Learning Spanish was one of the most enjoyable and rewarding journeys I've had learning languages. In this article, I'll tell you how I learnt Spanish, all the way from classes at school to teaching myself the language for dissertation research in Madrid and volunteering as an English teacher in Ecuador.

My Early Interest in Languages

Learning Spanish didn't happen overnight; it all started with small sparks of curiosity. I hadn't always planned to learn Spanish, but my early experiences gradually built my enthusiasm for languages—and eventually for Spanish in particular. Here's how it began.

Learning Spanish at Primary School

During primary school our French teacher began offering evening classes in Spanish. Though her French lessons included plenty of focus on grammar and verb conjugations, I still enjoyed learning French, and so I was keen to try learning Spanish - especially when the teacher told us that Spanish is easier to learn than French!

Whilst she was an excellent teacher, her Spanish lessons left me disheartened. At that time, Spanish was completely new to me, and thus seemed harder than French. This wasn't helped by the fact that the classes were held after school and relied on printouts rather than the typical chalkboard instruction used for other subjects. I can still remember squinting at the grainy, black and white speech bubbles from the dialogues littered across these pages. I was struck by the Spanish use of upside down exclamation and question marks at the start of sentences, feeling both bewildered and intrigued by the sight of ¡Hola! and ¿Cómo está?.

Learning Spanish at Secondary School

At secondary school I continued to study French, and from the second year had the option to choose another language with the aim of eventually taking it at GCSE level (the exams students in England sit at the age of 16). I didn't need any time to mull over which language this would be, as I was sufficiently encouraged by the brief time I'd spent learning Spanish at primary school.

Both French and Spanish went about as well as they could have done given the inherent limitations of studying a language at school. The teachers were great, and they even let us watch the occasional film in these languages to keep things interesting. Although like most teenagers I probably spent too much time chatting with friends during some lessons, I was fortunate that I genuinely enjoyed learning Spanish, and so I felt willing and able to put in the time and effort required to do well in the GCSE exams - ending up with A* in both Spanish and French.

For A Level (one of the most common qualifications students take aged 17 to 18 in England), I had to choose three subjects. Though I gave serious thought to the prospect of choosing both French and Spanish, I decided that it would give me a more balanced resumé if I only included one - and so I went with French on account of having studied it longer. Because I love learning about how the world works, the other two I chose were Economics and History. Despite this decision, I hoped to come back to learning Spanish one day.

Not Knowing How to Improve

Although I loved learning French and Spanish at school and will always be grateful to my teachers, there are certain key elements for language learning that school simply can't provide.

To become fluent in a language, you need consistent exposure to it, and in a variety of ways. Spending a couple of hours a week reading a few pages of a textbook and reciting some verb conjugations is not enough. Not only is it not enough, but it’s the least effective way to learn a language. It’s like reading a recipe and forgetting the ingredients. 

This isn’t the fault of teachers. When faced with a classroom of twenty to forty pupils, it’s very difficult to do anything other than meander through a textbook in unison. This almost invariably leads to failing to speak the language, and the worst part is we tend to be discouraged by the whole experience, and give up on learning another language altogether. We think that if we couldn’t learn a language with the help of a teacher, what chance could we possibly have of accomplishing it on our own.

The opposite is true. Teaching yourself a language is easier. Sure, a private tutor or a night class isn’t necessarily going to do any harm if that’s your preference, but you really don’t need one. All you have to do is provide your brain with enough exposure to the language, and it will do the rest. You don’t need to learn verb conjugations, grammar rules, or vocabulary lists in isolation. You just have to provide your brain with enough examples of sentences containing a certain verb, and it will realise how that verb conjugates automatically. Likewise if your brain comes across enough sentences containing a certain grammar rule, it will pick up the grammar rule naturally. Though we will go into more detail in the following pages, this is the crux of becoming fluent in a language. Show your brain enough of it, and your brain will spot the patterns. 

We could compare this to looking at the Bayeux Tapestry. If we focused on every tiny sinew of thread that comprised an archer’s bow, we may eventually gain a respectable sense of its shape. We will fail, however, to comprehend where the archer’s bow fits into the rest of the tapestry, let alone who was firing at whom. 

