*learn the language before you travel
Here we are almost 7 weeks into our travels, and we do not regret selling our house, all of our possessions, or even leaving our family and friends (though we miss them a lot).
We did do one thing wrong, though, and one we want to share it with those of you planning a similar trip.
Learn the language before you go!
Not knowing the language means you miss out on subtle and overt lessons about your destination, and the really sad part of it is that you won’t even know what you missed.
Warren spent quite a bit of time working on Spanish before we left, but because he did not have anyone to practice with, it was hard to retain it. I thought by nature of growing up in New Mexico and having an ear for accents in my previous work that I would pick it up pretty easily. (ha!)
Neither of us landed here with any real Spanish knowledge apart from hello, goodbye, please and thank you. And even though we’ve had some dedicated time to learn, we realize now how much we’ve missed by simply not knowing the language until now.
If we had it to do all over again, we’d take lessons online and through independent study for a few months on our own, and then we’d jump into an intensive class for a few weeks or a month before departing.
This past week I spent 2 hours at a local salon getting a much-needed pedicure for my abused feet. The salon owner and the manicurist were both Ecuadorian and spoke only Spanish. By the time my toes were dry, we had talked about kids, men, dating, divorce, exercise, clothes, and the differences between Ecuador and the US. In fact, we exchanged email addresses and I promised to introduce one of them to my single brother back in the US (you aren’t dating anyone seriously, are you, Jeff?).
I would not have been able to do this before now, and we are just a few days away from leaving Ecuador. This interaction showed me just how much I had been missing before, and it gave me reason to not hate conjugating verbs quite so much.
We’ve decided to head into Colombia next week and backtrack to Ecuador in the new year to visit our friends and see more of the country. Because of the “beauty shop lesson” we are studying hard so we can take in more of the experience as we travel further into South America.
We’ve listed our favorite ways to study Spanish before, but since that post we’ve discovered a great site called Quizlet that has flashcards on a variety of subjects, including Spanish. It helps us to break things up and study in a variety of different ways, and if this is true for you, you might like Quizlet.
Have you ever learned a language specifically for a trip? What was your experience like?
PS - If you want to learn a little Spanish every day, check out our Facebook page for daily words that coincide with what we’re doing/learning. It is an fun way to pick up a little Spanish.
About Betsy
It’s so true, we started our trip in China and missed out on a lot for not knowing the language. We’re now in Thailand and slowly but surely learning bits here and there. We’ve said that before we head to South America we want to learn Spanish somewhere for these exact reasons
It is something I think we all know, but until you see what you’re missing it is hard to be motivated to get in the study time. The landscapes and wildlife are only part of the story when you travel - if you leave out communicating with the locals, you miss out on an entire dimension of the trip. Good luck on your Spanish!
Hi Betsy, Just loving your posts and especially appreciative hearing you have no regrets, as I am up at 3:30am with an anxiety attack, as I’m about to embark on my own adventure of shedding all my belongings aside from what my car will hold, move to a huge new city, start a new, challenging job and a new life. So much of the day to day comforts and routine will be gone, and I’ll be apart from my son and partner at least for a while - so scary, but it’s all exactly what I’ve dreamt of this year! At least I won’t have to learn a new language . Happy trails and send my regards to Warren!
Alisa, Warren had quite a few of those early morning panic attacks before we left, but I can assure you he sleeps like a baby every night now. You will, too. Big rewards do not come without big risk! We are sending good vibes your way and know you will have an amazing adventure.
So proud of you both. Committing to learning a new language is not the easiest of tasks - what I love most though is the universal topics carried on in nail salons!
Just an FYI - I had drinks with someone this week who attended Meet Plan Go - went and got her library card and is using Mango Languages to learn Italian for a trip she is planning to take.
Way to go - way to go!
Debb, this is what I’m loving about this trip - we have some interesting differences, but at the core we’re all remarkably similar. That’s a pretty reassuring discovery.
Yay for using Mango through the library - we are combining it with a few other tools for a multimedia kind of approach and I’m surprised at how quickly we are learning. Warren would disagree, though - Mr. Overachiever thinks he should be fluent in 2 weeks! I hope your friend does well with her Italian.
I totally agree with you on this one. We started our trip in S. America as well, and while we had an elementary understanding of the language, it simply wasn’t enough. One of the best things we did was take an intensive Spanish class in Buenos Aires. It was fantastic, taught us so much, and just improved our overall quality of travel. Interacting with the locals create some of the best memories.
Adam, thanks for sharing your experience with the intensive class. We are considering doing that when we get to Colombia next week (preterite and past imperfect tenses are KILLING us).
You know, I am a people person, but I woefully underestimated how much of the joy of our trip would depend on interacting with other people. Learning Spanish is a requirement (and I’m already thinking of French next year…)
Um, I beg to differ. Warren did have someone to practice with. LOVE YOU WARREN!
You crack me up, Margit. Warren did get to practice a little bit with you, but I couldn’t leave you two alone long enough to make him fluent or I would have lost him for sure.
And I love you too, Betsy!
SMOOCH!
I’ve been trying to teach myself French… even though we’re not going anywhere near France on our planned RTW next year. Hah… I just looove the language.
There’s nothing like total immersion in learning a new language though. Volunteering for 6 months in a homeless shelter in southern california, I picked up spanish like there’s no tomorrow.
Forgot most of it unfortunately. Maybe I should do that again… Hmmm..
Enjoyed your post as usual. Cheers, Jill.
