Sí! Estoy aprendiendo!
So I'll face the facts: Some days, the words just seem to go in one ear and out the other. Some days, I wake up and just don't feel like speaking Spanish. Actually, some mornings I don't even feel like speaking English. I'll say what needs to be said (and it's possible to get by without saying a whole lot), but please don't ask me any detailed questions.
Last Thursday, I was having one of those days. It started at breakfast with me referring to the chickens as crackers. ("Gallinas" and "galletas" do sound quite a bit alike, but I definitely knew better by this point, considering my frequent encounters with gallinas.) I was rushed that morning, and I didn't have time for coffee, which was another problem. Coffee doesn't miraculously improve my ability to speak Spanish, but it does stimulate the brain a bit and bring to the tip of my tongue the words which might otherwise lie dormant. Anyway, I walked to school, somewhat irritated by the endless road construction which made crossing the street a challenge. My first class, phonics, left me frustrated with myself for having difficulty forming questions that would usually be no problem. Next was conversation class. The topic of the week: la familia. Entonces, la tarea? Find a newspaper article about the family, read it (try to understand it), and present the information to the class. Fairly simple, but I wasn't really in the mood. I mean, I think that my article was about the deterioration of marriage and family life in Costa Rica, but my words that morning were faltering to say the least, and whatever came out of my mouth felt like a jumbled mess. There were no major crises in gramatica later that day, but I certainly didn't amaze anyone with my mastery of indirect objects.
Finally, the school day ended, and I returned home for lunch. In reflection, I realize that lunch was probably the turning point of the day. Having food in your stomach can make a world of difference, and my day improved drastically after lunch. After such a depressing morning of Spanish, I decided to devote the rest of the day to language study. Because the girls were at school, the house was fairly quiet, so I sat on the couch in the living room and spread out my books, vocab sheets, and flash cards. As I reviewed verbs, I grew a bit more encouraged. I had actually learned a lot of new verbs in one month! I added some additional words to my stack, and soon ran out of cards. Then I started flipping through the pages in my 501 Verbs book and checked off the words that I already knew (Ok, so I don't know all 14 tenses, but I know the definitions and frequently used tenses.) I realized that I knew a lot more than I had thought, and what's more, the 501 Verbs book is pretty interesting. You might even say that I began reading it "just for fun."
Later that afternoon, I enjoyed several extended conversations with my host mom, Marivel, and later with my host dad, Leo. I even carried on a brief phone conversation! Luis studied vocabulary with me in the evening, and I noticed that I actually have better pronunciation than him. (Not that this is something to really brag about. After all, he is four years old, and he'll probably surpass me in pronunciation by age five.) All in all, it was a very encouraging afternoon and evening for me, and I realized that, sí, estoy aprendiendo! Although it may not be in the leaps and bounds that I desire, I am beginning to see significant improvements in my language fluency.
The days since Thursday have been further affirmation of this fact. At a house party on Friday night, I enjoyed conversation with other Ticos and was able to clearly communicate; and what's more, not focus so much on the effort of communication, but on the people themselves. Saturday and Sunday were full of good conversations as well, at a restaurant, a theater, at church, and in my home. Perhaps one of my "problems" is becoming that as my pronunciation improves, people think that I know Spanish better than I really do--and as long as I stay on limited topics this is just great, but my real abilities (or lack of abilities) reveal themselves quickly when we come to a topic in which I have limited vocabulary. Also a rather humbling experience is watching a theater production, as I did on Saturday night. The play was called Tienen Sangre, Ahi! and subtitled, Una Familia Unida en el Delito. Those of you who know Spanish are already thinking, "Sounds a little strange, Laura." And you would be right. (The title, by the way means, "There is Blood There! A Family United in Crime.) It was an extremely strange little production somewhat on the lines--thematically speaking--of Crime and Punishment, in that it was a psychoanalytic analysis of the guilty conscience. I probably wouldn't have understood it very well in English, let alone in Spanish. Add to this the fact that the set was very minimal and that the actors were using the Vos form, which I've never studied...well, it became a bit laughable in a creepy sort of way.
Anyway, the bottom line is that there are good days and there are difficult days in this journey of language acquisition, and I would like to think that the good days will increasingly outnumber the difficult ones, but maybe it will all become relative. Even if this is the case, I can say quite confidently now that I am learning and I am enjoying communication. God will give me language in his time, and it doesn't matter ultimately whether I feel adequate or eloquent in Spanish. When he called Moses, He promised to help Moses speak and teach him what to say (Exodus 4:12). So, I claim this promise for myself and pray that God will give me his words.
