I would love to have a chance to speak SPANISH with someone here in the US or Spain, or whereever.. Since I have international calling MCI it would not cost me an arm or leg to call and talk. My problem is not being able to speak, since I am limited with my speaking I always feel very stupid when I am with friends in Madrid and then I rather speak English or German. Most everybody also thinks that I speak the lanugage well, well I dont. Anybody game? Mecky :o

Hi mecky! Yours is a common problem... for those who care about it. "Feeling stupid" is normal and should be taken seriously and used as incentive to LEARN more Spanish (or whatever language) - don't let it scare you away though.

We ALL feel/felt this way as we were learning another language.. I remember my first trip to Madrid in 1995 and I sat down with my ladyfriend's sister and she was asking me directly what kind of sightseeing I had done that day. My ladyfriend tried to interrupt and help as I was fumbling through words and incorrect conjugation, but the sister wouldn't allow it, saying, "He has to learn by making mistakes", which is totally true.

Those with whom you speak MUST feel comfortable to correct you when you make mistakes. I tell everyone to do this and it helps a lot. Sure, we cannot stop a conversation at every point we aren't understood because it would be impossible, but from time to time it's necessary to learn.

Another short (??) but GOOD story, in 1998 when me and my ladyfriend went to Sevilla (specifically, Alcalá de Guadaíra ) for Semana Santa, we stayed in the house of her aunt there and we were all sitting down and talking. The aunt was speaking VERY quickly and I wasn't understanding much, also because of her Andalú (I suppose). My ladyfriend suggested to her that she slow down so I could better understand. The aunt said, plainly, "¡Oye! El es extranjero. No es tonto." This means, "Listen. He's foreign. He's not silly/stupid!"

Many people who have no experience or education in knowing/learning another language really don't understand this learning curve. Fact is, if you don't understand a language or are misunderstood often, depending on with whom you're speaking, you WILL look less than intelligent. Again, it depends on the listener.

As I said above, this is GREAT incentive to learn more and faster and I truly hope you can find someone with whom to speak. Best way, of course, is to GO someplace if possible.. and this is usually NOT possible most of the time. I find I learn A LOT more and faster during the short stays in Spain than I do sitting at home studying books or reading Spanish newspapers (but these things help a lot in vocabulary!).

(added) By the way, you didn't mention above, but have you ever taken any classes in Spanish? It's essential to at least have a base knowledge on pronunciation and basic verb conjugation. I've taken free classes here in Columbus before, Adult Learning Classes... sometimes sponsored by universities or churches or other non-profit organisations.

Best of luck to you! Saludos, MadridMan

[ 01-05-2002: Message edited by: MadridMan ]

I could't agree more with MadridMan.

Learning languages is very tough. The last time I had the chance to speak in english before the MadridMan party v3.0 was 5 years ago in my english classes in the college. I'm able to write and read in english quite fast, but when I tried to speak in MM party I realized that I lacked the fluency I had years ago. When you stop speaking a language you loose fluency in it, but you can recover it fastly when you start speaking it again.

To be honest, MM speak spanish very well, almost without accent, not fluently, but very understandable. Shawn had both a good accent (very slight) and fluency. It was easy to speak with them in spanish (though as it is normal sometimes I had to repeat sentences, speak slower, or switch to english). The key is having people with which to feel comfortable, and who understand that not everyone speak their language (Britain is disgusting in that sense, everyone thinks that you should know english by birth, and when you say something they often make as if they didn't understand it, and then repeat it making a remark on the accent... "Oh you meant Rooooooyaaaal Squaaaareeee" making you feel as stupid as they can... ).

Hey MadridMan, your ladyfriend was very kind, you are very lucky And her english was quite good (or at least I could understand her very well, perhaps the reason is we have the same accent).