The same inherent problem arises when learning languages the traditional way. If we focus on grammar rules, verb conjugations, or vocabulary lists, we may remember them for a short while, or perhaps even much longer, but we will never understand how they all fit together in natural sentences, both spoken and written. It’s therefore vital, and far more enjoyable, to take a step back, and study entire scenes of the tapestry at once. To see the archer’s bow in the context of the cavalry being fired at. To see the new word in the context of a sentence it would be used in.

The Breakthrough: Two Semesters at the Sorbonne

I wish I’d known this when I moved to Paris in the autumn of 2017. Studying history in England, I took an optional year abroad at the Sorbonne, which I’d qualified to do on the basis of having done French at A Level (final year of secondary education in England). Deep down I knew this was scant preparation for taking a year of university seminars taught in French, but it was too good an opportunity to ignore. I had nine months to improve before arriving, but despite repeatedly vowing to work on my French, I never felt like I knew how to. I skimmed through various books, blindly hoping that one of them would bring about some sort of eureka moment. When this moment wasn’t forthcoming, I gave up. And so I wandered into my first lecture woefully unprepared. 

For all its inherent limitations, something school had given me was an ability to read French without getting completely lost. More complex sentences were still beyond me, but I could at least recognise some words and grammar rules. It was this small foothold in the language that made me think the year abroad could be feasible. I’d heard the cliché that immersion in a place where the language is spoken was the only way to become fluent, and so I thought that simply by being in Paris I would learn French. 

Though this turned out to be partly true, it could have been so much easier. My approach - which was essentially to take no approach - ensured I hardly had a clue what was going on in seminars during first semester, resulting in a tirade from a professor barely veiling their disgust at my lack of French proficiency. It also meant that when French students made conversation with me, I could hardly muster more than a few phrases. 

In the end, I got lucky. My patchy reading level, and the patience of the majority of the professors, was enough to keep my head above water for the first semester, and I gradually became more at ease with the language. The barrage of reading required for history essays and seminars ensured my reading comprehension went from strength to strength, and though I still found it hard to understand the majority of the seminars, I could feel my listening comprehension slowly improving. 

The first class of the semester had been a lecture-seminar double-header. For the three hours it lasted, I managed to make one note; ‘8th November?’. Sure enough, when 8th November came round, nothing happened. Nothing relating to that module, anyway. My listening ability had somehow made some strides. 

For weeks I’d had the demoralising sense I was barely understanding anything the professors were saying. Though I don’t recall the date, I remember vividly the moment when things seemed to move up a gear. One seminar in early winter, I noticed I was picking up more words than usual, and felt encouraged. Without thinking, I stopped trying to translate everything the professor said into English. It was like a weight had been lifted. I felt less mentally fatigued, and discovered I understood more than I thought.

This brought to light two essential elements for becoming fluent in a language. The first, as we’ve already touched on, is immersion. The couple of months I’d spent attending seminars had helped my ears become more and more familiar with real, spoken French - not the robotic recordings of French A Level textbooks. 

The second, is to not translate. This can seem confusing at first. If you don’t understand what’s being said, surely it’s necessary to find out what it means?  Well, it depends where and when. Whilst listening to or reading a language in a passive setting, it is best to leave your senses to focus on the words they’re hearing and seeing, rather than muddying the waters with confusing attempts at translation. When you first learn phrases and sentences during your active learning, however, you will need to see a translation at some stage to grasp their meanings - more on this later.

By second semester I was frustrated again. I knew I was gradually becoming better at French, but it was completely by accident. I still had no clue how to consciously improve. The issue was the colossal gap between my reading and listening comprehension. I was able to read university-level articles without feeling completely lost, whilst I still couldn’t fully understand a paragraph worth of rambling from a professor. This meant I was reluctant to go back to basics to improve my listening and speaking, as I felt it would hamper the progress I was making with reading comprehension. At the time, I was unaware that improving my listening comprehension didn’t require the ‘back to basics’ approach of school textbooks, so I ended up doing nothing to address it. The result was a slow, organic process of my listening comprehension steadily improving over the second semester. 

By the end of it, I felt unrecognisably confident in comparison with that first day when I couldn’t even make an accurate note. The only disappointment was that my speaking had barely improved, largely through a combination of my lack of commitment to it and the fact the lingua franca of our group of international friends was often English.

Though my listening still needed plenty of work, the hours of seminars had brought it to a level where I felt confident enough to engage in French podcasts and TV series in my spare time. As I began to enjoy watching French films and series, I noticed my listening comprehension rapidly improve. Feeling encouraged, I even began to repeat some of the sentences I heard in the hope I could remember them and say them in the future. It was this foray into self-study that helped me realise how to learn a language - and how to do it in a fast, enjoyable way - and it was this understanding that shaped how I learnt Spanish.

