Might Need The Black Light For This One

Edgy, unrelenting, and borderline inappropriate at times: ways I would describe class 20, and ways many of my friends would describe my sense of humor. So it was a perfect match.

Today's class used David's attempt to seal the deal with his hot neighbor as a platform for discussing the "telos (sex hotels)" of Buenos Aires - an interesting part of the local culture. As many children here live with their parents until they are married, often into their mid to late 20s, finding a private place to spend time with your significant other becomes crucial. Therefore, the industry of "sex hotels," rented by the hour, flourishes and is as much a part of daily life as maté and soccer. They are scattered throughout the city, in plain sight except for the requisite shrubs making the entrance somewhat inconspicuous, and well-known and accepted by the locals. Interestingly, they are used not only by teens looking to have a little fun, but also by married couples looking to spice things up or grab some time away from the kids. The guide books say that they are extremely clean - even cleaner than you often find local hotels to be. Sounds a little creepy to me, but I guess it's hard to fit in the backseat of the tiny cars they have here.

Another class and another helpful Spanish phrase, or so I thought. Class 20 introduced the phrase "acabar de" meaning to just have done. For example, "acabo de llegar" means I just arrived. Sounds useful enough until they give the caveat that using acabar without the de means to have an orgasm. That one seems a little too easy to screw up (insert joke here about men screwing up orgasms) so I don't think I'll be trying it out just yet.

As Bueno, entonces... Learn Spanish has a knack of doing, it expertly used a raunchy topic, sex hotels, as a jumping-off point to discuss basic concepts of the Spanish language. In today's class it was the use of "por vs para (two words meaning for)." Again, like "ser vs estar" this is a complicated discussion that doesn't necessarily follow hard and fast rules, however, Bueno, entonces... Learn Spanish did a nice job of hitting and reinforcing the most common uses.

Well, for the time being it looks like Jimena won't be sex-iled for David's sex-capade (sorry, I ran out of clever words to describe sex I learned freshman year in college) - it looks like he'll have to settle for the Motel Ocho.

To Be or To Be, That Is a Stupid Question

Class 19 kicked off week four by discussing the basics of "ser vs estar (both meaning to be)." This is Spanish 101 and I am shocked that it took until the fourth week for Bueno, entonces... Learn Spanish to cover this material. It isn't such a big deal for me having had formal Spanish instruction in the past, however, I think for people learning Spanish from ground zero this should be the first set of verbs covered in detail. If my memory serves me correctly, Rosetta Stone, spent much of the first unit on these verbs which I think is appropriate. That being said, as I've said before, Rosetta Stone tends to err on the side of overkill. I think Bueno, entonces... Learn Spanish does a much better job of giving each essential verb its due early on and revisiting them as needed. I just would have liked to seen the "ser vs estar" discussion happen earlier. Today's class used "ser" and "estar" as jumping off points to discuss how to describe cities - lots of good around-town vocabulary. I learned there are two words for block (street block - manzana (also means apple); block of houses - cuadra). I still can't quite figure out the difference. This is sure to be a point of discussion at my weekly Spanglish class on Thursday.

Even though today's class was mostly review, I did manage to learn a few more intricacies of "ser vs estar" such as using "ser" to discuss the location of events and "estar" to discuss the location of concrete things. I'm sure I've screwed this one up countless times over the past few weeks. Just add it to the list.

I also picked up a new phrase that I would like to put into the daily rotation - "tener poco/mucho/nada que ver con" meaning having little/a lot/nothing to do with. I'm always looking to pick up new phrases that are a bit more complicated than the basic simple Spanish that I speak. This one should make me sound a little bit more like I know what I'm talking about.

Another thing that today's class reminded me of is how Bueno, entonces... Learn Spanish does a wonderful job of sprinkling in Argentine trivia, history, geography, and traditions into many of the classes. Today I learned a little about Mar del Plata, a coastal town about five hours south of B.A. by bus, and it has me a little intrigued to visit. It's nice to get a taste of the place and culture you are visiting while at the same time learning the language. In the past we've learned about such things as maté, tango, and dulce de leche, and the teaser for today is that we are going to discuss B.A.'s sex houses tomorrow.

Week Three In the Books

Just another sign of the target audience of Bueno, entonces... Learn Spanish: Jimena spent nearly all of class 18 (week 3 review) in a jacuzzi, much to birthday boy David's enjoyment.

