We Leveled Up At Las LiLas School – Now Onto Spanish Class Round 2

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Tres cosas importantes en la vida – which means 3 important things in life – to the Spanish are salud (health), dinero (money), and amor (love).  After our Spanish teacher Anna translated what salud means, I asked in all ignorance, “What about heaven?  ¿Cómo se dice “heaven” en español?  (How to say heaven in Spanish?)”  The entire class was silence and then bursted into laughter.  It was happy kind of laughter.  I soon joined them after realizing that salud means health, not hell.  Oh well.  I probably speak Spanish with a Singapore accent while Anna speaks English with a Spanish accent.  How come I was the only one who didn’t get it.

Now you get it?  By now you should.  You knew that I have enrolled the first Spanish lesson this July and since then, my journey has not been that smooth sailing.  If I was to redesign the Spanish curriculum for the English speaking people, I would list out a whole set of vocabulary that is common between Spanish and English (the word ‘curriculum’ is a good example).  And I would also create a list of words that are similar between the two languages.  Such as importantes versus important, vacaciones versus vacations, salario versus salary, familia versus family.  Imagine, all of a sudden, Spanish is not such a foreign language anymore.  Imagine, the level of confidence that I would have, that any English speaking person would have, after seeing that entire list of similarity.

Though I have missed the first class of this new season (because of that trip, you know which trip I am talking about), I am as determined as ever to do well and pass the examination with the rest of the class.  I love my class, I really do.  I don’t want to be left behind as the rest of the class continues to the next level.  These are fun people, people with interesting careers, and most importantly, people whom I look forward to meet every week.

This new season I am doing something different.  I think one way to learn a new language is to try it without thinking too hard about it.  Once again … ¿En la vida solo hay tres cosas importantes amor, salud y dinero?

Si, el mismo orden (yes, in that same order).

45 thoughts on “We Leveled Up At Las LiLas School – Now Onto Spanish Class Round 2”

  2. wilfrid Post author

    Honeymeow – ¡Hola! I hardly understand what you say but I will certainly revisit this comment once I level up again. Wait … personas is persons, español is Spanish, No muchas probably is not much or not many and … interesante has got to have something to do with the word ‘interesting’ right?

    Thanks for dropping by and have a good weekend!

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  6. tansiying

    Keep it up! I think having a group of people learning together motivate you… unlike me, I start to stray and thinking of learning French… Haha, but guess its not so useful to be half “spanish-able” so I might go back to doing Beginner 2 soon!

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  7. Darkspore

    Hey dude, me got a bright idea for you. Install The Witcher Enhanced with Spanish voiceovers only, and use English or Spanish subtitles, and play the whole game through. I think it might just do wonders for your Spanish 🙂

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  8. wilfrid Post author

    Honeymeow – Oh, there are quite a few of us learning Spanish. Many people learn Spanish for various reasons. Some are exchange students, some have plan to visit Spain, as for me, I just wish to exercise my brain.

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  9. wilfrid Post author

    Si Ying – Personally I think French is harder. At least to me. I mean we can still more or less pronounce the Spanish words by reading the alphabets. I doubt so for French. But having said that, French is such a romantic language! And I would prefer to visit Paris any time.

    Beginner 2 class seems tough. We shall see!

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  11. si ying

    Yesterday I was talking to the Aunt in Paris and she was asking me why not learn French haha. Yap I think French is tougher, with little resemblance to English… like they have alot of “C’est” related word such as C’est Bon means delicious which I remembered from a food variety episode featuring food in France.

    Oh God, I am trying to motivate myself to revise my Spanish before the school informs me of my class. But I hadnt done much revision yet haha!

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  12. wilfrid Post author

    Si Ying – What a coincidence! I have an aunt in Paris too!

    I tried to learn French. Very darn hard. In fact, now onto lesson 3 of Beginner 2. It is getting really tough! How do the Spanish form sentences on the fly?! So complicated.