Teaching Myself Spanish

When I returned to England for my final year of university, I immediately took everything I'd learnt in Paris and applied it to learning Spanish. Before looking at this in more detail, it's worth quickly explaining the various reasons I wanted to learn Spanish again, as these motivations were the driving force behind how I learnt Spanish.

Motivation for Learning Spanish

Although I learn languages because I enjoy the process in general, there's always more specific reasons for deciding to learn a certain language at a given time. For Spanish, these were :

Personal Goals:

• To communicate with ease if I was ever fortunate enough to spend time in Spanish-speaking countries like Mexico, Spain, and Ecuador.

• To learn more about the history and cultures of Spanish-speaking countries.

• To enjoy Spanish media like books, series, films, news, and music.

Research:

• To read the work of historians writing in Spanish to help with researching the Spanish Civil War during my final year of university.

• Being able to read primary sources in Spanish to help with research for my dissertation - which looked into fascism in Spain during the 1930s through comparisons with contemporary fascist regimes.

Choosing Effective Resources

My experience in Paris had shown me what I would need to do to learn other languages and what sort of resources I should use. Combining these played a pivotal role in how I learnt Spanish.

Not all learning materials are created equal. It's vital you use materials and content that are appropriate to the three fundamental elements of learning any language. I call these :

1. Passive learning: Immersing in authentic Spanish that first-language speakers would watch, listen to, or read - and doing this as often as possible. Fortunately, the passive nature of immersion means you can attach this to things you already do, such as your commute, cooking, cleaning, or exercise.

2. Active learning: Taking time out of your day to actively learn Spanish through learning whole phrases or sentences. I call this Sentence Collecting, but you might have come across other terms like 'chunking' or 'sentence mining'. They all boil down to more or less the same thing; learning whole phrases or sentences. This is much more effective than trying to learn individual words, as learning a phrase or sentence provides you with multiple words in one go, improves your understanding of the grammar contained within that phrase, and gives you phrases you can use in conversation with Spanish speakers.

3. Practice: This is simply having conversations with Spanish speakers - be it through typed messages, audio messages, voice calls, or even in person if you happen to live in a Spanish-speaking country, region, or community. Practice is the most natural and authentic way of applying one of the most effective memory techniques: using or applying what you've learnt.

If you'd like to learn more about these fundamental principles of language learning, check out How to Learn Any Language: Free 40 minute Video + eBook. They’re the principles that provided the foundation for how I learnt Spanish.

Passive Learning

It's essential to focus on 'authentic' Spanish - in other words, content that first-language speakers would watch, listen to, or read. During the several months I spent teaching myself Spanish, I used a variety of podcasts, YouTube channels, series, and films - especially football podcasts based in Madrid. Due to the convenience of audio and the passive nature of immersion, I was able to spend hours each day listening to Spanish radio and podcasts - be it during my commute, cooking, cleaning, or doing exercise. The addition of immersion was one of the most significant improvements between how I learnt languages at school and how I learnt Spanish to fluency during my final year of university.

Listening trains your ear to the rhythm and flow of the language. It’s not about understanding everything, but about becoming more and more familiar with sound patterns. This is particularly important for Castilian Spanish, which is often spoken at a notoriously fast pace.

If you'd like far more detailed information on the benefits of passive learning and how to implement it with the rest of your journey learning Spanish, check out the How to Learn Spanish Guide, which not only includes a flexible, step-by-step plan for learning the language, but also covers the history of the Spanish language and all the free, online resources you need to learn Spanish.

Watching Spanish Movies and TV Shows

Movies and TV shows weren’t just entertainment—they were essential tools in how I learnt Spanish. Shows like La Casa de Papel (Money Heist) taught me idiomatic expressions and slang, whilst documentaries like 1994 allowed me to learn about Mexican politics in the 90s whilst immersing in Spanish. To keep it low-pressure, I started with subtitles in Spanish. Reading along helped me connect spoken words with their written forms. After a while, I progressed to occasionally watching without Spanish subtitles for the sake of improving my listening comprehension, but I also continued to use Spanish subtitles as I just prefer using them. If you'd like more detailed advice about how and when to use Spanish subtitles, I'd recommend How to Use Subtitles to Learn Spanish.

