Myth Buster #1

I can't tell you how many people told me, "when you get to Panama, you'll learn Spanish fast!

Myth: Spanish is easy to learn in a Spanish speaking country.

It's not. Especially in the beginning.

Granted, you do s-l-o-w-l-y learn the words to order food in a restaurant and greet people.

But that's about it. The rest is hard, arduous, time consumer work.

Let's consider the process.

First, you need to learn vocabulary. You will hear, by well meaning but ignorant people, just learn a word a day.

Forget it! There would be so many partially learned words running around in your head, you would be in a constant state of confusion.

When you first hear a word, you have to ask the speaker to repeat it at least 6 times just to get the spelling so you can pronounce it correctly. Now, you have to repeat it 30 to 50 times immediately in a futile effort to remember it. Even then, you will forget it and have to look it up a couple of times.

Now, you are at the point where you remember it and can repeat it to yourself. Like this:" what was the word for "too or also", oh ya, tambien." As you can see, you are not even close to ready to use this in a sentence or identify it when you hear it.

You move on to using it in your own sentences, about 20 to 30 times a day for a few days. The problem with this is: first you think to yourself, "I need to use tambien in a sentence," then you do. Language comes at you point blank, not proceeded by thinking.

This is not how we speak. In speaking, thoughts and words flow instantaneously out of our mouth. At this point, you may use the word in a sentence every 5th to 10th time you have the opportunity to use it. Not much yet.

Eventually, the word integrates into your mind and vocabulary.

But you see how much time and effort it takes to just learn one word!

There is a little magic from time to time. I was learning the word for breakfast, desayuno, a real bitch. I had been working on it for a couple of weeks. Now, I only have to pause a little before I use it. Now the magic. The word for dinner, cena, just popped out of my mouth and I didn't even try to learn it. A gift! I need more gifts.

Thank God for a free one every now and then.

And, you can't speak, hear or read by just knowing vocabulary. You have to understand how the language is constructed.

Now on to verbs. What a bitch!

You have to at least know the present, past and future tenses. Each tense has 5 different words in the conjugation, multiplied by the three tenses. You have to know 15 words for one verb. And this does not include some tenses that are important like the declarative tense, used a lot.

Verbs are really hard to master.

For most people, learning a new language is a big task. Many of the gringos down here gave up. They studied for months or even a couple of years, and can't make enough progress to keep going. So they quit.

I don't want to quit. We both are committed to learning the language. It's the only way to fully appreciate the country, and enjoy it.

Now to the good part. (As you may remember, I am going to share the good part so you don't think I hate it down here)

Success is so sweet! When you understand a sentence or one pops out of your mouth, it is a thrill.

Someone said, "If it's easy, it isn't worth doing."

I agree. Learning Spanish is a task worth doing. The benefits are enormous...integration into a culture, Panamanian friends, easy of living by being able to communicate.

I am also hoping it will ward off Alzheimer's or whatever is happening to me, I forget.

Believe it or not, I enjoy it. I just want you to know how hard we are working down here!

And, I just had to bust the myth. It's my job!