Learning Spanish, Very Slowly
11. Jul, 2008 
9 Comments
This morning I was riding on the back of the vespa with my husband. It’s 80 degrees out, I’m wearing a summer dress, tucked behind my knees as we ride, and my hair is loose under my helmet. I’ve gotten comfortable being on a vespa again, and sit relaxed behind Drew, holding my skirt around my knees. Drew has adapted as well, cutting around cars and taking advantage of the vespa’s small size and speed. We just purchased our local cell phones (prepago or prepaid) from Movistar, which we originally had thought was a movie rental place, but apparently having a cell phone makes you famous.
I’ve been practicing my Spanish with locals in casual language exchanges, called intercambios. I met one person in particular (who speaks English so well, I’m not sure why he needs my help) that has been helping me unlock some keys to pronouncing Spanish correctly. I have to exaggerate my vowel sounds and open my mouth more. If feels a little silly, but in English we practically mumble compared to the Spanish: barely moving our jaws, closed mouthed and dropping the ends of words. In Spanish, a lost syllable changes the meaning completely– it could be a different word, tense or subject based on how the word ends.
I’ve been teaching him too: the reason you get out of a car and off a train, but never visa versa. Get off the car, makes me think someone is standing on it. Get out the train, makes me think you have a small train in your pocket. I didn’t realize English was so complicated, but I’m glad I have something to offer.
The truth is, I thought my Spanish was pretty good, even advanced intermediate. Now that I am here, I know I’m closer to beginner intermediate. There is only thing I want to be able to do: Think in Spanish. That is my goal for this summer.
This morning, I came a little closer. As the vespa rounded the street near our apartment, I thought, “we are here!” with a bit of surprise because I hadn’t been paying attention. In the same moment I said, “Estamos aquí”. I didn’t translate. I didn’t mean to say it in Spanish. I was just telling Drew something and it just came out. I stopped for a second to check if it was correct, if I had used the right verb and tense. I did. It felt good.
I’m off now for another intercambio, and then this weekend I’ll be flying to Paris for a few days. I’ll be posting reports from France, so stay tuned. Have a great weekend!
Photo: Bjaglin
Sounds like you’re making good progress and making a strong effort to learn, which is always the most important thing. When you begin to dream in Spanish, then you’ll know that you’ve really got it down!
Have fun in Paris.
Theresas last blog post..A Pain in the Arm…and the Wallet
this post made me so happy (which means even more bc for the second week in a row i am sitting in immigration all day). this process of language acquisition you describe so well is beautiful… it is so precious. when i started forgetting whether iwas thinking in spanish or english i knew i had finally gotten it.
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Hablas espanol muy bien. En tiempo, hablabas espanol perfecto!
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It is a slow process. I have days where it seems like I am virtually a native speaker and other days where Spanish seems as foreign as Tagalog. Keep trying; it definitely gets easier.
Vanessas last blog post..My feature in the Blogger Neighborhood
Theresa: That would be a amazing. I can’t wait.
Julie: Thanks! I am really enjoying the process, too. I agree there is something very beautiful about it, and I tried to express that, but I always feel like I fail at perfectly describing the sense of wonder and beauty in it.
Matt: LOL. Um, should I mention ‘hablabas’ is in the past tense? (Maybe I know spanish better than I think). Oh no! I’m becoming a spanish nerd!
Vanessa: Thanks! I look forward to it! I know this is all normal, but it’s still very interesting to me…
Hey! Glad to see you’re on the road! I’ve been doing some travelling of my own and have been a bit lazy with the ol’ blog reading. Learning Spanish is on my endless to do list so I’ll be interested in how it all goes for you. I had given up any hope of learning Mandarin but have had a second wind on this trip and am learning a few things from Chinese friends. Languages are tough!
I love the visual and it sounds like you are making very good progress. English is a VERY complicated language. I think about homonyms like their and there and how to explain it to someone that doesn’t speak the language.
Good luck!
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Christine-
Don’t give up! And, just to be sure that we are all on the same uncomfortable page of trying to speak a second language for the first time, correctly, let me tell you how incorrectly I managed to speak at first when I was in Spain…
The doorbell of my Spanish apartment in Madrid rang, I answered by saying, “Si??” as they do in Spain, and then a man starting talking very quickly/ nervously to me. I opened the door, and sure enough he continued speaking a mile a minute, and the only thing I could make sense of was the package he was holding in his hand, and the letter he was showing me, with a man’s name whom did not live in our apartment. Instead of taking a second to think of what I wanted to say to this man, in Spanish, because I clearly HAD to speak Spanish to him, not English, (I was in Spain after all) I chose to conjugate the only verb I could think of, the verb tener. I told the man, in Spanish, “We don’t have him.” I said it again, this time, “I don’t have him.” I repeated it to this man, as if it made sense. I could gather from the look on his face that I did NOT know what I was talking about, so he left.
I immediately closed the door, and thought to myself, “What on earth did I just say?!?!?!”
Hope that gives you some inspiration to stick with those intercambios! Obviously it is working if you are subconsciously thinking in Spanish- great job!!
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