The language barrier
I arrived in Stuttgart today and was met at my hotel by Bernd and Barbara Penkwitt, parents of my cousin, Meike Penkwitt in Freiburg. I've known Bernd and Barbara for years and always enjoy seeing them, even though my limited German makes it difficult for us to carry on a full conversation. We get along with smiles and gestures and much good will.
Barbara is my mother's cousin, though much younger. Technically, I am her "first cousin once removed," but just "cousin" will do. Her father, Hermann Kilian, was the brother of my grandfather, John Kilian. Hermann was just a boy when my grandfather and two of his other brothers left Germany in 1924. The family was separated by the Nazi era and World War II, and not really reunited until around 1961. My aunt Joan, married to an Army doctor, took advantage of living in Stuttgart to seek out her father's surviving German family. I completed the job in the late 1980s, compiling a chronicle of of names, dates, and places that spoke of war, death, and survival. One of my grandfather's brothers and five or six of his cousins died on the German side in World War II.
At dinner last night, we were joined by Bernd and Barbara's son, Florian, Florian's buddy Kai, and my second cousin (again to be technical) Tabea Kilian. All three are young and speak excellent English. Things got cracking and we had a great time over beers discussing Florian's two months of bumming around Morocco, Tabea's trip to Wisconsin last summer with her 75-year-old grandfather, and Kai's relation to the American science fiction writer Robert Heinlein and his various experiences talking to Floridians about George W. Bush.
They don't call it the language barrier for nothing. Most Germans learn English and a second foreign language in school. Unlike us, they have a ready ability to practice their English in everyday life, which is the key to retention of a foreign language. I tell Germans that it is entirely possible for an American to go through his entire long life without ever encountering a foreign language speaker. I took German every year from the seventh through 12th grades and again in college, yet I struggle now with even basic conversations. I had worked with language tapes for several months before coming over here, but nothing stuck.
I wish it was otherwise. I know I am missing mountains of family history from the war years and other years because of my inability to converse easily in German. They would happily tell me if only I was able to listen.