Fernando

[ 01-05-2002: Message edited by: MadridMan ]

Hey all! I have studied/spoken Spanish since I was 11 years old (I am headed for 34 in a couple of weeks). I have traveled to Spain and Venezuela NUMEROUS times (now live in Spain). I speak with my husband only in Spanish (HE doesn´t speak English ). I have many Spanish speaking friends, in the US and other countries.

The long and the short of it...one would think that by now my Spanish would be PERFECT. Well, guess what, it isn´t. I still mess up on the gender endings and occasionally use an incorrect verb tense. And on really bad days, (or when I am REALLY tired), I will say something and my husband will look at me quizzically and say "¿me lo puedes decir en Cristiano por favor?".

Learning a second language is a tremendous feat and it cannot be done overnight. Some people can learn faster than others, others may be able to express themselves perfectly but never get rid of their accent. As an adult, I have studied both Italian and German and had to constantly remind myself that I wasn´t born speaking English or Spanish, that they were both skills that were acquired...and such acquisition skills would be needed for the Italian and German.

Take your time, don´t get frustrated, just get practice.

I´d like to share a quote that was said to me just before I headed off to Spain to study my junior year in college... "if you hear a person speaking to you in imperfect English (or Spanish, or fill in the language) or with a foreign accent, it doesn´t mean that they are less intelligent or less educated than you are, what it means is that they speak one more language than you do".

So, chin up! get the practice and go for it...simple thing that you can do while in the US? Find online chats in Spanish (I like using MS Netmeeting) and find someone who is interested in practicing their English.

Good luck!

Thanks for the kind words Fernando, and your spoken English is quite good and it is even more amazing that you have had little opportunity to practise over the last five years!

One of the most challenging things to learn for me, and I suppose many others, is understanding the slight nuiasnces that differentiate closely related words. I encounter problems from time to time where I know multiple words for the same occurance, but I say the word that is in disuse or is considered overly didactic. Last night for example, I used "quebrar" and was subseqeuntly advised politely by Paloma and Antonio that that "romper" is in popular use and that "quebrar" sound somewhat stilted to describe a broken telephone reciever. But, it is through these real life lessons that fluency is obtained.

Do any of you board members have any experiences with learning Spanish in Central America, particularly Panama? I know the dialect there is somewhat unique but if you study at a certified language school are you learning Castillian?My compliments to you,Fernando, also. Your sentence structure is very good in writing and you seem very contemporary in your way of expressing certain somewhat colloquial comments.

Hi Mecky! After taking Spanish for many years in college and working in a Spanish speaking environment, the best advice I can give to you is to swallow your pride and allow yourself to make mistakes when speaking or you will never truly be fluent.

I regret so much feeling stupid about speaking my first couple years in college. I was so afraid that I would say something incorrectly that I barely ever volunteered anything in a conversation. It was a wake up call when I began to see other americans I worked with learning great conversational spanish without any schooling just because they weren't afraid to jump in and give it a try. Once I let my inhibitions and (pride) go, it became alot easier to learn.

If you ever want to practice writing in Spanish feel free to e-mail.

Buena Suerte!

Well first of all thanks to all for the encouragement. Imagine what kind of accent this will be: Me speaking Spanish with a southern american drawl and overtures of German in the accent. Madridman I agree, I do need total immersion, but then my husband thinks my english is excellent and what else do I need more. I did actually do pretty good while I was in Madrid last February, ask Puna she was with me. But then none of these people knew me so it did not matter to me. and everybody was so nice to me. I do teach conversational German here at the Community College and I have taken basic courses in Spanish. However I lack the discipline to study the Grammar and really just want to talk (Total Immersion) Your encouragement means a lot to me and I will call one of the boardmembers tomorrow in Spain to practice my speaking. How super. Just maybe I will then get up the nerve to speak to one of my friends here in my town that is actually returning tomorrow from Madrid. Well I am going to jump into speaking Spanish tomorrow, promise and that will be to any one of my Spanish Friends. Well Amigos Muchas Gracias, and then help me. Mecky