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  13. si ying

    Oh actually the Aunt in Paris isnt really my relative. Jus happened that a year ago when I first went to Europe alone I met her. Actually I met up with a friend in Barcelona then went Paris alone. Was june and so brought along summer clothing. But then it was super cold and raining when i reached paris. Plus first time alone so abit blur also. Happened that some stranger who helped me find my way back to my hotel told me that there is a chinatown near to my hotel that I might like, so I went there. She runs a VCD rental shop in Chinatown there and I happened to ask her for direction for chinese wanton mee. In the end instead of eating at the shop I bought a bowl of instant noodles of wanton mee flavour and then realised my hotel doesnt come with a kitchen. So went back to her shop to ask if she could spare me some hot water to cook my noodles! Haha long funny story but since then have been in contact with her. 🙂

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  16. wilfrid Post author

    Si Ying – Very gang ho you were! Ha ha ha. I spent quite a lot of time alone in Paris (school holiday then work). I thought it is a pretty good city to be on your own at times. So much to explore.

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  19. Pingback: So This is What the Spanish Exam at Las Lilas School Beginner 2 is Like

  20. Jonathan

    Hi Wilfrid,

    I happened to stumble on your page. Glad you have had an interesting journey learning the Spanish language so far. I picked up a few interesting points from your sharing, they are indeed very valid.

    Spanish is indeed a relatively easier language for the English speakers due to the fact that it is more consistent in the pronunciation (very much like Bahasa Malayu, with little exceptions). In fact, it is more consistent than the English language, for instance we pronounce “reg” differently in different words – try pronouncing “regular” and “regards”. Both begin with the letters “reg” yet its pronounced differently. In Spanish, “reg” is pronounced exactly the same way wherever it appears.

    I remember my learn Spanish days too. I found putting the language into good use on a daily basis helps A GREAT DEAL. One of the ways I have found to be very useful is by keeping a journal (or a diary). By just writing simple phrases helps getting the language into our “system”. Need to try to keep it simple though – our tendency is to try to write long complicated sentences.

    So, whatever new words I learned, I tried to use them in whatever new words in that little journal. It does not matter if I got stuck somewhere, there’s always the dictionary or I would just write them in English first and revisit them when I got “up-to-level”. Try it, it will be very interesting when you re-visit those initial pages after some time.

    Depending on the learning styles, there are of course other things a learner can do to master the language faster… Hope we can keep exchanging experiences.

    Keep it up!

    Jonathan

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  21. wilfrid Post author

    Jonathan – Thanks for your tips! OK, I will try to write short sentences in Spanish and get into my system. Seriously, I don’t think I can write anything complex and long. I will be happy if I can write something simple.

    I think the challenge of Spanish, at least to me, is the verb form and grammar. Maybe one day it will come as a second nature. But until then, it is still brutal memorization. Ha ha ha.

    We have just started the level 3 of the course. After 2 months of break, I think all the Spanish phrases have just vanished into thin air!

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    1. Jonathan

      Hey Wilfrid,

      How are you doing with your Spanish language learning endeavor?

      It’s been 5 years since. Are you using the language in ways you had intended to?

      Share with us your journey. Curious to know…

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  22. Chin Ta

    Hi Wilfred, I don’t know if you remember me but I was in B1 with you with my friend Aaron and we are now in Mexico… I was searching for Las Lilas and stumbled across your website, very interesting 🙂 Are you still taking classes at Las Lilas? Because I might want to continue when I reach Singapore in June…

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  23. wilfrid Post author

    Chin Ta – Wow, hello old friend! How’s life in Mexico?!

    Yes, we are finishing E1 now and onto E2 this month. I think you guys can skip all the way to beyond E2! Quite a number of us still stick together in the same class. Do keep in touch! See you in June. Eager to hear your Mexico war stories 🙂

    Cynthia and I will be heading to Spain this June …

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  26. Chin Ta

    Ah i see, yes Spain will be great especially now you can speak the language it will be more fun I guarantee! We are taking classes here but only learning and using the basics of the language… I want to continue but might take intensive classes because I’ll be on school holiday till August 🙂 We should catch up once I come back

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  28. wilfrid Post author

    Chin Ta – I don’t know man. I think I may be able to ask “how much does it cost?” but not sure if I can understand the reply … ha ha ha.

    I am pretty sure you can catch up in no time! Yep. Let’s catch up, regardless.

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  31. wilfrid Post author

    Si Ying – Oh, they didn’t notify us. We have to keep emailing them.

