Habla Español?
Porque muchos de los lugares que vamos a visitar hable español pienso que necesitamos practicar nuestro español más. Rebecca y yo hemos practicado el hablar de español en el pasado. Hicimos esto vía los cursos de idiomas de Pimsleur, cuál recomendamos altamente. Ahora tenemos nuestro nuevo libro, Spanish for Cruisers, para ayudarnos.
For the Spanish challenged and/or those who are too lazy to have it translated on the web:
“Because many of the places that we are going to visit speak Spanish I think that we need to practice our spanish more. Rebecca and I have practiced speaking Spanish in the past. We did this via Pimsleur language courses, which we highly recommend. Now we have our new book, Spanish for Cruisers, to help us.”
http://babelfish.yahoo.com/
We started to learn Spanish,at the encouragement of my wife’s employer,but we just get into it.
So,we’re taking the easy way out and going to the Bahamas.
Of course,if you listen to two Bahamians having a conversation,you would never know they were speaking English!
lol. That’s not too encouraging! 🙂
tu espanol es perfecto.
muy macho, amigo!
arriba!!
Muchas gracias mi amigo!
I have been forcing myself to learn some spanish, because the engineering office of my company is now in Madrid, and I am commonly sent 50 page equipment proposal in Spanish. As a result, I can read enough, but can’t speak or understand for beans. As I begin to cruise further south, I need to fill that void.
I always liked reading childrens books as a break from actual text book-style study.
Of course, you are ahead of me! I can easily understand what you have written, but if I had to compose it on the spot…. My head hurts from trying to get the gramar right.
To be honest we used computer translation to help compose it properly. We can definitely understand it too, although had I written it without checking, no doubt some of it would have been messed up. We found the Pimsleur language courses to be very easy. My biggest problem is that I speak more Portuguese than Spanish (we have quite a few Brazilian friends), so when I actually start talking, what often comes out is Porteñol. 🙂
Cuidado!!!! Computer translators are more often wrong due to the fact they don’t flip flop the language. The computer will translate it literally the way it’s entered. So sometimes what you think is OK comes out offensive. And not ALL the islands of the Caribbean are Spanish speaking… some are French! If you have time and can afford it I suggest taking a Continuing Ed class at a local Jr. College. Conversational Spanish is the best. The more the teacher teaches speaking the better, you may or may not want to learn how to read and write, it would be helpful. Loretta Stone is really worth the $$$ too.
I am definitely aware that they aren’t perfect. IF today’s post is grammatically correct it is only because I went through it piece by piece to make sure it made sense. I am also aware that some of the islands are French speaking. We’ll just skip those (just kidding). 🙂 As for continuing ed classes, I am at this time LESS than impressed with formal classes (just got back from one). My experience is that learning via language tapes is about 100 times more effective! After 1 – 30 day Pimsleur course I could communicate in Brazil well enough to be understood. Much better than the 10 years of French that I was forced to take in school. I doubt the college courses offered here would net the same rapid results. As for Rosetta Stone (I think that is what you meant), I don’t have any experience with it. I think it is computer based. For me, the ability to practice while walking, jogging, etc., just by listening to my iPod, is handy, but that might work too.
In my limited experience of speaking what little I know of French in Paris (remnants of high-school French coupled with a few other words I thought I might use), if you speak it well you get a barrage of French in response that one has no idea what it means.
It solidified a theory I had long held; to wit: learning phrases in the language of a country one plans to visit is pretty useless. So I can say, ‘Where are the toilets?’ in perfect Spanish. If I can’t understand, “Head down this street two blocks and you will come to a pub. They won’t let you use the bathroom unless you buy a drink though so you’d be best to turn right and carry on another block until you get to McDonalds.’, then there’s not really much point to it, is there? Better to ask in English and get some hand signals and the odd broken English word in return.
I tried learning Spanish off of a set of CD’s and they’re good but if one doesn’t have a chance to practice, the one forgets it in about two days. Or at least, this one does.
I can see that Sandra.
Definitely be immersed in the language helps. We have had non-English speaking Brazilian friends stay with us for a month or two at a time. My Portuguese got a LOT better during those periods.