Last Thursday, I was having one of those days. It started at breakfast with me referring to the chickens as crackers. ("Gallinas" and "galletas" do sound quite a bit alike, but I definitely knew better by this point, considering my frequent encounters with gallinas.) I was rushed that morning, and I didn't have time for coffee, which was another problem. Coffee doesn't miraculously improve my ability to speak Spanish, but it does stimulate the brain a bit and bring to the tip of my tongue the words which might otherwise lie dormant. Anyway, I walked to school, somewhat irritated by the endless road construction which made crossing the street a challenge. My first class, phonics, left me frustrated with myself for having difficulty forming questions that would usually be no problem. Next was conversation class. The topic of the week: la familia. Entonces, la tarea? Find a newspaper article about the family, read it (try to understand it), and present the information to the class. Fairly simple, but I wasn't really in the mood. I mean, I think that my article was about the deterioration of marriage and family life in Costa Rica, but my words that morning were faltering to say the least, and whatever came out of my mouth felt like a jumbled mess. There were no major crises in gramatica later that day, but I certainly didn't amaze anyone with my mastery of indirect objects.
Finally, the school day ended, and I returned home for lunch. In reflection, I realize that lunch was probably the turning point of the day. Having food in your stomach can make a world of difference, and my day improved drastically after lunch. After such a depressing morning of Spanish, I decided to devote the rest of the day to language study. Because the girls were at school, the house was fairly quiet, so I sat on the couch in the living room and spread out my books, vocab sheets, and flash cards. As I reviewed verbs, I grew a bit more encouraged. I had actually learned a lot of new verbs in one month! I added some additional words to my stack, and soon ran out of cards. Then I started flipping through the pages in my 501 Verbs book and checked off the words that I already knew (Ok, so I don't know all 14 tenses, but I know the definitions and frequently used tenses.) I realized that I knew a lot more than I had thought, and what's more, the 501 Verbs book is pretty interesting. You might even say that I began reading it "just for fun."
Later that afternoon, I enjoyed several extended conversations with my host mom, Marivel, and later with my host dad, Leo. I even carried on a brief phone conversation! Luis studied vocabulary with me in the evening, and I noticed that I actually have better pronunciation than him. (Not that this is something to really brag about. After all, he is four years old, and he'll probably surpass me in pronunciation by age five.) All in all, it was a very encouraging afternoon and evening for me, and I realized that, sí, estoy aprendiendo! Although it may not be in the leaps and bounds that I desire, I am beginning to see significant improvements in my language fluency.
The days since Thursday have been further affirmation of this fact. At a house party on Friday night, I enjoyed conversation with other Ticos and was able to clearly communicate; and what's more, not focus so much on the effort of communication, but on the people themselves. Saturday and Sunday were full of good conversations as well, at a restaurant, a theater, at church, and in my home. Perhaps one of my "problems" is becoming that as my pronunciation improves, people think that I know Spanish better than I really do--and as long as I stay on limited topics this is just great, but my real abilities (or lack of abilities) reveal themselves quickly when we come to a topic in which I have limited vocabulary. Also a rather humbling experience is watching a theater production, as I did on Saturday night. The play was called Tienen Sangre, Ahi! and subtitled, Una Familia Unida en el Delito. Those of you who know Spanish are already thinking, "Sounds a little strange, Laura." And you would be right. (The title, by the way means, "There is Blood There! A Family United in Crime.) It was an extremely strange little production somewhat on the lines--thematically speaking--of Crime and Punishment, in that it was a psychoanalytic analysis of the guilty conscience. I probably wouldn't have understood it very well in English, let alone in Spanish. Add to this the fact that the set was very minimal and that the actors were using the Vos form, which I've never studied...well, it became a bit laughable in a creepy sort of way.
Anyway, the bottom line is that there are good days and there are difficult days in this journey of language acquisition, and I would like to think that the good days will increasingly outnumber the difficult ones, but maybe it will all become relative. Even if this is the case, I can say quite confidently now that I am learning and I am enjoying communication. God will give me language in his time, and it doesn't matter ultimately whether I feel adequate or eloquent in Spanish. When he called Moses, He promised to help Moses speak and teach him what to say (Exodus 4:12). So, I claim this promise for myself and pray that God will give me his words.
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