It’s all still very much a work in progress…

Coffee and lingo…

Saturday morning and I have arranged to meet up with one of my language exchange friends for coffee. She has very good English as a result of many years of language exchange with English visitors and teachers who have come and gone again. She has been attempting to help me with my Spanish since I arrived, and I have to say, she has an awful lot of patience.

She likes to concentrate on specific verbs each time and stresses the importance of each one with sentence examples. I am always exhausted at the end of our conversations along with being frustrated with myself that I am finding it so difficult to pick this up and learn.

Concentrate!

It also doesn’t help that I am on par with my 8-year-old students at times! My attention span dips and I seem to focus elsewhere. I find myself earwigging other people’s conversations (not that I know what they’re chatting or gossiping about!).

Or, I just find myself wondering with general people watching, like the Spanish fashion. I have noticed that the majority of Spanish women are pristine. Not a hair out of place. There doesn’t seem to be any particular fashion trend, apart from teenage girls in ripped jeans. But Spanish women appear to pull it off with the trends and colours they have put together well. My friend catches me sometimes as she turns to say something or to explain one of the examples from one of the sentences she has written and snaps my attention back to where it should be! Oops!

But, I have been here a couple of months now, and although I don’t feel confident in starting or holding a conversation in Spanish I came here only knowing; hola (hello), Por favor (please), no, Si  (yes) and lo siento (sorry). I am finding though, that the more I listen to Spaniards’ conversations the more I seem to be recognising certain words and getting the gist of what they are talking about. But, I also fear that this will get me into a lot of bother one day, especially as I must make it obvious that I am earwigging!  I am one of those people that has to look at the person talking. I feed off of people’s facial expressions when I am having a conversation with someone. It’s one of the reasons I hate talking on the phone! I fear I will either have to deal with an angry Spaniard with my nosiness one day, or I will end up hearing something that I really don’t want or need to hear!

Starting to get to grips…

But, on the one hand, at least it means I am recognising more words and have extended my Spanish vocabulary! Even if it is only a teeny tiny bit! But, my earwigging seems to be paying off and I have picked up more and I’m using more words in general day-to-day interactions with other people. For example; adios (bye), agua (water) and its pronunciation, as I first said this with a ‘q’ instead of the ‘g’, which was quickly corrected by my language exchange friend! Hasta manana (see you tomorrow), manana (tomorrow), how are you (¿Cómo estás?), buen gracias (I’m good thanks, very good (muy bien) and buenos dias/tardes/noches (good morning/afternoon/evening).

So my next step is to develop the confidence in using these to speak in sentences and hold a conversation. My housemates, who are Spanish, with one being fluent in English and the other having some level of English (a lot more so than my level of Spanish anyhow!) almost refuse to speak to me in English. They tell me that I must learn the language. And they’re right of course! I am living in Spain, and it’s one of the reasons why I’m here! To immerse myself. But, at the moment, they end up having to explain themselves in English when I am at a loss with what they are trying to get across. Made obvious, I’m sure, by that confused gormless look on my face. Where other people must think -‘ for goodness sake, is she really an educator?!’

Can’t help feeling like I’m going backwards…

On this particular occasion, having returned from coffee, it was to ask when I was going to get around to cleaning the bathroom, as it was my turn. But coffee and croissants just happened to be more appealing before tackling that chore I’m afraid! There are moments when I think my below basic Spanish isn’t so bad. Saves on upset and arguments at times! But saying that, house sharing isn’t so bad, well not as bad as I thought it would be anyhow!

When I first moved here I was keen to find somewhere on my own, as I quite like my own space and I had already lived on my own in England for a few years. I like coming home from work and shutting the door on the world for a while in my own private space. But having researched and looked around and having done the sums, living on my own would have worked out too expensive. I hadn’t house shared since I was a student. I’m still very good friends with my uni housemates, so I’m taking that as a sign house sharing has been successful in the past!

Nonetheless, I was quite nervous and a bit put out at first. It felt like I was taking a massive step back after living on my own and being independent for so long. However, I think I have found some good housemates and friends here. We appear to get on well. We do our own thing with work and other friends, and respect each other’s space as best we can. But we also get along, which is the main thing. We’ll watch a film, have a Chinese or go for a drink. They are both pretty local too, so have been showing me the sites with walks around the city, day trips and a weekend to the beach. They’ve shown me places that I probably wouldn’t have discovered on my own here. So I’m grateful and feel more settled and at home even. But I still can’t help but miss living on my own at times!