stammtisch; roughly translated its means regulars table. They meet every week at Boulders on Broadway, and it is the perfect opportunity for me to get back into practice.

Last Friday was the second time I attended, and I absolutely love it. I am usually uncomfortable speaking German here in the states - I never liked it when people spoke a language I didn’t understand around me, and didn’t want to put that on someone else. But with this group I feel completely comfortable. I show up, chitchat about whatever for a couple hours, and head on my way. I’ve already noticed my German becoming stronger.

The people are great. Typical European culture and very inviting. They took me in right away and just started conversing with me. We don’t really talk about anything specific. More or less we just hang out and chat about whatever comes to mind. They tell stories, jokes, make bets with each other. Its great fun.

I’m very grateful that I found these people. They don’t know it, but they have helped me hang on to something that I hold dear. I was afraid that with my busy life I might not be able to make it back to Germany to fix my language skills, but now I don’t have any worries.