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Published: July 31st 2010
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"'You the good pilot up there, what do you really want... you want to go very fast in the wrong direction or slowly in the good direction?'" -
Betrand Piccard - a question posed to him by a weatherman during his balloon flight around the world.
People ask me a lot why I'm learning Spanish. Reasonable question. It comes down to many things... dreams, goals, interests.
Prior to this, besides self-studying Spanish, I dipped my feet in for about four weeks on two trips to Ecuador a couple of years ago, of which I also wrote about. However, I've never been committed to it... emotionally, it was a goal that I had sitting in front of me and it was like I was looking at it earnestly wondering if this is something I *really* want to do... especially with my old age of 30 (31 as of posting this) years old (joke... I joke partly to make a point to those my age who are already giving up on their dreams and partly because 30 is still young).
The school we studied at was called
IH Riviera Maya. It is located on 14th Street and faces Calle Corazón (my most
favorite street in Playa). It has several classrooms, an Internet lounge, and a beautiful courtyard.
As mentioned in the previous post, my mom was with me on this trip and she is further along in her Spanish studies than me. One of the many amazing things about my mom is she can out self-study almost anybody (though, she'd likely disagree with me). Maybe it is from raising four children. Maybe it was from the study habits she learned while in graduate school while pregnant with another baby at home. Actually, I won't continue... the list is long. The point is that her study habits typically outpace my own. So, after the school's initial test, she started in an intermediate class and I in the beginner's class. 😊
We signed up for three weeks of classes; due to holidays it was only 13 days at 4 hours a day (52 total hours). Our first day of classes went well. My class started with introductions. There were two other students in the class... a girl from Canada and a guy from Australia. The Australian guy was hilarious; I love Australia... if America could throw a massive ring around their massive
country and pull it across the Pacific Ocean next to ours, I think we'd be better off for it.
At any rate, the first day we also covered the alphabet, which is great because I didn't know the Spanish alphabet (an oversight on my part, I know). We also covered basic greetings/salutations, requests, and personal descriptions.
The following days we learned more about the present tense and conjugated a lot of verbs. We had a workbook and did exercises both in class and for homework. The Spanish instructor kept the class moving. Throughout the three weeks, she did an excellent job of keeping us engaged and learning.
In the following two weeks, we stayed mainly in the present tense and worked on regular, irregular, and reflexive verbs, creating sentences, and practicing (verbal and written). I learned a lot and gained a lot of ground. However, I also gained a better understanding of how much further I have to go... which is a lot but, I believe, within reach. My next planned study-trip is to Antigua, Guatemala for 10 weeks lessons up to six hours a day. It is going slow, but I also believe I'm heading in
the "good direction".
Sidenote: Since writing this, I spent 2.5 months studying in Antigua, Guatemala, spent three months back in the States, and am currently visiting family in Ecuador.
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The school has a mini-kitchen where someone comes in and prepares lunch. The food was off-the-charts good (though, that can be said of a lot of the food in Playa, and we ate a lot 😊. My favorite dish was enchiladas de pollo con mole (chicken enchiladas with mole). Homemade
mole is sooooo good! The chef spent the morning preparing it with over 20 ingredients such as herbs, spices, peppers, tomatoes, nuts, and cocoa.
They also made smoothies. Smoothies in Playa, generally, are made with FRESH fruit and yogurt/milk... and they are usually gigantic.
Unfortunately, this also meant that after lunch I often went back to class stuffed. No regrets. 😉
They also had an after school activity every day in the evenings. We did a few cooking courses. There is also a Spanish-language movie night and salsa lessons, as well as a regular movie night at a restaurant on the beach.
In the cooking classes we made enchiladas de pollo (chicken enchiladas),
plátanos rellenos con queso (fried bananas stuffed with cheese), horchata (rice milk w/ cinnamon), and tacos. The cooking classes were held in the school's residence (which is a few blocks from the school) and taught by one of the Spanish instructors.
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We also had a few movie nights at the beach. One of the restaurants on the beach shows movies every Monday night. The first time we went they played "The Doors", which is amazingly depressing... Jim Morrison essentially self-destructed in a morass of narcissism, drugs, and delusion. I love a few of their songs, but seriously. A lot of his lyrics are immensely perverted and/or greatly skewed from reality. I digress... Peel away the film and you have a starlit night with great company on the beach with the moonlight reflecting softly off the water while we drank beer and ate tortilla chips with fresh guacamole.
The movie the next week was "August Rush"... which is possibly the polar opposite of The Doors. It is about a musically gifted (Mozart level) orphan trying to find his parents with music, belief, and determination helping him along the way. While some of his musical development is likely
unrealistic (Mozart had training early on and his father was a composer), the larger theme of believing in yourself and your dreams, of hope, of courage, and the beauty and magic of music makes the film such an inspiration to watch. As before... great atmosphere, beer, chips, and guacamole. 😊
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