Whew. I had my first Spanish test for this term, today. While studying for it, I wanted to look up a word in the sentence, 'Había salido con mi amigo que estaba con su novia y yo estaba viajando en la parte de atrás del auto.' The word I wanted to search was 'salido', and this is what I found in an online Spanish-English dictionary — see words circled in blue:
Interesting. Before you ask what kind of Spanish I am studying, the full translation of the sentence is, "I had left with my friend who was with his girlfriend and I was traveling in the back of the car." 'Salido' is the past participle of 'salir' which means to 'to leave'. Who knew it is also the Spanish word for "horny bugger'.
Ayer, en la clase de español, mi maestra nos pidió que la lista de las frases siguientes en orden de importancia:
Saber pilotar una avioneta Saber mās que una enciclopedia Ser rico Ser "mās" guapo Acabar con todos las guerras del munda Saber si Dios existe Encontrar el amor de tu vida Ser invisible Ser inmortal
My friend Dave listens to Spanish radio to help improve his Spanish. I tried that but like with most pop music stations, I cannot deal with the DJs' shouting and drivel - especially drivel I can barely understand. I've decided to watch Spanish movies and listen to Spanish songs instead. This Caetano Veloso song is in an album of his that I own - Antologia 67/03. Unfortunately, I left the CD sleeve back in Singapore so I can't read the lyrics as I listen to his songs. Thank goodness for Google - found the lyrics and the translation below by Genève Gil. It's not a line-by-line translation but it's all there. You can read it as you listen to the song - it's completely charming.
My Spanish exam is finally over. Learning a new language is much more difficult than I thought it would be. I enjoy the classes and I am happy with my professor because he spends a considerable amount of time not only talking grammar, but sharing the stories of various countries in South America, their culture and the kaleidoscope of personalities who are part of their history. Of course my professor speaks exclusively in Spanish in class - I am often flipping pages of my dictionary, scrambling to make out the meanings of words that I do not know.
Perhaps it would have helped if the two languages I already speak - my mother tongue, Malay, and English, conjugate their verbs. Then maybe, I would not be struggling to remember the twenty or more mutations of each word. Sometimes, when I stare at the verbs, the words on the pages become little worms, changing their shapes everytime I mentally shout out a different tense - "Be Imperfect tense! Now Preterite! Then Subjunctive in the singular first-person!" The worms wiggle to form the right verbs. They look so funny! How silly, but it is how I cope.
I am making excuses. What is really slowing my progress is fear. I tell myself that I will only say something in Spanish when I can string together a grammatically perfect sentence. Why? Because I am afraid of sounding stupid and have everyone laugh at me. But as a beginner, that perfection is hard to come by except for very simple sentences. So this fear holds me back. I don't talk, I don't practice, I don't become fluent. My five year-old nephew made me aware of this. He started with Malay and has been learning English in school for about one-and-a half years. During our long-distance phone calls, he chatters away in English, mistakes and mispronunciations and all. But he is blissfully unaware, and so everytime we talk, I hear his English improving. Oh, I so admire his courage. I look up to his three-and-a-half foot person when it comes to learning a new language.
So that is my new resolve - speak more Spanish! I posted the video of the Coca-Cola advertisement above because it's so poignant, and it feels good that I understood all that is written and part of what is said. It's a long way off, but I am looking forward to being able to watch a Spanish movie without subtitles.
