How Living in Spain Helped Me

So, you thought I was gone? Like gone, forever. Well, I’m not. I just went back to the Netherlands for some college work (just one semester) and things were a bit hectic for about a week or two. That means less Spanish only and more Dutch, but that’s how life goes.

But being in the Netherlands and speaking with people about my experiences in Spain helps me reflect on how much I learned there. It’s true that I learned most Spanish right here in the Netherlands, but staying in Spain really kick-started my near-native being.

Do I still think you should learn Spanish first? Oh yes, because if I hadn’t learned it first I would’ve been in big troubles from time to time. Speaking Spanish well is absolutely essential if there are problems (I’ve had some problems in Spain, unfortunately), whatever other people say.

But then there’s the speaking part. Until going to Spain my main ‘daily Spanish dish’ consisted out of lots of input and just tiny amounts of output (apart from chatting, but spoken output was pretty rare). But when you move to Spain (to a ’small town’) and work with Spaniards on a daily basis (who think they can speak English but really CAN’T) you’re forced to speak.

In the beginning this was difficult at times because I had to speak for hours and hours, but it soon was so normal that I started mixing Spanish words (or at least the Spanish words for some things came up first) with Dutch when I phoned to family in the Netherlands. That was pretty weird but also cool.

At the same time speaking really helped me. I’ve spoken some times on this blog about ’slow memory’ and ‘fast memory’. Until going to Spain much of my Spanish was in my ’slow memory’; I could understand everything but speaking was a bit slower with the occasional error (but not every sentence, like one error every few minutes). But when I arrived in Spain I started moving things from the ’slow memory’ to the ‘fast memory’. This went unconsciously.

But that’s not all. Living in Spain (especially in the countryside) gives you the opportunity to learn one specific form or dialect of Spanish. I lived/live in a town in Castilla-La Mancha (Albacete) where they have influences from Madrid, Andalucia and also Murcia, which has a great mix as result. Spending several months only in that town and working every day with natives really formed my accent (some friends from Alicante said it was awful that I spoke like one ‘from the countryside’; I saw it as a compliment, hehe).

But it also resulted in learned many, many expression you’ll never hear on the television. This is not only good for yourself, but people find it really funny if they hear a foreigner use slang and expressions only they in that region use. It sure boosted my confidence!

So, now I’m preparing myself for a longer stay in Spain and for Spanish college life (next year I’ll study in either Alicante or Murcia, I still have to decide), but this long stay really boosted my confidence, skills and overall level in Spanish.

Do I regret it? No way!