I'm just starting out in German, which is my 2nd foreign language, and my 7th language overall. I come from India, a country where multiple languages are not only good to know, but a necessity to survive. I am ethnically a Bengali, born in Jamshedpur, a part of erstwhile Bihar, where a dialect of Hindi is spoken, brought up in Chennai, Hyderabad and Bangalore, each of which have their own unique languages of Tamil, Telugu and Kannada respectively, and am currently studying Engineering at IIT Madras, which was set up by erstwhile West Germany in Chennai.
Needless to say, I'm multicultural, and since childhood, I have grown up using at least 3 languages on a daily basis. At home, Bengali; at school and with friends, English; and on the streets while travelling and visiting shops, a mix of Hindi, Kannada, Tamil or Telugu, depending on where I was staying at that time.
India, as is probably common knowledge, was a colony of the British, and my forefathers are witnesses of extremely horrific situations that led to them losing their homeland, their livelihood, and most importantly, their pride.
Ironically, today, Indians pretend that those that speak English are the social higher-ups, and treat the native Indian languages as socially lower in value. This is where my story begins. I was adamant on joining a college that had no connection with the British rule. And so, I ended up at the IIT Madras.
After joining my university, following one of the common traditions here, I decided to learn German. However, with the onset of COVID-19, I had a great resource at hand: nearly unlimited time all day long, for multiple days. I took up German learning courses on YouTube, and when my next semester started a few days ago, I even started the official German A1 course offered at the institute.
However, my thirst hasn't stopped there. I wish to be able to communicate with other German speakers by the end of my course, and hence, I signed up on this amazing website!
Please feel free to contact me on Skype or via a message on this website. I assure you that I shall reply within a few days, if not lesser. Peace, Love and Respect!
Abhigyan out!