Continuing with the "wishing I had know that before I got here" theme, today's class discussed the difference between "castellano" and "español." The former being how Spanish is referred to here in Buenos Aires and the latter being the terminology I learned in school. For example, instead of saying "hablo español (I speak Spanish)" in Buenos Aires, they say "hablo castellano." At a friend's birthday party shortly after we arrived here, I was asked if I'd rather talk in "castellano o inglés." I replied, "en español," as I assumed "castellano" meant Spanish but I didn't quite here the word. It was a little embarrassing and my wife later apologized to me for not mentioning that "they call it castellano here." This is just another example of how Bueno, entonces... Learn Spanish is tailored to those planning on spending time in Argentina in particular - it prevents a lot of those awkward moments caused by not knowing the peculiarities of Argentine Spanish (castellano). So here is the more detailed explanation: "castellano" refers to the language while "español" refers to the nationality.

As a review class, I don't think this one did a particularly good job reinforcing the high points of the past week. Most of the weeks' material was glossed over to make time for the usual sexual tension-charged banter between David and Jimena. I did, however, learn the word for couch (sillón) which would have come in handy yesterday when we had a friend over to my apartment and, when offering her a seat, I motioned over to the couch and said "there."

One other small detail that I like about the classes is the teaser at the end of each class. The narrator always ends the class by giving you a snippet about what the next class will cover. It helps keep my interest and gives me something to look forward to. Tomorrow, we will apparently cover "ser vs estar (two forms of to be)" - basic stuff in the present tense, but still confusing to me otherwise.

It's Gettin' Hot In Here

What's the most important rule of general conversation? When all else fails just talk about the weather. Given my lack of knowledge of conversational Spanish my conversations often have long periods of silence, however, before Class 17 I didn't necessarily have the ability to invoke the time-honored conversational crutch - discussing the weather. In Buenos Aires, people seem to be quite preoccupied by the weather. We're always told to bundle our kids up more because it's soooo cold, or "you won't believe how hot and humid it gets in the summer." They don't understand that we came from Boston where you just assume that it will be cloudy, cold, and dreary everyday, and if it happens to be nice out, well, that's a win for you. In addition, when we arrived we were told there are two things we shouldn't trust here: taxi drivers and weathermen. Judging from the beautiful day today when rain was forecast, that seems to be pretty much spot-on. My biggest fear before coming here was finding myself at a dinner party having to make conversation. Learning weather vocabulary has helped put this at ease. Now I just need to know how to respond to the inevitable, "psst doc, could you take a look at this rash of mine?"

Much to my excitement, class 17 also began to unravel the secrets of the elusive and mysterious subjunctive tense. I can't figure out for the life of me how to use it. Bueno, entonces... Learn Spanish used useful Spanish phrases such as "I hope it's warm tomorrow" and "I hope it doesn't rain" as a jumping off point for this discussion. The teaching point was to think of the subjunctive tense like you are giving orders to the weather (conjugated the same as the imperative tense) - quite helpful, and a tip I am not likely to forget.

I like the program's ability to seamlessly transition into teaching new concepts without setting of sirens and flashing lights to say "hey, this is a new concept...pay attention!" Normal conversation is not compartmentalized into fifteen minutes of present tense followed my fifteen minutes of past tense, and so on. It is a mixture of all the tenses thrown together easily by native speakers, however, quite arduous for those new to the language. Therefore, a language learning software that mimics how verbs are used in normal conversation is worlds more useful. For instance, Rosetta Stone spends the whole first unit on the present tense, followed by past tense in unit two, and future tense in unit three. This may be a fine method for those who are going to complete the full course before ever using their Spanish, but the structure of Bueno, entonces... Learn Spanish gives you the tools to have realistic conversations entirely in Spanish after having only watched a handful of classes.

There was also a part of the class that was near and dear to my heart. David had a lot of trouble pronouncing the word "veterinaria (veterinarian)" which I struggle with on a daily basis when telling people what I'm doing for work here in Buenos Aires (I currently am teaching private medical English classes to a veterinarian).

Other helpful things from this class were diphthongs (vowels written together and pronounced as a single syllable) which go against the general rule of all letters in Spanish being pronounced separately. We also learned about "dependent prepositions" - ones that are always paired with certain verbs, and are often times not direct translations from English (very difficult for the non-native speaker).

Competitive Shopping: The Next Great Sport

The second half of this course (Class 16) got off to a good start by covering two of my favorite things: competition and clothes shopping. Most people who know me know that I am willing to compete at just about anything, and am confident I will win. Just hearing the words "you couldn't do that" or "I could definitely beat you at X" puts a smile on my face. Now I have the vocabulary to continue my ascent up the "meaningless victory" list while I'm in Argentina. Well, at the very least I'll be able to watch a soccer game on tv or read the sports section of the paper without being completely lost.

