tención: The opinion described in the article is subjective, it is a personal view of things. Every person has a different ability to learn languages, like any other activity.
Before moving to Spain, I had little experience in learning foreign languages. I have only been relatively successful in studying Business English at university. And even it was safely forgotten for a couple of years as unnecessary. At the age of 29, fate threw me to Spain, where I began to learn a completely new language for me.
Everything that I read on the Internet on the forums living in Spain six months before moving:
- Spanish is a very easy language.
- In three months, you can learn to speak fluently without even learning the language.
- The Spaniards will be happy to help you when they see that you are trying to learn their language.
- Simple grammar and the like.
As it turned out, many statements do not correspond to the real state of affairs at all. Read more about all this under the cut.
How I Prepared to Learn Spanish
Since we were preparing for the move in advance, I decided to master the basics of Spanish, with the help of a video on YouTube from Polyglot. I quickly looked through them: I remembered no more than 10 words and the principles of declension of simple verbs in the present tense. Ignorance did not bother me, because I was waiting in Spain for language courses for people like me.
When you start learning Spanish, it seems that things are not so bad, even for those who have problems with the humanities. Already two weeks after the start of training, I could at least explain myself with the teacher on household and educational issues. But after two months it became clear that I was happy early.
Main problem: tenses in Spanish
In Spanish, there are 14 to 18 times, seven of which are complex compounds. All this wealth is conjugated in 4 moods: imperative, subjunctive, conditional and indicative.
Indicative:
- Presente de Indicativo;
- Pretérito Indefinido;
- Pretérito Imperfecto de Indicativo;
- Pretérito Perfecto de Indicativo;
- Pretérito Pluscuamperfecto de Indicativo;
- Pretérito Anterior de Indicativo;
- Futuro Simple de Indicativo;
- Futuro Perfecto de Indicativo.
Imperative mood:
- Imperativo Afirmativo;
- Imperativo Negativo.
Conditional mood:
- Condicional Simple;
- Condicional Perfecto.
Subjunctive mood:
- Presente de Subjuntivo;
- Pretérito Imperfecto de Subjuntivo;
- Pretérito Perfecto de Subjuntivo;
- Pretérito Pluscuamperfecto de Subjuntivo;
- Futuro Simple de Subjuntivo;
- Futuro Perfecto de Subjuntivo.
If we compare it with the Russian language, then in the great and mighty, researchers distinguish from 10 to 16 times. But three main forms are most often used: future, past and present. In Spanish, all tenses are actively used with the exception of two that can only be seen in official documents - Futuro Simple de Subjuntivo and Futuro Perfecto de Subjuntivo.
Those who study Spanish have a minimum of 12 times to master, most of which I did not even know existed. Is it possible not to torture yourself and talk using three simple tenses? Yes, and you will most likely be understood. But whether you understand what they will answer you is another question. It is definitely not enough to use only simple tenses in spoken Spanish. If a person wants to integrate into Spanish society, find a job or plans to study.
In my plan, before moving, there were two main points: to study the language for six months and immediately after the courses to start studying at the university, at the same time pulling up Spanish. Within two months after moving, I realized that my plan was scattered to dust. Without amazing inclinations to grasp foreign words on the fly and memorize them the first time, there is no chance of learning to speak Spanish passably in six months. Therefore, having buried my hopes, I signed up for an additional seven-month course and at the same time hired a tutor for 2-3 hours a week.
In the first six months, it took me 5 to 7 hours a day to study with homework. After I signed up for a new course and began to study additionally with a teacher, I started to learn Spanish up to 10 hours every day. It was a complete immersion and a crazy pace of study. Despite my best efforts, it took me six months to start talking to people on the street.
Subjunctive mood and other features
And at that moment, our group moved on to the study of the subjunctive mood. From the very first lesson, it became clear that we must forget everything that we had learned before and start learning again with subjuntivo in mind. There is also a subjunctive mood in Russian, but in a very simple form - for example, "I would go to the cinema with you, but I will be busy." It is this “would” that forms a certain modality of the verb, that is, it indicates the emotions and desires of the speaker.
