Hello retired colleagues,
I hope you all are healthy and enjoying the best years of your lives!
Leslie (my esteemed former colleague in the Language Arts Department) asked me to drop a few words about my Spanish-learning journey this past year, and here it goes—
After about a year getting adjusted to the routine of retirement, I grew restless and lit out for my favorite European city, Barcelona, where in the past, I stayed for two summers, including one after my second sabbatical, during which I took private Spanish lessons, read the local newspapers in cafes, and had daily casual conversations with the people I would coincidentally meet in the local establishments, during my goings-about-the day in Barcelona, the capital of the autonomous Spanish region of Catalonia, where live 1.5 million people of 173 different nationalities, Catalan is the official language, along with Spanish, Arabic and Urdu and frequently heard, and FCB (Football Club Barcelona) is like a religion.
Most of my days during this year have been focused on my conversation and grammar classes in a private Spanish language school, called Camino Barcelona. Each week Íve been obligated to complete twenty hours in class to meet the requirements of my student visa. For more than the ninety-day stay that a tourist visa allows, it´s required to get a long-term visa to reside in Spain. There are several type of visas. The easiest one for me (and the most economical) was a student visa. The upside is this requirement is that after a year in school, my Spanish level is good enough to complete the day-to-day chores of shopping, banking, doctor´s appointments and so on. I have a social life, read books and watch movies, Netflix, and the News. The downside, which is really not a downside, is that in my retirement, Íve become a student again, confined indoors three hours a day five days a week in front of a white board and a native-Spanish speaking teacher in a classroom in an office building. For some, sitting in a classroom may be confining and oppressive. Fortunately for me, a classroom is my natural environment. As a student, grad student, then professor, I never really left school, and classrooms, so for me inside the four walls of a classroom is a comfortable habitat. And reading Spanish, and completing homework, is my form of Sudoku. Hopefully, it will help retain plasticity in my brain.
When I reflect upon journey this year from monolingual Californian to bilingual expat, I realize that what launched me into this new world has been what language-learning theorists call an immersion experience, that state of being during which a person is living, swimming, dreaming in the target language. This is what has ¨clicked ¨ for me this year, and I highly-recommend a blend of schooling with residing in a friendly, local neighborhood, as a means to master a language—be it Spanish, Chinese, English, Arabic, whatever.
Using a second-language everyday, and especially with people in social interactions, has launched me into a new world of understanding ideas and expressing my thoughts and feelings. Spanish for me is part of my life and a genuine way to connect with people in Spain, and because Barcelona is a hub of Hispanidad, this human connection extends to Spanish-speakers from South and Central America, North Africa, and North and Central America, Russia, Ukraine and the Middle East. Barcelona is true city of immigrants—and the common link among us is the lingua franca of Spanish.
In sum, Barcelona, known-widely for its enchanting allure, Mediterranean weather and gastronomy, legendary football players, surrealistic art, Gaudís Sagrada Família, monuments and museums, has been very good for me. I will be here for another year, and, yes, that includes another commitment of 20 hours each week sitting in the classrooms at Camino Barcelona.
(I’ve learned a lot about visiting and residing in Spain. If you would like to learn more about the life here, feel free to contact me at charlesheimler@yahoo.com)