She still remembers her first German word well. „That was ‘tschüss’,“ says Lobna Alhindi. One of the volunteers from the circle of friends in Poltringen said goodbye to her like that. „He explained to me that you don’t say ‘bye bye’ in Germany,“ recalls the Syrian-born woman. „And that many people in this country say ‘ade’.“ That was in December 2015. Today, Lobna, one of the editors at tuenews INTERNATIONAL, speaks fluent German. She completed her C1 language course this summer. This means that her language skills are so good that she can communicate effortlessly, could study or work in many professions. The levels are defined in the „Common European Framework of Reference for Languages“. C1 stands for „competent language skills“. In good German: „You can express yourself clearly, in a structured and detailed manner on complex issues“, as the description states. This also includes understanding „implicit meanings“.
Lobna, who now has German citizenship with her family of five, really likes living in Germany. „Everything has its rules here,“ says the trained primary school teacher about her new home. And even if that doesn’t always apply to the German language, she assures us: „I love the German language.” She has therefore made a great effort to learn the language: In June 2016, she completed the A1 and A 2 language courses, and after six months she had the B1 exam in the bag . „I got full marks“. This was followed by B2, naturalization, and now the „C1 for work“ course. She is very ambitious. That’s why she is sometimes almost a little jealous of her 14-year-old son, who speaks German without an accent. This also applies to her favorite word „natürlich“. „He says it the way the Germans say it,“ says Lobna. It is only on the second repetition that you actually notice that she still has a hint of a foreign-language „r“. She says of her son: „I think his mother tongue is German.“ Even though the family mostly speaks Arabic at home, Lobna has already noticed that German also has its advantages when raising children: „If I say something to the twins or my older son in German, they do it straight away.“ That doesn’t always work in Arabic.
Lobna is not afraid of complicated sentences. „Ich möchte einen Beruf finden, der es mir ermöglicht, Familie und Beruf unter einen Hut zu bringen,“ she says, which translates to „I want to find a job that allows me to balance family and career.“ She admits that it’s one of the phrases she learned on her last German course. „But I understand the sentence and know how it’s constructed.“ She says that she also learned how to present herself as well as possible in a job interview and how to deal with customers and team colleagues. The course was „multicultural“, she says. There were three Syrians on the course, which took place four times a week from 5pm. to 8pm. for seven months, while the others came from Ukraine and Romania. Lobna listened very carefully when it came to learning phrases for everyday life. „Ich hoffe, dass ich nicht störe,“ was one of these phrases. „I said it straight away the next time I rang our neighbors’ doorbell,“ she says.
Now in winter, she wants to get back to her books, review grammar and watch YouTube videos to learn more about the finer points of the German language. She also wants to listen to German radio more often. „I learn from listening,“ she says. If she misses a word in conversation, she immediately looks it up and asks for confirmation that she is pronouncing it correctly.
Her C1 course has given her a lot of confidence in the language. „It’s no longer difficult for me to call somewhere. I understand everything and can ask questions.“ On one condition: the people she talks to don’t speak Swabian to her, „because I don’t understand Swabian,“ says Lobna. That will probably change in the future, because Lobna now wants to really get into working life: Either in an office or by training to become an educator. In any case, she wants to put her German skills to good use. „I won’t remain speechless“.
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Lobna Alhindi, Redakteurin und Übersetzerin bei tuenews INTERNATIONAL, hat das Sprachniveau C1 in Deutsch geschafft. Foto: tuenews INTERNATIONAL / Hamza Alezo.
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