In preparation for going to Costa Rica in less than three weeks, I've been trying to start practicing my Spanish more. Yes, I should have started a while ago, but I'll take what I can get at this point. I finished the fifth Harry Potter book in Spanish but reading is really about the easiest thing to do, so it's not the best way to practice. Looking for something more challenging, I got Cielos de la Tierra for my next audio book, and found myself way out of my depth. I'm catching a fair number of words and phrases, but I really have no clue about the overall story line. That's a pity, since it's kind of a waste of what looks like a very interesting book. But hopefully my Spanish will continue to improve and I'll be able to come back to it again some day and understand more of it.
At Project Read last week, Alice recommended the Destinos video series for learning Spanish, so I checked out some of those. They seem really well done, but the ones I got were far too basic to be useful to me. I'll try some later ones next week, to see how those are, though that would mean jumping into the middle of the detective story that spans all 30-something episodes. In the meantime, I think I'm probably better off just watching the Spanish channel on TV. This weekend I've watched some news programs and soap operas, from which I learned, respectively, such useful phrases as "George W. Bush" and "I'm pregnant with your brother's child." I'm sure that will come in handy sometime.
Of course, what I really need to work on most is speaking. I'm really slow when it comes to actually generating any Spanish, as opposed to just understanding it. It's harder to practice that, though.
2 comments:
I thought you had watched some of Destinos in one of your Spanish classes, but it sounds like you didn't. I wonder if I watched them and just completely forgot about them -- yikes! :) Another thing you could do is scan for Spanish radio stations to listen to on your way to work, to see if songs are easier to grasp than novels. Or you could just come up here and finish off my Spanish classes with me. :) I'm getting excited about our trip!
"I'm pregnant with your brother's child"... I'm VERY glad you're learning that one, Graham, it should come in very handy here ;-)
I am awfully excited about you guys visit too :-)
Say, did you ever get that letter Jac and I wrote you?
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