Jill, immersion is the way to go, and kudos to you for doing it while you were helping people at the same time. We’ve considered volunteering as a way to improve our language skills on our travels, but your tip is something every single person reading this right now can try. Thanks for sharing that.
Gran post, como siempre. Es valiente de que usted fije sus errores, así como sus éxitos, y sé que muchos de sus seguidores aprender de ellos.
Sea paciente con usted mismo, y sé que va a aprender el idioma en el tiempo. Una cosa que he encontrado es que la gente en las grandes, las ciudades más internacionales tienden a hablar Inglés, mientras que la gente en lel campo no. Esto puede ser útil en la planer de sus viajes en el futuro. Es posible que quiren pasar un tiempo en las grandes ciudades o pueblo turísticos, en primer lugar, y luego emigran a pueblos más pequeños a medida que se aclimate a la lengua.
Sólo una idea. !Seguir postando!
Joe, puede tomar mas tiempo para responder a su commentario de lo que hizo para escribir el articulo entero!
I like the idea of hitting the big cities first where English might be more commonly spoken and then venturing to the smaller town as we become more comfortable. Unfortunately, geography won’t make that easy, and we are often going to be in small towns first. And I really, really don’t want to rely on English if I don’t have to.
It will be interesting to see how this plays out on our travels and I’ll keep you posted. You are my inspiration when it comes to chatting it up with people, and it is hard enough to live up to your standard in English. Throw in a new language, and this is harder than school (but so much more fun!)
I think immersion is the only way to learn a language. My partner, who is a native Spanish speaker, and I have been together almost two-and-a-half years, and, although I can read and understand most Spanish, I still can’t speak it. It’s so difficult to sustain a conversation in Spanish when you know that it’s easier/faster/more efficient to speak in English. However, if I were forced to speak Spanish, that is, if English were not an option, I’m sure I’d be fluent in a few months. (Mind you, that’s after 4 years of high school Spanish, and a great deal of vocabulary retention.)
Keep it up. It’s awesome to speak more than one language!
(P.S. The hardest part for me, aside from slang… Verb tenses!)
Leslie, I feel your pain. Verb tenses are killing me - just when I got the present tenses down, I realized I still had preterite and past imperfect. And coming up next is future! I think I’m just going to speak in the present tense from now on to make it easy.
Apart from that, I think learning a new language must be more fun when your lover is the one teaching you. If you ceased to communicate in English you’d probably be fluent in 2 weeks.
One of our other readers, Simone, met her partner Luis 5 years ago and neither spoke the other’s language at first. I’m not a gushy romantic, but that story makes my heart swell! You can follow their travel adventures here: http://travelingbastards.blogspot.com/
I have 1 word for you guys… “PIMSLEUR”… get the PIMSLEUR method to learn Spanish from English… there’s no better contingency plan you can execute at this point than getting those MP3 and use them to get up to speed quickly… I think I gave Warren the first 20 or so lessons… trust me and do it… it WILL help…
Sergio.
Hey, is this why Warren is speaking better than me?! Hmmm, I’ll have to find out where he’s hidden these little gems. The website is pretty interesting - a full money-back guarantee if you don’t learn the language in 10 days.
Has anyone else tried this program? What did you think? http://www.pimsleurapproach.com/
Betsy- Big congratulations on the beauty parlor conversation! It sounds amazing- how thrilling to be able to cover so many subjects. That is fantastic after less than two months away from home.
By the way, I love the new profile picture with your gorgeous orange scarf. Who says you have to give up fashion when you get rid of most of your belongings?
Thanks, Angela. I brought a few orange things with me (my favorite color) and like to not always look like all my possessions fit inside a backpack. Scarves and small jewelry can really make a difference in this lifestyle.
You know, a jillion years ago someone gave me a spanish program from my iPod. And now that I’m heading that-a-way, I think it’s time to use it. This is a good reminder to clean off my desk, find that software, and learn me some Es-pan-yol.
We like Mango, but we’re also pretty impressed with Coffee Break Spanish on iTunes. The podcast is also more convenient because you can listen to it anywhere and each lesson is only 15 minutes or so.
I LOVE Otavalo! One of my fav places in Ecuador!
Otavalo has been terrific, and we enjoyed Quito, too. I checked out your site and you have quite a trip planned as well. We can’t wait to see how your trip unfolds as you visit the places we plan to go in a year or so. Madagascar, especially. Please keep in touch!
Betsy and Warren… Enjoying your adventure posts and updates. Just thought I’d let you know that I’m still following your exploits and wish you well. I admire anyone who learns more than one language. How many do you think you will master by the end of your trip? Best wishes for a continued safe journey. (watch out for those big snakes in the Amazon) …Howard
Hi guys! Have been enjoying following you through your first couple of months! What a wonderful adventure. I do agree learning the language really helps- but have you considered how you are going to handle all of the other countries/areas of the world you end up visiting? Obviously, most of South America will now be easy for you as you go but on our RTW, for instance, we were in 20 countries on 5 continents…it would have been impossible to learn them all - including dialects -. I’ll be interested to see your progress.
I wish you best of luck w/ your continuing adventure. It’s great to see you are both so truly appreciative of this opportunity! Enjoy Columbia and can’t wait to read about it! Rhonda
Hi, Rhonda. I think we want to learn the language of the places we´ll be in the longest, so Spanish makes sense (South America for a year and then Spain for several weeks), and in the months before we leave SA I want to start learning French for parts of Africa and Europe. For countries that we will only be in for a few weeks, we´ll just take a beginner course to learn enough to get along.
You are right - it would be too difficult to learn the languages of 20 different countries, but making an effort to know the basics will make our trip much easier.