💾 Archived View for dressupgeekout.com › gemlog › 20210818.gmi captured on 2022-01-08 at 13:38:25. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content
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Haven't been uploading this like I said I would, lol.
I think the main thing to communicate is that I've decided to study Spanish in earnest -- for real this time.
So, like, I'm half Mexican (basically), but Spanish wasn't ever really a presence in my family life. (There's kind of a reason for that.) But anyway, I also live in a very Mexican neighborhood. So here I am, more or less able to understand what I read and what other people are saying (kinda) -- but not able to say anything for myself. I can't contribute to the conversation!
A week or so ago, I decided I was fed up with that. I don't like having those "basically"s and those "kinda"s. Truthfully, I feel that I need to be able to express myself in Spanish.
My French studies throughout middle school, high school and college have greatly informed my understanding of romance languages in general, so I've had kinda-sorta of a leg up already. That's a good thing! I love languages anyway, so I'm glad I stuck with learning a foreign language that whole time. But I might be starting to feel some regret about having chosen French when Spanish was always an option. I dunno. Feels like a missed opportunity, somehow.
Some conscious, purposeful changes I've made in my daily routine recently:
- I switched the default system language of "dawnchorus" (my daily driver, a MacBook Pro) to Spanish.
- I've begun watching Club de Cuervos on Netflix, without subtitles. It's pretty funny!
- I've resumed the Duolingo habit. I kinda gave up on Duolingo after I decided I wasn't really learning what I wanted to with their Korean module, but their Spanish one seems fine.
- Been reading Spanish Wikipedia articles out loud every once in a while to improve my speaking.
I'm not sure if total fluency is ever going to happen, but I want to keep this up as long as I can.