Silent Spanish.

"I listen to the space between the words others speak. I live in the silence where knowing dwells. I make room for life by creating stillness." - author unknown (but I found it in a little book of meditations that is always buried in the bottom of J's backpack.)

Hmm, how to create stillness when we move every few weeks - if not every day in a van that's not exactly a smooth and quiet ride. That'll be the challenge of the day.

43 days here before another RI tour. I've been here, I don't know how many days, but in total over a year. And here's a secret - I'm not fluent in Spanish (although I am an expert at Spanglish ; ) Some people pop on over to a country and the language seems to seep into their body while they sleep, in a matter of months words flowing eloquently out of their mouth, not a misunderstanding to be found. That's definitely NOT my story.

 I tried to take a Spanish class here, but I gave up after the third time my teacher left in the middle of class to go buy a Coca-Cola across the street, leaving me to "practice" with the only other person in the room - a dude from England who had such a think accent I couldn't even understand his English, let alone Spanish. And the first time she picked up her phone to chat with her friend in the middle of class, I thought positively and tried to justify it as "authentic-learning material". But then when I wasn't learning squat and my money was a-flowing out the door I decided to cut my losses and try the more lossey-goosey way of learning...hit the town and learn from the locals.

Turns out locals have really bad Spanish (well really bad Spanish for learning Spanish.) I mean, they all understand each other, but my scatterbrained mind just wasn't getting it. I did however learn all the swear words in all of maybe a week. Proof that repetition is the best way to learn. But all the other Spanish that isn't a swear word- when you don't know enough to sort out the jargon from the Spanish and decipher the tense from the verb endings with no hint of a pronoun, it's hard, like really hard.

Ok, so I needed a little order. I wanted verb charts and study sheets and vocabulary lists. I wanted to get homework, turn it in and then get it back covered in red ink. That's how I learn - showing my mistakes to the world. I learn a lot from my mess-ups, which makes me realize that old teacher saying of "there's no such thing as a mistake" is right in my case anyway.

So I went to the library. I checked out their Spanish books and started trying. And then after a few days of hardcore studying, I would get sidetracked by life, forget the routine and then have to return the library books anyway. So now I'm on about the millionth cycle of this and hoping maybe this time I can just stick with it. My not-orderly, but ever desperately wanting to be orderly mind made a calendar with a chart - what I will learn each day until coming back to RI where I'll probably forget everything in the three weeks I'm there before returning to Spain again. Here's to hoping I have my great-grandma's genes and I too live to be 104. I think I'll need it.

I should say last August I had a little glory moment where somehow my Spanish muse came, sneaked into my brain when I wasn't looking and somehow managed to eloquently debate, argue, and persuade (in Spanish) with the Immigration Officials to give me my gosh-darn residence permit that they were 3 months late in giving me. I was so proud. And so shocked. I had no idea there was such a repertoire of Spanish hiding somewhere inside. And then again,  I spoke really good Spanish (I thought anyway) when living in a little village full of French people who had beautiful accents and mixed in their "oui's" with a little Galego Spanish and then some Castellano Spanish too. Somehow that combination really worked for me. The second best is the Frenchy-Spanish over here in Catalonia. Somehow I understand them too. Now if only my Spanish muse would return and then I could have a really lovely conversation in say- Castilla La Mancha.

Sometime last year in my anguish over learning another language I made a little list of things that help a second language learner (or third or fourth or fifth language.) Maybe you want to know them. Maybe there is someone in your life that has a different song singing inside and they are just scrambling to keep up with the other tempo that surrounds them. So here are my tips:

1.) speak slow - I mean not so slow that it's demeaning, just not at an unmindful runaway pace.
2.) speak clearly - As in, again, be mindful because lazy, slurry, sleepy speech sounds like gobble-dee-gook. The only reason other native speakers can understand it at all is because they already know all the words in the word bank and can use process of elimination and context to figure it out - imagine trying to do a word scramble in a language you don't know and without a word bank. Exactly- it's not possible.
3.) Don't speak entirely in slang, euphamisms, and figures of speech. They mean nothing to the language learner and it's super frustrating because maybe we understand the literal meaning of the word, but it has zero context. A slang phrase here and there is fine, but just like with food, "everything in moderation."
4.) Use subject pronouns. Please. Especially if the language in question has a million different verb endings. Maybe it's easy for the native speaker to figure it out based on the ending, but for the learner; using the pronouns makes it possible to learn the connections between the endings and the subject!
5.) When I make a mistake, don't tell me what I did wrong by repeating the mistake - it pisses me off and I don't learn squat. Instead repeat back to me the correct way of saying what it was I was trying so hard to express.
6.) Be patient, really listen and help naturally fill in the words I'm stuck on so that the conversation can flow. I learn more this way and the whole experience is a tons more enjoyable for both parties.
7.) Smile - as in control your facial muscles in a positive way. I'm trying here. I get you might be confused, but so am I and a distorted/judgemental face does nothing to calm the stiuation and create the environment condusive to a lovely interchange. A question face is fine - just as long as it's a friendly one.
8.)Use the same questions, words and phrases repeatedly. There's a reason why the swear words are what I'm fluent in right now! If only we repeated verbs and adjectives and adverbs as repeatedly and I'd be a regular Miguel de Cervantes (he wrote Don Quixote).
9.) When having a conversation treat it just like a really good novel - help set the stage so to speak. Give context. It helps if you speak slow in the beginning of a conversation (or each time you change a topic within a conversation) so that I kind of get the big picture. And well the three R's are helpful here too - Reduce, Reuse, Recycle! Oh an if there are others in the conversation too be aware that speaking with more than one person is super duper hard - so be a good role model and set a good example. If chatty Cathy is talking a million miles a minute, ask her questions to clarify which will slow her down and help me to catch up.
10.) When you use big or new words, pair them with their more simple synonyms so I can learn. I don't necessarily need the word translated - because I am smart after all, if you use other words within the language that are simpler to describe I bet I'll get it and learn so much more in the process.
11.) And lastly - always speak the language with me. Don't fall back on my native language - I won't learn anything that way. 

Well that's my two cents. My two cents for an adult perspective. If the language learner is a child I'd suggest smile more, sing more, laugh (in a good way) more, tell more stories and give them space and time to play and figure it out. Or then again, maybe that's exactly what us adults need too. I'm remembering a little boy that knew Spanish and was learning English in our school. To witness his process was amazing. I think of him often now and try to do what he did. He watched a lot. He was quiet at first, absorbing everything. He said "Ms. Sam, can you button my pants?" about 3 times before I had any idea of what he was talking about and then another two weeks worth of school before what he was asking really sounded in English what he was trying to say. He didn't give up. He opened his mouth  and let escape whatever came out. He repeated himself unfalteringly, never seeming bothered by the fact that I was slow at understanding him. He taught patience, humbleness, courage, and drive. And I'll never forget that smile and twinkle in his eyes the very first time I understood the first time. Those twinkling eyes showed everything - we clicked, we communicated, we got each other. He said it and I understood it. It was the "YES! Whatever came out of my mouth this lady finally understood! Alright!" moment. I don't know who was prouder, him or me. I was grateful in that moment for the open-ended assessment system we used in the classroom because this was a milestone that definitely couldn't be documented in a simple flow-chart multiple choice system. This was way more than that. And one of these days I'll feel that understood in Spanish. Hopefully sooner rather than later because I don't know if I have the perseverance that is naturally built into a 4 year old.