Learning a new language is not easy!

July 24, 2008: Speaking and Conversing in Spanish

            Listening, understanding and speaking in Spanish are very tiring for me. Occasionally, I find myself understanding without a lot of effort and some people are easier to understand than others. But often times I concentrate and try to grasp onto a few words here and there that I know and then interpret the rest, but it doesn’t always make sense. I struggle tremendously with trying to form correct sentences. It is very exhausting.  I search my mind trying to figure out how to say what I want to say and say it correctly. I feel like my mind is going a million miles a minute trying to search for the right verb and the right tense.  I mix up my past and future in my responses to others.

Shopping is pretty easy though. I can do numbers and ask shopping-type questions in the present tense. But for the most part, it is a struggle getting across what I want to say. Often what I really wanted to say goes unsaid. I just make do with what was understood, of what I did manage to say. I can understand some of what I read, if it is familiar words, but the health, plant and words that may not be taught in an American Spanish class make it a little difficult.