Why are you learning Spanish?

[nostar]

I recently moved to a neighborhood in Detroit, MI called Mexicantown. I also do programming and web work for a non-profit organization called Southwest Solutions, which is based in Mexicantown. One of the many services provided by this company is 'Family Literacy' which serves low income Southwest Detroit families:

http://www.swsol.org/family.php

I've always wanted to be fluently bilingual, but never had a real purpose, so I never stuck with any other language. Now that I live in a community that is predominately spanish speaking, I am determined to become fluent in spanish in one year.

Doug

[GooPach]

I'm learning spanish because I want to live in Mexico part of year each year.
I'm working on making a website to help Mexicans teach non spanish speakers
spanish for $8 an hour over the internet using Skype. We are just starting.


www.3by5Spanish.com is the name of it. I'm in steep growth curve. Learning Spanish and how to make a site.

Gail

[RebelDogg]

I've spent the past four or five months studying Japanese with Japanesepod101.com. I decided to put Japanese on the back burner for a while though I've by no means abandoned it completely and am definitely going to keep up on studying Kanji (Japanese writing)

The main problem with learning Japanese is that almost no one speaks it where I live. I have no friends that speak it. My only source of hearing it was through the internet and movies (I LOVE Japanese movies and anime!)

I decided on Spanish because there are a lot of Spanish speaking people here. Unfortunately many of them ONLY speak Spanish. Also, Spanish is EVERYWHERE. Movies almost always have Spanish audio/subtitles. It will be much easier to expose myself to Spanish than it was to Japanese. I believe that I have a much better chance of becoming fluent in Spanish than in Japanese and will then have skill in a language that could actually be of use to me in the coming years, not to mention a language that I will have ample opportunity to practice. My neighborhood has a large Mexican population.

Actually, there was an unpleasant (though now peacefully resolved) incident that occurred with one neighbor almost a year ago that could have been avoided had we been able to communicate better... and had he not been drunk... and if I didn't have such a quick temper...

Also, my best friend is from Puerto Rico so I'll actually have someone to talk to and have help from.

Here's to hoping I stick with this!

[crayoncore]

I have always been in love with Mexican and Latin American culture. I took about a year and a half of Spanish in high school but transferred to a school my sophomore year that didn't offer languages as electives. After that I basically gave up on my Spanish until I started working in restaurants and found that most of the kitchen staff in restaurants are native Spanish speakers. I found it's helpful to get things done quickly and properly if you have a good relationship with your kitchen staff and what better way to bond than to speak to them in their native language.
However, most of the Spanish I've learned before signing up for spanishpod101.com was only useful in the kitchen and was a simple process of me asking a cook "Como se dice?"
I live in Chicago, which has a very large Hispanic population so knowing more than what we call "restaurant Spanish" is helpful in general.

As of recently I started dating one of the Kitchen staff from my work who is from Mexico and has only been living in the U.S. for a little over a year. His English is good but not enough for us to have good communication (which I've heard is good for relationships). I decided to learn Spanish to not only be able to talk with my boyfriend but also to help him with his English by being able to answer him when he says "Como se dice?"
Our relationship has become more complex because he plans on returning to Mexico soon and there has been some talk of me moving there with him. If this happens I don't want to have to rely on him to be able to communicate with people when I'm out in the world.

[serena07]

I think Spanish is good language and I want to learn it. Spanish language is very interesting and In my opinion everyone need to learn it. spanish courses barcelona

[nuevogirl]

I am learning spanish because my husband and I plan on spending 6 months of the year in Mexico and I want to be able to talk with my neighbors and travel around the country. I also want to learn as an exercise to keep the little brain cells active as I am getting older.

[serena07]

I wanna go to tenerife for my holidays and how can i communicate with the native people to share info and experiences? I think i must have knowledge of it.

[jpv206]

wow serena07, why tenerife? When will you be going? Just curious

[winterpromise31]

I love languages and I love to travel. I'm learning both Spanish and Japanese. I think Spanish is a beautiful language and my hubby wants to travel to Japan, which is why I'm learning both.

High school was 10 years ago but I took 1 year of Latin and 2 years of Spanish. Since then, I have not learned much but I look forward to refreshing my rusty vocabulary!

[jpv206]

hi winterpromise31, Spanish and Japanese are great languages to learn!

[hpwolfe]

I have retired and moved to Costa Rica. Obviously, to fully participate in my new community, I need to be able to speak Spanish. I have been studying in my home for quite while, and about 4 months ago, I began taking classes four hours a week. More recently, I have started studying Spanish Pod 101. I didn't discover until after I subscribed to SP 101, that it has a Costa Rican component. I have tested that out and found it to be be very good--Costa Ricans verify the regional word usage for me. Spanish Pod 101 is a very important component of my study now. Thanks.

[Evandar]

I'm learning Spanish because I've simply been interested in languages for many years. I tried Japanese first, many years ago, but that didn't work out at all, for various reasons. Now I've studied Spanish for almost two years, and while I feel I've learned just about nothing yet, I do realize that in fact I know a great deal, I just have a long way to go yet. I've been a user of Spanishpod for a few months, and JP was host there for a good while, and I really like his style, so when I found out he started to work for this site, I had to come and check it out. ^^

[jpv206]

Evandar, thanks for checking us out!

Podcasts like SpanishPod101 are really good at improving your listening comprehension, especially if you listen daily. To reach your language goals, though, you'll still have to go out and speak to people... practice practice practice!

Good luck and thanks again for listening!

[Evandar]

Evandar, thanks for checking us out!

Podcasts like SpanishPod101 are really good at improving your listening comprehension, especially if you listen daily. To reach your language goals, though, you'll still have to go out and speak to people... practice practice practice!

Good luck and thanks again for listening!

No problem, it's an exciting site, if a little confusing, at least now in the beginning, haha. As for going out and speaking Spanish to people...well, I have a Bolivian friend who lives here in Norway, and I've typed with him a fair bit, which is really helpful, but I haven't really tried to speak Spanish with him yet. You're right, though, I should try to rectify that soon. It'll probably be really awkward in the beginning, and then as I calm down a little, conversation can start to flow a little easier.

[jpv206]

Cool, Evandar. Let us know if there's anything you'd like to see here, or if you have any questions about anything!