It depends on what other languages you know. If you know only English, it will take a while because although some English and German words are remarkably similar, and more still can be correctly guessed, the way they are used and assembled into sentences often isn't. Translating English into German or visa-versa isn't straight forward for that reason.
For instance, "half" in German is "halb". So you'd think that half past nine would be "Halb neun". It isn't. In German, it's "Halb zehn" because they count the hour the minutes advance to, not the hour that has past. So you see, there is a conceptual difference that occurs frequently in learning German, and if you try to rush it or abbreviate it, you'll be "durcheinander" (which means "confused" or "in a jumble" and not, as a literal translation implies, "through each other").
