{"id":7439,"date":"2022-03-25T10:48:23","date_gmt":"2022-03-25T10:48:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.applelanguages.com\/blog\/?p=7439"},"modified":"2022-04-05T12:17:34","modified_gmt":"2022-04-05T12:17:34","slug":"spanish-in-buenos-aires","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.applelanguages.com\/blog\/locations\/argentina\/buenos-aires\/spanish-in-buenos-aires.php","title":{"rendered":"Spanish in Buenos Aires"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Today our blog was taken over by George who travelled with us to our incredible Spanish school in Buenos Aires.<\/p>\n

Keep reading to find out how he got on!<\/p>\n

\u201cHola. Una empanada, por favor\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201c<\/em>\u00bfQu\u00e9<\/em> tipo quieres<\/em>?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026Ehhh\u2026 Sorry\u2026 Do you speak English?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

I discovered two things during my first few days in Buenos Aires. One: empanadas are impossibly cheap and delicious (and are now a fundamental part of my diet in Argentina). Two: English, always the fallback option when travelling in Europe, is not widely known here at all. What\u2019s more, the Spanish spoken in the Buenos Aires region, Rioplatense, is a distinct dialect of its own – influenced by the millions of Italians who immigrated to Argentina from the 1850s onwards.<\/p>\n

\"\"Since studying Spanish at school many years ago, my experience of using it since has been typical of many other native English speakers in Europe. By which I mean, we\u2019ll \u2018have a go\u2019 with a well-rehearsed opening salvo, before receiving a response in perfect English – often technically better than our own. Apart from a token \u2018gracias\u2019 at the end, the Spanish tends to stop here.<\/p>\n

As a result of this, I\u2019d almost forgotten everything over the years.<\/p>\n

Learning the language<\/h4>\n

When it comes to learning languages, particularly as an adult, being thrown in at the deep end is often the most effective way of making real<\/em> progress – as scary, or as awkward, as this may make some interactions. My Spanish language school in Buenos Aires<\/a> clearly agreed with this approach – and had one fundamental rule to make it happen.<\/p>\n

Spanish was the only<\/em> language permitted in the classroom, for both teachers and students. To fresh enrollees – whose repertoires barely stretched beyond \u2018hola\u2019, \u2018por favor\u2019 and a local swearword or two – this initially seemed unthinkable, if not counterintuitive. However, with surprising speed, this immersive, in-at-the-deep-end method really did start to work for us all.<\/p>\n

For example, when a classmate asked what \u2018arroz<\/a>\u2019 (rice) meant during a reading comprehension, our teacher asked those of us who knew the word to describe it, charades style if necessary, with the little Spanish we had;<\/p>\n

\u201cE<\/em>l arroz es comida\u201d<\/em> (rice is food<\/em>)<\/p>\n

\u201cE<\/em>s una peque\u00f1a cosa blanca\u201d <\/em>(it\u2019s a small white thing<\/em>)<\/p>\n

\u201cE<\/em>s popular en Asia\u201d<\/em> (you\u2019ve got this one)<\/em><\/p>\n

Persevering in this way showed us that, yes, we could<\/em> get by without our English safety net, while giving all of us more experience of speaking and listening to Spanish without pause.<\/p>\n

Activities in Buenos Aires<\/h4>\n

Outside of the classroom, daily activities organised by the school – such as dance lessons (salsa and tango), 5-a-side football, history lectures, and a trip to La Boca – gave us opportunities to practice our Spanish in the wild, while learning more about this fascinating country.<\/p>\n\n\t\t