    Not planned yet. Ha ha ha. I think my top priority is to try to memorize as much Spanish as possible 🙂

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  33. wilfrid Post author

    Si Ying – Oh dear … directions … hmmm … the only thing I can say is … sige todo recto … something like that … lol.

    I think I shall start a page in my webbie just to put down all the Spanish notes for revision’s sake.

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  34. si ying

    haha actually thats cool! and i can take it as my revision also. i keep trying to use as much spanish as i can as possible in daily life but dont seem to work haha 🙁 the only way i can is to sometimes write in spanish for my blog entries but hardly possible to write say a para haha

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  35. YY

    Hola, soy YY, la estudiante en las lilas escuela tambien. Me gusta mucha aprender el espanol y espero practica con nosotros.
    I’d like to share with you all on how I learn.
    1) Change the interface of ur msn, facebook , skype and some website that u r quite familiar with to espanol language. By looking at the word, it helps to recognize and remember it. Since u r familar with the word, changing the interface is like having the whole page translated to espanol in seconds.

    2) Write simple sentence or quote on your status in facebook, msn or skype. It can be like “estoy feliz hoy”. Don’t worry of the grammar mistake. Just learn how to build the sentence first then later when u learn the correct grammar, u will remember. And I’m fortunate to have oversea friend who speaks spanish to correct my grammar when they saw my status.

    3) Chat/email with your spanish speaking friends. When I chat with spanish speaking friend, I will try to construct the sentence and when I come to the word that I dunno, I will write in english and my friend will translate the word for me. In this way, it helps me to learn new word cos I construct the sentence, I will remember how the word is being use. Also, when my friends reply, I’ll learn new words and sentence structure too.

    4) Learn vocab by audio/video materials. I’m someone who will remember thing easily by watching instead of reading. So this is a useful method for me.

    5) Play games in spanish. It is fun and therefore u will like to learn more.

    6) Write the name of the object in spanish and paste on it. I also write the grammar rule in post-it note and paste it on the wall. After I can remember it, I will remove it and throw away. Then, I can replace with new things 😉

    7) Listen to spanish songs. I love latin musics, mainly tango, salsa and bachata. Listen to the lyris and learn words too. I started by learning the song title first.

    That is what I’m currently doing when I started taking lesson in las lilas. I’m planning to find few spanish learning lovers to form a group where we can hang out and practice spanish. Actually, Me and my another 2 friends used to have practice session after the class. It was very good! We enjoyed it and hope to grow the group 😉

    Espero vosotros ‘enjoy” leyendo.

    Saludos,
    YY

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  36. wilfrid Post author

    YY – Hola! Thanks for dropping by. And your lovely suggestions in learning Spanish too. Which level are you at now? We are on the Tuesday class. Do drop by and say hi (if you are not in my class!)!

    Saludos! [Cool, now I learn a new word]

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  37. YY

    Solo B1, en Antonio clase todos los lunes, siete en punto. Nosotros tenemos siete clases ya.
    Creo que es importante practicar siempre, let’s do aqui en esta “blog”.
    Aprendendo feliz! Happy learning.

    Hablamos pronto,
    YY

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  38. wilfrid Post author

    YY – ¡Hola! ¿Tienes un blog? ¡Su español es muy bueno! Somos en classe de Natalia, cada martes.

    OK. That’s all I can write (after pondering for 3 days what to write … lol). Thanks for dropping by and see you see 🙂

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  40. YY

    Wilfrid,

    Es sabado hoy y estoy revisar el español en mi oficina. It takes alot of efforts to learn a language and therefore i revise every Saturday if i’m free.

    Estoy planificación viajar a América Latina o España el año que viene, es por eso que estoy aprendiendo español ahora.

    Just try to write anything that you want to say. I will usually construct the sentence and then refer to dictionary to double check on the grammar and spelling. Sometimes, you will learn new words and by keep typing the new word, you will remember. So, don’t restrict yourself to write only those words that you had learn.

    Por cierto (by the way), no tengo un blog pero puedes agregar mi en Facebook. Mi dirrección de correo electrónico es coolgengster@hotmail.com.

    Espero vemos pronto.
    YY

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