My relationship with Spain is simple – l love the place, don’t understand the
people. And I don’t, sadly, mean in the deeper, anthropological sense – it’s
just that our Iberian cousins are fundamentally different from me. They
speak Spanish, a wonderfully romantic, guttural, lascivious tongue, and I
don’t.
My Spanish is embarrassing on every level. I have been there many times and
know about four words.
And, yes, “dos cervezas” are two of them. Admittedly, I don’t own a Union Jack
beach towel, but in terms of international linguistic assimilation, I might
as well.
But no more. Things are going to change. I’m learning Spanish and I’m doing it
properly. In Spain, for a start. I booked myself a week off, and vowed not
to return until I was practically native.
There are numerous companies that offer residential courses in Spain, but I
chose Don Quijote, an established Spanish language school that originated in
Salamanca, an old university city 125 miles to the west of Madrid, in 1989.
Salamanca was declared a Unesco World Heritage Site in 1988 and shared the
title of European City of Culture with Bruges in 2002. The first Castilian
grammar book was written there in 1492, and it’s widely accepted that what’s
spoken in Salamanca is Spanish at its most pure.
I chose to stay with a local, rather than with other students in university
accommodation, so my immersion would be absolute(ly terrifying). My host was
Felissa Rodriguez Martin, a 63-year-old lady living on her own. The welcome
pack sent out by Don Quijote informed me she was “an excellent cook” and
“chatty”. It wasn’t wrong. The food was outstanding, and she could certainly
talk. What they omitted to mention was that she was only chatty in one
language. And it wasn’t mine.
ON THE first morning at Don Quijote, you take a simple written and verbal test
so you can be placed in the appropriate class. I sat in a room of about 20
students who all admitted they couldn’t speak a word, while el profesor,
Salva, explained in Spanish what was going to happen. As I sat there, his
words bouncing off my skull like bullets off the wings of Batfink, I thought
how daft it was talking to us in precisely the language we came here to
learn – if I could understand Spanish, I’d be out there spouting it to dusky
señoritas, not sat here doodling and feeling stupid. I’m not exactly sure
what happened next, but everyone suddenly guffawed. The frauds! This lot
could already speak the lingo enough to understand almost certainly complex
comedic propositions. I shrank in my seat and adjusted my dunce’s cap.
The test had 16 questions, ranging in difficulty. It was the work of a moment
to leave it blank. My verbal assessment didn’t take long, either.
I was put into the most beginnery of beginners’ classes, which suited me fine.
Despite wanting to cram as much tuition in as possible, I was warned that
four hours a day, with a couple of one-to-one lessons later on, was probably
sufficient for a complete idiot, sorry, novice. What an insult, I thought,
cringing at this return to my student timetable. I haughtily maintained a
derisive attitude right up to the end of my first lesson, when the amount of
information I was trying to stuff into my brain made it creak and groan like
an old ship at night.
I was in the morning group, which meant I was done by 1pm, and Señora Felissa
served lunch at two. That left me the afternoons to explore Salamanca. What
a sensational city – small enough to walk around, but detailed enough to get
lost in. The central hub is the Plaza Mayor, the stunning baroque town
square that was built over 26 years from 1729. The city has two cathedrals –
the older, Romanesque one dates from 1150 and is reached from inside its
younger, gothic brother, which it leans on for support.
Both are spectacular: you can spend a happy afternoon in either, but strolling
around their perimeters is almost as rewarding, as the sheer scale and
detail of the decoration on the facades above the doors is mind-boggling.
The university, first recognised as such by the constitutional Carta Magna
in 1254, is only nine years younger than Cambridge, and looks every inch as
lovely. It’s fascinating and I could go on, but for the first time in years
I’ve got homework to do.
Lots of it, actually. Over the course of the week we pretty much master the
present tense – by the end I have 79 new verbs in my notebook, and pages and
pages of vocabulary. Most of the teaching is in Spanish, but my three
tutors, Jabi, Pepa and Salva, who have 45 years of teaching Spanish to
foreigners between them, are perfectly willing to speak English to explain
things more clearly. Salva tells me that a week’s study in Salamanca is on a
par with cramming in a lesson a week for a year back home. That may be
pushing it, but I’d be hard pressed to find room for all this and work too.
Returning to my host on the Friday for lunch, I got a shock – there was a man
in the house. Felissa was obviously trying to impress one of us as she
served up paella, and it was superb. I prompted small squeals of delight
when, in an uncertain voice that would make Oliver Twist sound like Brian
Blessed, I asked for more.
And then it happened. My host said something to me. And I said something back.
And the two things, when put together, made sense. That’s a conversation,
that is. In Spanish. Okay, it was slow and lumpy, and as rickety as a
penny-farthing on a cattle grid, but we got there, the three of us, beaming
with the pleasure of hard-won communication, and me sweating slightly from
the exertion.
