27.01.06
By James Frankham
New Zealand Herald
My world is mute. Conversations, signs and words cannot find their way into my simple, Spanish-less existence. I decide to embark on Spanish lessons.
I know a smattering of German, a handful of French, enough Farsi to get me into trouble, and Papua New Guinea Pidgin as a party trick. But Spanish is the first foreign language I have attempted with any sense of commitment to the long haul.
I’m a writer, I try to convince myself, a professional wordsmith, so surely another language will come naturally. But the New Zealand education system does not require an understanding of the ins and outs of grammar. I learned about apostrophes at school. I’m quite good at them, but that, sadly, is the full extent of my grammatical repertoire.
So to understand the structure of another language I must first learn the basis of English properly. It will be no easy ride. Of all the places to learn Spanish in South America, Quito is reputably the best. The locals speak a slow, clear, clean form, free of the heavy dialects prevalent on the Ecuadorian coast and elsewhere in Chile and Argentina, where even a Spaniard could suffer comprehensive confusion.
It has world-class Spanish schools, with very reasonable rates, and although the President did a runner, Ecuador is one of the more stable Latin American democracies.
For the fainthearted and superficial traveller, learning Spanish is not an essential. If you are comfortable living in a world of your own, then you can get by looking blank for a few weeks – the illusion isn’t robust but it’s generally effective.
But a working knowledge of Spanish is imperative, for anyone prepared to scratch the surface of a culture by engaging with local people in any form whatsoever, and for those planning to spend more than a week or two in Latin America or venture out o f their hotel for any excursion more extensive than a couple of beers at the gringo bar. Because Spanish is common throughout Latin America, few people outside the tourist industry speak more than a few words of English. But for anyone on a linguistic journey, a word of warning. Brace yourself for a devastating bout of self doubt. Prepare to be consumed by the unforeseen depths of your own stupidity.
That is precisely the problem for me. I hate feeling stupid. I hate being unable to communicate, yet here I am on a sidewalk unable to pronounce a street sign written in an alphabet I have known all my life. I can’t talk to a child, let alone a bus driver in a hurry. I am deaf and mute, and I don’t like it. Manuel is my first teacher. He’s a vivacious type, an unshakable enthusiast, music lover and passionate protagonist of the language. He also loves Supertramp and the Eagles. The first week of lessons is good. We stick to the basics.
“Hello. My name is James. I’m from New Zealand. And I like bananas. Thank you.” It’s not a profound conversation, but it’s polite. Now I have a name, a nationality, and my Ecuadorian teacher knows what to feed me. In week two things go bad Very bad. No longer is it acceptable to tiptoe around the language, picking out the nice bits and avoiding those that leave a sour, confusing taste in my mouth. Now it’s all on, I’m conjugating – a difficult process involving phenomenal feats of memory and immense mental strain.
“Es necesario,” I’m told
Suddenly, all the happy, polite chats are gone. The room is spinning. My world is awash in imperfect and irregular verbs. I’m engulfed in a cacophony of words I understand, but sentences I don’t. It’s as if Quito has suddenly become a great ocean of confusion, a jungle of complexity. Before I didn’t understand, now I have enough knowledge of the language to be completely vexed. Buying a piece of bread used to involve pointing and smiling. Now I’m bound to identify, conjugate and construct. I’m tangled in reflexive verbs – a confusing aspect of Latin languages without any equivalent in English.
They are maliciously devised to confuse tourists and throw aspiring Spanish students off the track. I’m sure it’s part of some grand conspiracy to identify any gringo in an instant, merely by the blank expression left on their face after uttering “pararse”. Then, one fine day, the penny drops like a million tonnes of Inca gold. The reflexive dangles before me in all its conjugated glory – naked, simple, efficient. And one small corner of my confused bilingual world snaps into sharp focus.
“Yo entiendo.”
I wonder why I was so oblivious to the obvious. I skip down the street, gleefully reading signs, identifying shops, skimming the headlines of newspapers and asking for bread like the lady next to me. The accent isn’t perfect – I think one of the verbs is conjugated slightly wrong – but I get my empanada, I get my change and I’m skipping down the street again.
This is the moment where I go from dumb gringo to able traveller. It’s the greatest intellectual adventure one can embark on. It opens nations to discovery, unlocks the simple mysteries of foreign cultures, and creates the most precious opportunity of all – speaking to locals in their native tongue.
There is no better tool for travel. South America will never be the same.
Staying there
Amazonas Travel and Education Ecuador Spanish School offers superb Spanish tuition from experienced teachers. The family owned operation, which has competitive rates, is located in the centre of Quito’s new town. Excursions to places of interest around Quito, as well as a weekly evening salsa lesson, are included in the tuition fees. Package deals with accommodation are offered and many opt for the popular home-stays with an Ecuadorian family. It’s certainly the best method for rapid learning. Tuition is the equivalent of $11.50 an hour or $230 a week for the standard 20-hour course. If you want to stay with a family, the accommodation is $29 a night with three meals included. Groups get reduced rates.
Check out www.eduamazonas.com (link provided below) or contact Gustavo Guzman on +593 2 2504654, info@eduamazonas.com He’s a nice guy and speaks good English if you get stuck after “hola”.
Eric Castro, chief editor of Posicionarte in Quito, Ecuador.