Author: Keegan and Steve
Hola ¿Qué tal? That means, hi, how are you, in Spanish. As all may know we are now officially in España (Spain in Spanish). We took some Spanish classes and for me they were difficult. But for my dad he already knows Spanish pretty well because his parents would speak to him in Spanish when he grew up. Kendal, she should know Spanish because she took Spanish for two years in 7th and 8th grade but . . . she didn’t talk it much in 7th and 8th grade so she learned that speaking it is even harder. My mom she knows Spanish (she took lots of classes growing up) but she just doesn’t like to speak it. Even though my dad knows Spanish pretty well he didn’t teach me Spanish as a kid, why he didn’t I DON’T KNOW! I probably would have done a lot better in this class so I guess I will blame my bad performance on my dad . . . no offense. I wanted to learn . . . más o menos (more or less) and my dad said I did learn but I don’t think I did. My mom told me we are going to keep learning on our own and keep doing study sessions at Starbucks in the city center (after class we would go for a tapas lunch and then go to Starbucks to do our homework, it’s a really cool area). My mom says that when I take Spanish class back home I should do well because of this class . . . we’ll see. My Spanish teacher was pretty awesome his name was Juan Carlos and we played some Spanish games with him to help us learn Spanish. We also learned that he doesn’t live far from us in Triana. Thank you Juan Carlos!
Here we are with our teacher Juan Carlos
View from our Starbucks study-hall window - they play cool American Christmas music
We finished our week of initial Spanish classes and it went well. Kendal and Keegan definitely learned a lot and for Amy, because she was in that class with the kids, it was a great refresher course for her.
I took one Spanish class in 8th grade and most the kids in the school I went to spoke Spanish so I don’t recall learning much grammatically . . . let’s just say there was a lot of scary distractions in that school. What I remember the most is strategically figuring out ways to make it through that class, not to mention everyday, without getting my butt kicked. Surprisingly, Spanish was not offered in my High School. When I went to college my mother strongly recommended I take a Spanish entrance test “NO SEAS TONTO, TAKE THE STUPID TEST!!” and somehow I tested out of a number of classes (great money savings). I ended up in a conversational class with a buddy, it was a long Thursday night class, we laughed from beginning to end every Thursday before heading out for a night of college camaraderie (ahhh the good old days). So, not much to show for my classroom Spanish education and grammatically . . . I’d say I stink. Jumping in this class, which was in chapter 7, (some students are here for up to 10 weeks) I felt over my head. Four hours everyday was . . . suficiente para mi cabeza! One of the main benefits of such a small class is that you are forced to learn, your involvement is not a choice. The little I know I completely owe to my parents who spoke Spanish to me growing up, I am so grateful for that . . . and yes, I definitely wish I would have responded in Spanish. I hope to have that same determination to speak to my own kids in Spanish which is easier said that done. The class consisted of 6 other students with various backgrounds – all interesting stories. We were all happy with our classes and for the next 5 weeks we will just keep trying to get better by getting out there and talking to people.
This is the inside of our school - it was a very Spanish building
Here is my class - it was a great diverse group that allowed for interesting dialogue with very different yet similar opinions of current world events. We had a student from Japan majoring in Spanish; a retired professional from Italy; a linguist from the UK that just returned from Afghanistan; a clinical psychologist from the US; a South Korean student spending a year in Spain to learn spanish, a retired French military helicopter pilot and me. I was very lucky to have had the opportunity to spent so much time with each of them that week.
Journey For 4 