Spanish Journey

I've been studying Spanish on Duolingo for 497 consecutive days. But I think that streak is about to end. I'll go to 500, then I'm going to call it a day. Or 500 days. Have I learned anything? Definitely. What have I learned? I learned that the time for me to learn Spanish is long past. 

My friend Ralph who lived in Costa Rica learned enough Spanish to get around and get business done. He could say to the Uber driver "right" (derecha), "left" (izquierda), or "straight" (recto) in Spanish, which was helpful. Derecho (not derecha) also means straight, which I think is unnecessarily confusing.

Present tense Spanish is fairly easy. Okay, it's not always easy, but it's do-able. But then you get into past tense and future tense. This causes confusion. Then, just when you think you have a handle on those three tenses, they hit you with subjunctive. It's impossible to learn the subjunctive tense because they make up the rules as they go. In fact, I think all the grammar rules in Spanish are made up on-the-fly. Maybe I could have learned Spanish when I was much younger. I don't know.

And when four tenses give me difficulty, imagine my dismay to learn that Spanish has 14 tenses.

I won't say I've wasted my time. Though I can speak only rudimentary Spanish, I'm somewhat better at reading Spanish. Translating English to Spanish is difficult for me because I often can't think of the Spanish words I need to use, but reading Spanish is easier because when I'm presented with Spanish words I'm often able to recall their English equivalents. If I see "herramienta" I know it means "tool," but if you give me the word "tool" and tell me to say it in Spanish, forget it. "Herramienta" does not pop into my head.

Another problem with Duolingo is that it's buggy. Sometimes you work hard to make points and then the web page hangs and when you finally close and reopen it, the points you just earned are gone. That's disheartening. 

I don't plan to quit Spanish entirely. I plan to quit Duolingo. There are other programs that teach Spanish. One that is #1 recommended is +Babbel.  The #2 recommended language learning program is Pimsleur. I plan to look at those two programs and see which one is best suited to my learning style. I'd like to find a system that lets me learn at my own pace. Duolingo "pushes" me to keep up with the other learners in each new weekly group, and it pushes me to put in more time than I want to put into learning new words. Sometimes, I would just like to go over the words I've already learned more than Duolingo lets me do.

So that's what is on my agenda now, language-wise. 

Oh, and for readers who wonder why this old man is learning Spanish—it's because I have a ladyfriend named Nuria who hails from Costa Rica and I'd like for her to be able to hear her native tongue now and then, even if only a little.