You probably don't believe me , so ...
There is a whole chapter called " Getting on the bus" and the next chapter is called " Getting off the bus."
To give you the flavour of the thing, here's a review from Amazon ...
I've been trying desperately and hopelessly to learn enough Greek to communicate with my village neighbours. No, Brian Church hasn't taught me much Greek: his message is rather: `Enjoy everything Greek, and maybe, someday....', which makes far more sense than the optimistic claims of other language courses.
You know you're in for an enjoyable ride from the very first words of Lesson One (not to mention the title: `Welcome to Greek! You haven't a chance'): `Once upon a time, whilst the jury was still deliberating, my brother flew to Spain and I hurried off to Greece. At Madrid airport he was asked for his pasaporte. At Athens airport they wanted to see my dheeavateereeo. Guess who learnt the local lingo first?'
The book is brimful of love - and compassion - for things Greek. (Sample: `Cat Stevens, a Greek Cypriot [actually not, but....] was inspired to write `Morning has broken' after joining an afternoon queue in Syntagma Post Office.') Mind you, there are also useful nuggets, like : `At the end of the day, there's only one failsafe phrase in coping when people ask for directions. Learn this phrase and learn it well: tha ertho mazi sou/sas - I'll come with you.'
From the rollicking 2 pp. dedication (I still wonder about that tippling Daisy Williams), to the bittersweet love-story conclusion: ENJOY!
He obviously liked it ...and so do I ...but ... what's this all got to do with learning German ?
Well, for a start, maybe you remember the very odd and long-winded way I showed you how to remember that " Feld = Field" .... well, that's one of his things ....he relishes in showing the readers fatuous ways to remember the meaning of Greek words which are about 300 words long and take up half the page.
So ... in the spirit of Brian, here's how we would have told his readers how to remember that "Der Bleistift" = a pencil.
So ... you're on this ship captained by Captain Bligh, and his back has gone stiff from all that cold sea air, so you tell him about your old granny who always swore by a nice cup of tea as a cure for a sore back. Strangely, she always insisted that it only worked if you stirred it with a pencil.
Bligh - stiff - "t" = Bleistift ...a pencil. ( m, Bligh is a man)
Now that is a relatively short one .... far too simple in the "world of Brian."
Let's have a more "Brianesque" one now that you've got the idea.
What about the lovely word for a " patch-up job" ... die Flickschusterei !!
Well, there's this policewoman, who as you all know are often called a "Flick", who's really annoyed because she's had her shoes mended, and they cost a fortune, and when she got them back it was obviously a rushed and poorly-executed patch-up job ..... but what has made it worse is that when she examined the repair more closely and gave the patch a bit of a shove, it sprang up and hit 'er eye.
Yes ... Flick-shoes t 'er eye = Flickschusterei !! = a patch-up job. A she's feminine.
Let's really go for it this time .... I'll keep the target word a secret until it's done this time .. how exciting ! This one is truly up to Brian's standard ....
So .... it's hard when you've got something that you know should be good but you can't find a possible use for it. Not fair really ,especially when it's tricky to wend your way but the path is covered in dung as well, and then you can't even find it for ages because of heavy smög which slows down the process of licking it all off, but luckily Elizabeth comes along with her heavy-duty kite and you can all fly away home.
Yes, Fair-wend-dung-smög-lick-kite = Verwendungsmöglichkeit = (possible) use.
..and that "Elizabeth" reminds you that it's feminine.
I've mentioned my crap German teacher before, and I can't help wondering if things might have gone a bit better if he's given us things like that to do for homework .... I'm sure he would have had a much more fun-filled time marking it too.... let's face it, the usual old cobblers we used to get was hardly inspiring.
And as for you lot, go on, do some for yourself .. try to make them as long-winded and crapulous as possible. You know it has to be Terrific for your German !!!