If you’re worried about finding suitable content, Netflix has many Spanish-language options, and a quick internet search of 'telenovelas...' followed by the name of a Spanish-speaking country will provide you with plenty of suggestions for series to watch from across the Spanish-speaking world!

Starting to Read

Even reading can be passive, depending on your approach. I started by casually browsing Spanish articles and tweets on my Twitter feed (now called X), and gradually progressed to reading books in Spanish once my passive and active learning had enabled me to do so. More on this shortly.

How I Learnt Spanish through Active Learning: Assimil

When I embarked on the journey of learning Spanish, discovering Assimil was a game-changer. As a French company, I'd naturally come across them whilst in Paris, and the added bonus of being able to maintain my French by learning Spanish with a French book made it the ideal option for my active learning at that time.

Assimil's blend of dialogue, translation, and audio lessons makes it ideal for learners aiming for the reassurance of progressive lessons with the practical benefits of the dialogue format. However, like any study tool, its effectiveness depends on how you use it.

Most Assimil books have around a hundred lessons, each structured in the format of a dialogue in the target language, with the corresponding translation on the opposite page. As the lessons progress, the dialogues become more complex, to the point where Assimil promise to have brought someone to a B2 level in the CEFR by the end of their method. Although it’s essential to immerse, and at some point practice, in order to achieve this by the end of the book, there’s nothing more the book or e-course could do to help towards this - so it’s an honest enough promise. 

The format of Assimil, with Spanish on the left page, the corresponding French (English versions are also available) translation on the right, makes it very easy to use. In fact, it was this ability to maintain my French whilst improving my Spanish that made it my chosen resource for how I actively learnt Spanish. Personally, I’ve found Assimil very helpful when learning languages, and this format is why I don’t tend to use parallel texts or graded readers. Your reading comprehension will develop through sentence collecting, and this certainly includes Assimil. The difference is that Assimil structures every aspect of progression for you. 

Assimil is a fantastic resource, but getting the most from it requires a bit of strategy. How you approach its lessons determines your overall results. For me, a structured and consistent plan brought the best outcomes. Here are my tips for using Assimil effectively, based on how I learnt Spanish with their material:

1. Commit to Daily Practice (as regularly as you can): Consistency plays a pivotal role in determining how quickly you make progress with a language. Assimil lessons are manageable because they’re short, often taking no more than 30 minutes to complete. This makes sticking to a daily schedule easier.

2. Grammar: Each lesson has accompanying grammatical footnotes, briefly explaining any new grammar concepts from the dialogue above. Personally, I find this an ideal way to learn grammar. It provides the context of a dialogue, and also keeps to using straightforward explanations unburdened by detail. It’s therefore a great way to learn grammar through context, whilst simultaneously having any required clarification to hand. If you’d prefer a more rigorous approach to grammar, every seventh lesson is a review lesson, covering the key grammar points of the previous round of lessons in more detail. The back of the book contains a relatively comprehensive look at the language’s grammar, as well as some verb tables and a word index. 

3. Adjustments: Implementing passive learning and practice with Spanish speakers takes care of the unavoidable shortcomings with Assimil, but there is a final thing worth mentioning. Assimil began in 1929, and has since championed the idea of going back and reviewing each lesson once you’ve reached the 50th lesson of their method. As such, when you reach lesson fifty, you’d also review the first lesson that day. The following day you’d do the 51st lesson, whilst reviewing the second lesson, and so on. This is completely unnecessary, and doesn’t seem to have any research to back it up. Rest assured that techniques like keeping a notebook, diary, or using flashcard software are far more effective, especially when combined with immersion, practice, and the rest of your active learning.

4. Enhanced Sense of Progression: Perhaps the most valuable aspect of Assimil is that it provides a clear sense of direction to your language learning. There will be days when you find immersion, and even practice, a bit frustrating. If you’re feeling a bit tired you may suddenly feel frustrated you can’t understand more than you did the day before. That’s all perfectly normal. Your brain is becoming better at recognising the language all the time during immersion, but you only consciously notice it occasionally, giving the false impression you have sudden giant leaps in understanding the language, when in reality it was just the final breakthrough of a cumulative process constantly developing during immersion. Even knowing this, there will still be times you feel frustrated listening to radio or podcasts. When you feel like this, having something like Assimil, something which provides a clear path of progression, can be reassuring. When you’re feeling frustrated with immersion, it can be comforting to know that if you still do that day’s lesson of Assimil, you’re on the right track. You’ll be on the right track anyway, but you might find that reassurance invaluable.

