"My philological studies have satisfied me that a gifted person ought to learn English (barring spelling and pronouncing) in thirty hours, French in thirty days, and German in thirty years."

 

 

So wrote Mark Twain in his satirical essay on "The Awful German Language". You needn't have learned German for thirty years to understand this clip by Loriot, which is how I feel right now after having seen off Padma on the RIXON bus on its way to Canberra, from where she flies to Sydney and from there to Denpasar for five weeks in Indonesia.

I'm back at "Riverbend", enveloped by peaceful silence except for the low-volume sound from the radio tuned permanently to ABC Classic FM.

 

 

It took me a mere nineteen years to learn German, but I haven't spoken it for any length of time for more than sixty years, so perhaps it is time to read Mark Twain's essay again to remind myself what I have missed.

 

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