Re: James29's Spanish Log
Posted: Sun Oct 04, 2015 1:28 pm
This was an interesting week in my Spanish journey. I went to a conference for work and was extraordinarily busy. I did not get a chance to do any Spanish on either Thursday or Friday. I did speak a tad bit of Spanish on those days, but certainly not enough to "count." I believe this marks the first time in six years that I went two consecutive days without any Spanish. This does not bother me because the trip was so incredibly valuable from both a personal and business perspective that I'd do it all over again. In fact, on those days I actually got quite motivated about incorporating my Spanish into my business.
I met a nice guy from another state with a business almost identical to mine. He "speaks Spanish" like me and has been pursuing Spanish speaking customers with a ton of success. He does not have any Spanish speaking employees either and I doubt his Spanish is any better than mine. I had some nice long talks with him and got great advice on how to really start pursuing this type of growth for my business. It was extremely encouraging and it gave me the confidence and perspective I really need if I am going to go this route. It also validated many of my "crazy" ideas and strategies. This guy has basically been doing exactly what I have been thinking of doing and it is really working for him.
So, this trip really motivated me to make a consistent push with my Spanish. I'd really like to advance my communicative skills a little bit more so I can feel more confident. I think the only things that are really still holding me up are my receptive skills - I need to broaden my vocabulary and my understanding of spoken Spanish.
Earlier in the week I got a call from a Mexican immigrant and had a nice talk with him entirely in Spanish. I am really gaining confidence in my conversations with customers. There were some things I did not understand in the conversation (I would have had a hard time with the concepts in English) and I was very easily able to identify with the caller the issues we needed to further discuss and we were able to get right down to the issue quite well. With these work calls in Spanish I have identified a great routine... at first I just listen to the person and try to understand as much as possible. I miss some things as they are explaining things, but I just let them go on and on. I try to get as much of an understanding as possible and then at a good natural pause in the conversation I simply "loop back" and go over what I understood and ask if I understood things correctly. For the most part I understand things even when I think I am really missing something. We also identify the few key concepts the person needs to better understand. Often times the areas that I am not understanding well were simply poorly explained by the customer for one reason or another (e.g. they make an assumption that I know something or they use some super slangy word). Anyway, I am getting much more confident with these calls and that encourages me.
I really need to get better with this sort of Spanish... receiving a call from an unknown person and being able to listen to them on the phone and understand them. That is what I need. I think it is the hardest thing to do in Spanish because I am always speaking to someone who I have never heard before and I also miss the visual clues of talking in person. Additionally, my customers are often uneducated and/or quite emotional so they do not speak Spanish perfectly and they often speak very fast and/or slangy.
In terms of what I'm actually doing in Spanish right now, I am reading John Grisham's Sycamore Row. It is quite interesting so far. I am now 35% through it according to my Kindle. There were several chapters I read without even looking up a single word. That does not necessarily mean I knew every single word, it just means I knew what the words all meant from context. The translation was obviously done by a Spaniard which is not really a problem, but it is quite noticeable. I do prefer listening to Latino Spanish, but content is more important to me and, when reading, it really does not make much of a difference.
I also listened to the VOA news three days this week. Nothing new there. I would not mind using my morning commute time to do something that would help more with listening comprehension, but I simply cannot think of anything so I'm going to stick with the news. I can justify it because it falls into the listening to "easy" things category.
I have made no progress on my telenovela. I'll get back to it, but with all the stuff going on with family and work that is what is suffering.
I really wish I had more to report on my Spanish endeavors, but I don't. I'll get back on track this week.
I met a nice guy from another state with a business almost identical to mine. He "speaks Spanish" like me and has been pursuing Spanish speaking customers with a ton of success. He does not have any Spanish speaking employees either and I doubt his Spanish is any better than mine. I had some nice long talks with him and got great advice on how to really start pursuing this type of growth for my business. It was extremely encouraging and it gave me the confidence and perspective I really need if I am going to go this route. It also validated many of my "crazy" ideas and strategies. This guy has basically been doing exactly what I have been thinking of doing and it is really working for him.
So, this trip really motivated me to make a consistent push with my Spanish. I'd really like to advance my communicative skills a little bit more so I can feel more confident. I think the only things that are really still holding me up are my receptive skills - I need to broaden my vocabulary and my understanding of spoken Spanish.
Earlier in the week I got a call from a Mexican immigrant and had a nice talk with him entirely in Spanish. I am really gaining confidence in my conversations with customers. There were some things I did not understand in the conversation (I would have had a hard time with the concepts in English) and I was very easily able to identify with the caller the issues we needed to further discuss and we were able to get right down to the issue quite well. With these work calls in Spanish I have identified a great routine... at first I just listen to the person and try to understand as much as possible. I miss some things as they are explaining things, but I just let them go on and on. I try to get as much of an understanding as possible and then at a good natural pause in the conversation I simply "loop back" and go over what I understood and ask if I understood things correctly. For the most part I understand things even when I think I am really missing something. We also identify the few key concepts the person needs to better understand. Often times the areas that I am not understanding well were simply poorly explained by the customer for one reason or another (e.g. they make an assumption that I know something or they use some super slangy word). Anyway, I am getting much more confident with these calls and that encourages me.
I really need to get better with this sort of Spanish... receiving a call from an unknown person and being able to listen to them on the phone and understand them. That is what I need. I think it is the hardest thing to do in Spanish because I am always speaking to someone who I have never heard before and I also miss the visual clues of talking in person. Additionally, my customers are often uneducated and/or quite emotional so they do not speak Spanish perfectly and they often speak very fast and/or slangy.
In terms of what I'm actually doing in Spanish right now, I am reading John Grisham's Sycamore Row. It is quite interesting so far. I am now 35% through it according to my Kindle. There were several chapters I read without even looking up a single word. That does not necessarily mean I knew every single word, it just means I knew what the words all meant from context. The translation was obviously done by a Spaniard which is not really a problem, but it is quite noticeable. I do prefer listening to Latino Spanish, but content is more important to me and, when reading, it really does not make much of a difference.
I also listened to the VOA news three days this week. Nothing new there. I would not mind using my morning commute time to do something that would help more with listening comprehension, but I simply cannot think of anything so I'm going to stick with the news. I can justify it because it falls into the listening to "easy" things category.
I have made no progress on my telenovela. I'll get back to it, but with all the stuff going on with family and work that is what is suffering.
I really wish I had more to report on my Spanish endeavors, but I don't. I'll get back on track this week.