5. Repeat Dialogues Out Loud: Think of this as training your speaking muscles. Repeating dialogues not only improves pronunciation but also builds confidence. Even if I felt unsure about the sounds, practicing aloud made the language start feeling natural to me, and it was noticeable how much easier I found it to start speaking with Spanish speakers than I had done trying to speak French when I first arrived in Paris.

6. Limitations of ASSIMIL: Using one resource does not mean you have to avoid other resources. Though the dialogue format of Assimil is great for learning phrases in context, the nature of a dialogue means some of the phrases won’t necessarily be ones you want to note down and use. There’ll still be plenty, but there’ll also be some you won’t feel the need to put into Anki or try to use in a form of diary, for example. YouTube videos providing lists of common phrases, though often lacking in context, tend to include a whole host of expressions you’re likely to want to use yourself.

7. Continue Passive Learning and Practice: It’s vital you passively immerse in Spanish, and at some point begin practicing with Spanish speakers. It’s also important to take any of the dialogue phrases from Assimil you find relevant and use them with memory techniques you enjoy. 

If you're curious about the methodology behind Assimil, The Assimil Method article provides more in-depth insights into how it works - from the perspective of Assimil themselves.

Of course, you don't have to use Assimil for active learning. My preferred medium for learning most languages are actually YouTube channels, and if you're looking for some dedicated to learning Spanish, then I'd recommend YouTube Channels for Learning Spanish.

If you're looking for resources for every aspect of learning Spanish, I highly recommend The Best Resources for Learning Spanish. It will save you hours looking for resources - whether you're a curious beginner or a seasoned learner.

Dissertation Research in Madrid

During the first few months of the first semester, I immersed in Spanish and actively learned the language through Assimil. I fitted this into what little spare time I had available, which was taken up by university assignments, research, an evening and weekend job in Leeds city centre, and meeting up with friends and family whenever possible. After the couple of months it took me to complete Assimil's Spanish book, I stopped actively learning Spanish. My reading level had reached the point where I could evaluate the arguments of Spanish historians and navigate the website of Madrid's Hemeroteca Municipal comfortably enough to exchange emails with them about the possibility of a trip to their archives in the new year (the whole trip was actually cheaper than going to an archive in London that also had the documents I wanted to read).

From that point on, I maintained and improved my Spanish solely through immersion, as I had to then focus on learning Portuguese, Italian, Catalan, and German. This was again for the pressing requirements of primary source research for my dissertation, but also the same personal motivations I'd had for learning Spanish. I used Assimil's Spanish to Brazilian Portuguese book to learn Portuguese - thus further cementing the strides I'd made with Spanish whilst also developing my Portuguese enough to read about Salazar's Portugal in Portuguese newspapers and history books. I followed the same Assimil-based approach to quickly learn to read Italian and Catalan whilst maintaining my Spanish and French. It's worth noting that this seemingly fast pace of progress stems from two things:

1. French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and Catalan are all Romance languages, and thus have a lot of shared vocabulary. Learning one therefore makes the others much quicker to learn - and this is especially relevant to your reading level. Pronunciation can have significant variation between the languages, but even though many words will have different forms and spellings, these are usually similar enough to make their common origin immediately obvious to anyone familiar with another Romance language. For example, 'university' is université in French, universidad in Spanish, universidade in Portuguese, universitat in Catalan, and università in Italian.

2. The reason I was able to move on from one language to another during this period was because I was able to meet specific reading goals in a short space of time. The rest of the learning process, such as speaking, writing, and to a lesser extent listening, would require more time.

I arrived in Madrid during the third week of January, on a three-day mission to gather as much from the archives as possible whilst also completing a lengthy essay that was soon due. I spent two full days chained to a desk at the Hemeroteca Municipal, assiduously scanning page after page of El Debate (far-right newspaper) and El Socialista (socialist newspaper) onto a USB. During the evenings, I had just about enough time and energy to venture out of the hostel, stroll around Príncipe Pío, and finish the essay at a café.

Speaking with people at the Hemeroteca Municipal, the hostel, and the café was a welcome boost for my Spanish, but it wouldn't be until the summer that I actually spent much time practicing the language. Before then, I took the confidence I'd gained from reading old Spanish newspapers and did the same for sources in Portuguese, Italian, Catalan, French, and German.