The Spaniards are very emotional people, they have the subjunctive mood in any conversation and almost all times. It is rather difficult for a Russian-speaking person to understand the principle and logic of the rules of its use. For example, my friend from Italy did not even have to learn anything, because the approach is similar in Italian. And I still rack my brains before saying something in the subjunctive mood.
And to close the topic with Spanish verbs, I can only say that they are inclined by faces and numbers, as in Russian. For example, the simple verb “comer” (from Spanish for “is”) will conjugate as follows in all tenses:
It looks intimidating, but this is a simple verb that usually has no problem. Conjugation rules are rarely difficult, unless it is about irregular verbs. But there are few of them, and they often change according to certain principles that are easy to remember.
If we talk about Spanish syntax and phonetics, then here I can say, I had a rest. There are few rules, and they are mastered in the learning process by themselves. In most cases, words are read exactly the same as they are written, with the exception of a couple of rules. For example, the sound h is not pronounced - you just need to skip this letter in the word (why then is it needed?). "LL" is always read not as a double "l", but as "d". As you can see, such exceptions are easy to remember.
The word order in Spanish sentences is simple, and there will be no problems with it either. In some fiction books, especially by Spanish authors of the middle of the last century, very long sentences with a huge number of adjectives and adverbs are often found. It happens that by the end of a sentence you already forget what was there at the beginning.
For me, the Spanish language has become not as flexible as it might seem at first glance. I admit that someone will overcome the language barrier earlier, but I could not bring myself to speak, knowing that I was doing it wrong.
Spanish in Andalusia
Even though some Spaniards sincerely helped me in my studies, this often caused additional difficulties. And all because it is desirable to learn Castilian Spanish at the same time as the dialect that is common in the province where you live.
I am in Andalusia, where Spanish has taken on a special form. I call her lovingly "village". Imagine a distant Russian village where people say "einy" and prefer to talk to each other very loudly, raising the tone at the end of each phrase: "Lyudk, did you give the pigs ?!" Something like this is said here. Because of this feature and the manner of pronunciation of words by the inhabitants of Andalusia, for a long time I could not start to communicate in Spanish.
It is difficult to convey that despondency when, after a language course, you go out into the street and cannot make out almost anything among the mash of sounds and words. And it's not even about the specific slang that is in Andalusia and which is not in dictionaries, but in the manner of pronouncing words, swallowing endings, abbreviations and the very high speed with which sentences fly out of the lips of others. For example, the well-known phrase "buenos días", or "good morning", is pronounced in Andalusia very quickly and in a truncated version. The end result is something like "wen!" And communication with older people still causes some suffering for me. A similar situation is with young people from 10 to 25 years old, who have their own manner of communication and a huge stock of slang words.
In the process of adaptation, it turned out that the manner of communication and the Andalusian dialect differs from city to city and from village to village. Even in the neighboring suburb, which is a kilometer from where I live, residents speak a little differently. This seriously complicates the task, and even now I do not always understand what they are telling me if the local dialect is used.
The same can be said for the writing style of most Spaniards. Unfortunately, I am a member of several parent chat rooms because my children are at the local school. About half of parents write correctly, using official Spanish for correspondence and sometimes placing commas for better understanding. And some messages often force you to set aside a glass of wine and strenuously parse abbreviations, illiterate words, and mentally place dots where they do not interfere. Often, only after a serious analysis of the message, it becomes clear that it does not carry any useful information for anyone except the sender himself.
For all the difficulties that have arisen and arise in my path, the Spaniards never refuse to repeat a phrase or start speaking a little slower for the success of communication. This is almost always accompanied by a polite smile. But, in my opinion, the "hospitality" of the Spaniards is somewhat exaggerated due to the numerous reviews of tourists. But I will write about this another time.
And now you can read about studying in Spain (not languages) , moving to Spain and learning English in the USA .
