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So after 24 days of intense duolingo, it is not possible to say simple things like this, without outside help.
For some reason, all language courses I've seen focus on the completely unusable present tense for a long, long time. While it seems simple and perhaps not entirely unwise to learn to conjugate verbs in present tense, it makes it impossible to communicate even simple thoughts.
The present point in time is just that - a POINT, while the rest of everything is in the past and possibly the future. Simple present tense is useless unless you want to talk like Tarzan.
I am happy with duolingo as I am much more comfortable with the language, learning about 1000 words, internalizing present-tense regular verb ending, and spending a lot of time drilling because if its gamification. But I also spent a day learning to say how often el Senior Gonzales showers.
Duolingo has expanded my comfort zone to seek help elsewhere: youtube and various websites.
And I am completely flabbergasted that, after a couple of weeks of present-tense conjugation, I was not shown how simple it is to construct simple and useful phrases like "he estado estudiando" (I've been studying) or "fui al supermercado" (I went to to supermarket)... Crap, "he estado" is the same for any "...ando" verbs! It is a trivial amount of added complexity, but so much more useful!
I don't think I am too crazy, or that my needs are that different from others. Why is it that language aquisition, a basic human need, so poorly understood that even extremely well-funded and determined groups of linguists make learning a language so inefficient?
I think duolingo is great as an engine of learning (it got me off my ass and completely addicted), but it could be much better, I think. And obviously it cannot be the only source of learning.
He estado despotricando! Mi diatriba es estupida.