Also, seeing as how I am still looking for steady work here in Buenos Aires, my day mainly consists of dropping the kids off at school and picking them up four hours later. So, like any good house-husband (or "man-ny" if you will), I often fill the morning window shopping along Avenida Santa Fe or at Alto Palermo, one of the local malls. The only problem is when the always-attentive salespeople inevitably come over and ask me if I need any help (on second thought they might be telling me to look in the husky boys section instead). My reply usually goes something like this: lower lip out, eyes squinting, head nodding side-to-side, and hand waiving them off --> the international sign for "get the f*%k away from me, I'm trying to shop in peace." It's not that I'm trying to be mean though, I just don't know what to say to them in Spanish. Even more stress-provoking is the chance of actually liking something and needing to try it on - uncomfortable interaction overload. Well, after class 16, I know have the vocabulary to expertly go from "just looking" to "I'll take two!"

This vocabulary will also be quite useful for my upcoming trip to the local cafe/wine bar, DiVino. They recently had a nice looking red wine in the window (it had a tag that said "muy bueno") that was offered at a very good price. My wife and I had been meaning to pick up a couple of bottles, however, when we walked past the window yesterday it wasn't there. Now that I've learned the word for display window (vidriera), I can specifically ask about the particular bottle in question rather than just grunting and pointing like I usually do. I kind of feel like a caveman who just saw fire for the first time.

In a nutshell, Bueno, entonces... Learn Spanish is continuing to provide the high-yield conversational Spanish it advertises.

Halfway Home

Today's class marked the halfway point of the course. I hope the second half keeps me as engaged as the first half did. That being said, I felt like today was a bit of a step back in usefulness. Yes there was some helpful information but overall I think it spent too much time on low-yield topics (describing people in great detail). For some topics a basic vocabulary is all you really need when learning a new language and I think descriptions fall into that category. I could have done without learning how to say someone has long eyelashes.

What I found most useful about this class, and several other recent classes, is that there will often be digressions to discuss pronunciation. Again, reflecting on my time using Rosetta Stone, I felt that this is one major area where it fell short, and moreover, even provided false advertising. One feature of Rosetta Stone that really intrigued me when I was investigating different language learning programs was the free headset it provides for pronunciation exercises. My wife can attest to the fact that, on a daily basis, I would curse at the computer after having to repeat myself countless times due to the headset intermittently recognizing my voice. It was very frustrating - I found myself not even using the headset after a while because it was more trouble than it was worth. Furthermore, the voice recognition software was very inadequate. For example, I could say the word perfectly and it would tell me I was wrong, or I could say the completely wrong word (not just mispronounce the correct word) and it would tell me I was correct. The impression I got from Rosetta Stone's advertising was that the headset would really help me with my pronunciation, something that I work really hard to perfect. This could not have been farther from the truth. Bueno, entonces... Learn Spanish, on the other hand, uses David to illustrate poor pronunciation and Jimena to demonstrate perfect pronunciation. In addition, there are mini teaching sessions to discuss exactly how certain letters are pronounced depending on where they fall in a particular word. I've learned a lot of helpful pointers from these lessons, and have gotten great feedback on my pronunciation.

You Got a Perty Mouf, Boy

The title - a reference to class 14's discussion about double negatives and their acceptance and requirement in Spanish as opposed to English where they are reserved for characters in Deliverance.

This class continued our nice run of informative classes and gave me déjà vu about a recent experience of mine. Once a week, I take part in an "intercambio (language exchange)" with a porteña who is looking to practice her English. I was telling her about how we are keeping our children on an American schedule (early to bed, early to rise) rather than exposing them to the late nights of Argentine kids. She was intrigued and asked me to describe a typical day of mine. For the most part I think I did ok, but there were parts I struggled through. David and Jimena did this same exercise in class 14 and it was very helpful to hear how they described a typical day in their lives. I'm sure I'll have a chance to discuss my daily schedule again and next time I'm hoping it will sound flawless (and more advanced now that I learned a few more words to temporally arrange things).

One of my favorite parts of class 14 was learning the word for "to get (conseguir)." I never realized how much I used this word until I arrived here and I found myself constantly trying to translate it into Spanish. I feel like a thesaurus, constantly trying to thing of a good synonym for it that I know how to say in Spanish. For instance, I would translate "I got the food you asked for from the store" into "I bought the food" or "I have the food you wanted." I won't bore you with more examples, but there are millions. Finally, another word I can stop talking around. Thank god.

The other big concept that class 14 covered was sentence structure - particularly when to use "a" to signify the object of a verb, and when you need to proceed a verb with an indirect pronoun (when using a verb signifying something being sent or given to someone else). I know for sure that I have made this mistake when telling people about emails I have sent or making a trip to the post office. Just another example of not picking up on word usage patterns that Bueno, entonces... Learn Spanish has illuminated for me.