27.7: Language course part II

Today I started the second module of the Estonian language course, this time for the A1-A2 level. I spent the morning revising material and also met up with my previous teacher, Heli, to go through some of the material I wasn’t quite grasping, which helped to clear up a few things. At 1.00 our first lesson commenced. There are certainly a larger number of students this time around – approximately 40. These are spread over levels A1-A2, A2-B1 and B1-B2. My class has 12 students, again from all over the world. First impressions were good, I think there are several students who are approximately at my level and we are starting with material which is revision of the last two weeks work.

After the class we had a coffee break and then there was a repeat of the historical overview of Tartu, which I decided to skip, as it was exactly the same as that from two weeks ago. At 6.00 we had a welcome party where the whole cohort got together for supper. This time around, there were noticeably more Americans, probably constituting the largest nationality. There were naturally many students from European countries including Belarus, Germany, Belgium, The Netherlands, Ukraine and Latvia. This time around I had some stiff competition for furthest student with another girl from Argentina. Interestingly, her grandmother is also Estonian. Once we were sufficiently acquainted, I went for a drink with two of my classmates, Martin and Martina, to sample some of the local beers. Martin is from Latvia, not that you’d know with his perfect English accent, and works as an English-Latvian translator for the EU. Martina is from The Netherlands and is completing a PhD in human geography there.