In the nick of time my German text has arrived. This is the text for my University of the Third Age course, beginning tomorrow.

The tutor had warned us – after I had sent off my order – not to buy the expensive edition with the three included CDs because he had made a CD comprising all the conversations we would study plus some additional material.

Guess which edition I had ordered? I’d taken the position that getting the conversation right is half the battle, and I didn’t see any mention of a download site for the spoken texts. Sure, I could puzzle out the pronunciation and try to remember the voice of the tutor, but there’s really no substitute for hearing native speakers say the words.

And I could listen again and again, speak along with the CD, really drill the words and the word order and the pronunciations into my thick head.

Not to worry. Only a few dollars more. All up, the whole thing would cost me not much more than a hundred dollars for a year of instruction. That’s the beauty of U3A. It’s all pretty much free. We students pay a dollar an hour for the room rent, a few dollars for incidentals such as photocopying and refreshments, and that’s it. The tutor provides their services for nothing more than the pleasure of passing along their lifetime skills.

I had a quick shufti through the book. Standard stuff, beginning with the alphabet, some basic grammar, and getting into conversation as soon as possible. I didn’t bother to get stuck into serious study; the tutor would tell us how to approach the text.

Pete