Practice: Volunteering as an English Teacher in Ecuador

Having maintained my Spanish listening and reading level through watching Mexican series and doing research for my dissertation, I was fortunate enough to have the means and time available to spend one month of the summer volunteering as an English teacher in Ecuador.

Baldomera

On the long flight to Quito, I started reading an Ecuadorian novel I'd come across on the Kindle store. Although I usually prefer reading non-fiction, I always try to read at least one novel in a language I'm learning, as fiction usually exposes you to a wider range and depth of vocabulary. The novel was called Baldomera, written by Alfredo Pareja Díez Canseco and published in 1938. The author was part of the 'Grupo de Guayaquil', a literary group who - through their writing - sought to depict the realities of daily life for Ecuador's indigenous and African-Ecuadorian communities. Baldomera is often considered to be Díez Canseco's greatest work, and tells the story of Baldomera, an African-Ecuadorian woman forced to struggle against the brutality of the racist and sexist society of 1920s Guayaquil - Ecuador's largest city and port.

Though a novel, the hardships that befall Baldomera are based on grim reality. Aside from the personal injustices suffered by Baldomera, she also participates in an infamous event from Ecuador's history. During the General Strike (la Huelga general) of November 1922, the Ecuadorian Army killed anywhere between 90 and 900 workers - authorised by the country's liberal president, José Luis Tamayo. It is known as la masacre de obreros del 15 de noviembre de 1922 (the massacre of workers of 15 November 1922), and in Díez Canseco's novel, Baldomera was on the frontlines, defending her comrades against the army's brutality before eventually having to flee for her life.

As the first novel I'd read in Spanish, there were plenty of words I hadn't come across before, but this was precisely why it was so helpful for improving my Spanish. I finished reading it not long after arriving in Quito, and was eager to continue learning about Ecuador's history and start practicing Spanish.

Spanish Conversations

The taxi journey from the airport to the hostel gave me an immediate opportunity to practice speaking Spanish. The taxi driver was friendly, asking plenty of questions and recommending Ecuadorian food. He was also curious about what brought me to Ecuador and what I thought of Antonio Valencia - one of the greatest Ecuadorian footballers of the past few decades. Although my spoken Spanish was rusty due to a lack of practice, after just a few days of having similar conversations the words began to flow more smoothly. This is how practice forges your spoken fluency in a language - by making your responses automatic. The more times you hear and respond to a certain type of question, the more you'll be able to answer without thinking.

During the month I spent in Ecuador, I had countless conversations with people in a variety of settings. From speaking to people out and about to chatting with the volunteering organisers on the bus to local communities, I was able to meet amazing people, learn more about Ecuador, and improve my Spanish. And of course, the goal of improving my Spanish was only a goal because it made it possible to achieve the first two - meeting great people and learning about their country and culture.

Aside from the fluency created by having similar conversations in multiple settings, the range of experiences I had in Ecuador also gave me the opportunity to discuss certain topics in Spanish for the first time. Although I got the bus to travel around the country at weekends and would always get the city bus to local communities for volunteering, most sightseeing and trips within Quito suited a taxi. Given the length of Quito - a city perched high up between the mountains of the Andes - some of the taxi journeys were long enough to cover all sorts of topics. One taxi driver, Jaime, covered several trips during my time in Quito, and so eventually we got on to topics as diverse as his detailed work as a sound technician and his thoughts on marriage, life, and the role of the army.

Another time I was fortunate to have a long chat with a lady who drove a taxi to earn extra income. She bemoaned the dominance of English as a global language, saying she found it too difficult and expensive to learn. I told her not to worry, as Spanish was growing by the day in the United States and that other languages like Mandarin Chinese were ascending in global prominence. I half-jokingly assured her, es el fin del idioma ingles ('it's the end of the English language'), and as we both laughed about life, I felt incredibly grateful for the opportunity to connect with people from different parts of the world that learning languages provides. She dropped me off at Estadio Rodrigo Paz Delgado, the home of LDU Quito - one of Ecuador's top football teams. I was there to arrange tickets for myself and a few of the other volunteers to attend the upcoming Copa Libertadores match between LDU Quito and Boca Juniors (one of the top clubs in Argentina - along with their fierce rivals, River Plate). Known as 'La Casa Blanca', the stadium provides a stunning backdrop of the Andes as you watch the game. If you ever find yourself in Quito, I'd definitely recommend it.

