You are welcome here.

Liebe Leserin, lieber Leser,

This is a safe place. This is a safe place for you. This is a safe place for you and me to be together.

Here at GermanWithNicole I have purposefully created a safe place for people to explore the German language, Germanic culture, thoughts about elements of our lives that vary from culture to culture. The main goal of this work is education and cultural understanding. At the heart of everything is compassion.

Here there are visitors from all over the world every day. Newsletter subscribers read in Iran, South Africa, Ireland, Peru, Brazil, Canada, quite literally all over the world. And you are all welcome here.

You are the reason I am here doing this. Writing this blog, teaching lessons, communicating with you on social media. I connect people to the German language, to new thoughts and ideas. Folks who come here are looking to understand something new, they are taking a risk not only to learn something, but also to better themselves. Their families. Their communities.

People are the Alpha and the Omega of this work. Germany has taught me so very much about people. From the very first time I read it, the first line of the German constitution moved me deeply:

“Die Würde des Menschen ist unantastbar.”

The dignity of a person is untouchable.

Your dignity is untouchable.

No one can take away your dignity, the truth that you matter. Especially here, where we stand between cultures, between languages, and we stretch our arms wide, wide enough to include many, many cultures and many, many people. Many ways of living, many ways of being. Many ways of speaking with one another.

I'd like to share with you something a friend of mine told me a couple of years ago. It's important to read today.

"Weißt Du, was ich Dir immer sagen wollte?

Menschen, die ZWISCHEN den Ländern und Kulturen leben, sind am wichtigsten!

Denn sie bereiten uns darauf vor, daß wir uns in der Zukunft in ganz normaler Weise auf der Erde als Brüdern und Schwestern erleben.

Und erkennen, daß wir sowieso alles in uns tragen!"

Translation:

"Do you know what I've always wanted to tell you?

People who stand BETWEEN countries and between cultures are the most important!

It is they who will prepare us for the time in the future when we live normally together on earth as brothers and sisters.

And help us recognize that we carry all of that in us anyway!"

You and I, dear reader, stand between the countries, between the cultures. It is you and I who create the relationship between the countries--between the actual people!

The safety you have here stays the same. The welcome you feel here stays the same. The new ideas here will keep coming, and here you are safe to take risks to learn something new.

Your dignity is still untouchable. Your dignity remains untouchable.

You are welcome here.