I’d done it. And to prove it, I did it again in the taxi to the airport, as I
chanced upon a driver who was teaching himself English. We sparred: I
answered his (pretty good) English questions in (pretty bad) Spanish. By the
time we arrived, neither of us would shut up – we were talking over each
other like a married couple.
Unlike a married couple, we practically embraced as we said goodbye. I love
the Spanish. They’re a complex people, but they’re great once you understand
them.
Paul Croughton travelled as a guest of British Airways
Travel details: Don Quijote’s Intensive Spanish courses (020 8786 8081, www.donquijote.org
) start every Monday at all Don Quijote schools (Barcelona, Granada, Madrid,
Salamanca, Tenerife and Valencia, as well as Guanajuato in Mexico), from
£121 a week.
Accommodation is available in student flats, from £79, and in homestays, from
£122, half-board; (prices for one week; single room). Other companies
offering residential immersion courses include Cactus Worldwide (0845 130
4775, www.cactuslanguage.com )
and Languages Abroad (01509 211612, www.languagesabroad.co.uk
); or visit www.ialc.org (International
Association of Language Centres).
Fly to Madrid with BA (0870 850 9850, www.ba.com
), from £60. Or try Iberia (0870 609 0500, www.iberia.com
), or EasyJet (www.easyjet.com ). The
train from Madrid to Salamanca is £24 return, bookable through Spanish Rail
(020 7725 7063, www.spanish-rail.co.uk
).
Immersion course? Pah, I can do it in an hour
A WEEK? Who’s got a week to spare? We’re all busy busy busy these days. Handy,
then, that Berlitz has just launched a series of CDs which they claim can
teach you the basics of Spanish, German, French or Italian in just one hour.
Bung one on the iPod, listen on the plane, and bingo, you’re bilingual. In
theory.
As my Italian is nono existento, I made for Milan. After an hour amusing my
fellow passengers by doing the “repeat this phrase after me” thing in a loud
and clear voice, my first stop was the fashion quarter, the quadrilatero
della moda. In the hushed, white expanse of Loro Piana, a smart-but-casual
coat appealed.
An assistant approached and I summoned up my memorised phrase. “Quanto costa?”
I asked.
And that’s when I found the design flaw at the heart of Berlitz’s brainchild.
If you do get the right phrase, and pronounce it correctly, foreigners will
assume you are fluent and talk back to you. In foreign. The assistant burst
into rapid speech, and I couldn’t understand a word.
After a while, he stopped just as suddenly, and stared at me with a
significant expression. I nodded sagely in reply. There was silence.
“Cashmere,” he said.
“Cashmere,” I confirmed happily. It felt as if we had just shared a profound
truth. We stood for a little longer, solemnly nodding and looking at the
coat. It was a comfortable,intimatesilence, but it couldn’t last for ever.
“So, how much is it again?” “Four thousand seven hundred euros,” he replied in
English.
An involuntary shudder ran through my frame, and our common bond was
shattered. Now we both knew that a) I did not speak Italian, and b) I was
never, ever going to spend three grand on a coat. I made my excuses –
“Scusi!” – and left.
I was shaken but not defeated. I headed for the bar-strewn Via Brera where,
seated strategically next to a likely-looking bunch of twentysomethings, I
realised I’d forgotten all 13 phrases in the “making friends” section. I
used my iPod for some sneaky revision. They didn’t sound promising but they
were all I had. I launched in.
“C’e una discoteca in citta?”
Five blank faces stared at me. Milan is crammed with clubs, but I don’t think
anything’s called itself a disco since 1983. Sweating slightly, I ploughed
on.
“Mi piace la musica.” (I like music.) Nothing. “Per chi lavora?” (Who do you
work for?) Still nothing, so I played my trump card: “Quali sono i suoi
hobby?” (What are your hobbies?)
At last they began to smile. The oldest leant over, said “May I?”, took my
iPod and plugged in. He was soon hooting with laughter.
The ice was broken and we ended up having quite a chat (in English, of
course). The Berlitz CD had worked, though perhaps not in quite the way they
hoped.
A good conversation piece, then, but in other ways it’s a bit of a dud. There
are 325 phrases on the CD: you can hear them all in the much-vaunted hour,
but it’s impossible to learn much in that time, so you’re constantly
scrolling through your iPod for the appropriate one. Even if you find it, it
won’t get you far. I asked for directions, but since Berlitz had neglected
to include the words for “left” and “right”, I couldn’t make sense of the
reply. I could order a tea in a cafe, but not specify whether it was small
or large, or even ask where the lavatory was.
The conclusion? A little language is a dangerous thing. If you’re going to
learn one, do it properly. Otherwise, drop the pretence, take a decent
phrasebook, memorise “please” and “thank you”, and accept that it’ll take
more than an hour to turn you from bumbling tourist into suave local.Buona
fortuna.
Stephen Bleach
Stephen Bleach flew to Milan as a guest of British Airways (0870 850 9850, www.ba.com
). Italian for Your Trip is published by Berlitz at £4.99