Another Spanish conversation I'd never envisaged came when paragliding near Baños de Agua Santa, a thermal springs town about a six hour bus ride to the south east of Quito. The villages surrounding the Chimborazo volcano - Ecuador’s highest point - believe that a pregnant woman caught amidst a storm will give birth to an albino, a son of the volcano. It is also told that Taita Chimborazo is an envious husband to Mama Tungurahua, the volcano that watches over Baños. It is said that when thunder rages through the valleys of the province, it is Chimborazo and Tungurahua glaring and arguing with each other. Two smaller volcanoes that lie close to the feuding couple, Carihuairazo and El Altar, are said to have been beaten by Chimborazo in a battle for the love of Tungurahua.

When we reached the hillside deemed suitable for lifting off, the two guides said we'd need to wait for weather conditions to become more favourable. Wanting to learn more both for the sake of safety and pure curiosity, I asked them what was required in order to paraglide. They then explained the nuances of air pressure, wind, and the importance of these factors in determining whether gliding would be possible. Although I didn't catch every word, I was delighted that I could follow their explanation. It's small moments like these that are important to enjoy and remember throughout your journey learning a language - whether you're a beginner whose just started to understand specific phrases about your daily routine or if you're a more advanced learner chatting about paragliding in the Andes for the first time.

How Fast Is Spoken Spanish?

Spanish, on the Iberian Peninsula, is spoken at a notoriously fast pace. This can seem daunting to learners, but it’s nothing to worry about. Simply by listening to Spanish podcasts each day, your ears will soon become familiar with the pace of the language. This is one of the reasons the majority of the resources in the first three parts of this guide are centred on the Spanish spoken on the Iberian Peninsula. Once you’ve become accustomed to the pace of the Spanish spoken in Spain, those of Latin America - which are usually slower - will seem straightforward. 

Of course, this is just a generalisation. In Latin America, many regions and cities will speak at a different pace from one another. For example, the Spanish spoken in the Ecuadorian Andes is relatively slow compared with the speech of the coastal city of Guayaquil, where life, including Spanish, seems to move at a faster pace. 

I’d read prior to arriving in Ecuador that costeños (those on the coast) tend to speak more quickly than serranos (those in the mountains), but a weekend in Montañita, almost three hours up the coast from Guayaquil, showed how even regional generalisations are nothing more than this.

Montañita is a quiet town, popular amongst surfers and iguanas. There’s a fair bit of nightlife, but this only enhances the laid back feel to the days, as people nurse their hangovers by the Pacific Ocean. The people I met in Montañita spoke Spanish at a much slower pace than those in Guayaquil, and perhaps even than those in the Andes. It all varies according to countless factors, and though many of these are geographical and social, it will also vary from person to person. Some of the people I met in Montañita spoke faster than others, and I can vividly remember someone who spoke at a pace that scarcely got their words out - though this may well have had something to do with the time of day. 

In short, don’t worry about the speed of Spanish. It varies from place to place, and from person to person. By immersing in the language everyday, you’ll become accustomed to the pace soon enough. 

The Joy of Learning Kichwa

For me personally, one of the greatest joys of learning Spanish was that it made it possible to learn about indigenous languages of Latin America.

During several days visiting El Oriente (the East) - the Ecuadorian term for the region of the country covered by the Amazon rainforest - I was able to learn a little about the lives of indigenous communities. Although there are many different indigenous languages spoken in Ecuador, one of the most widely spoken languages (or language groups, depending on how you choose to define 'languages' and 'dialects') is Kichwa. There are Kichwa communities in both the Andes and Amazon, and our guide, José, told us that the Kichwa spoken in these regions could differ significantly - to the point where these forms wouldn't always be mutually comprehensible.

Spending even just a short amount of time with José made clear the depth of his community's knowledge of their environment. From laughing as he showed us a termite's nest by allowing the creatures to swarm all over his hand, to using a machete to unveil a tarantula camped beneath the bark folds of a random tree during the night, Jose's understanding of the Amazon was profound. As caymans glared at us from nearby waters, José would point at a fruit or leaf and say mucha energía - meaning that particular thing would give you 'lots of energy'. He did this for seemingly everything in the jungle, and would often chant ¡Sí se puede! ('Yes it can be done!') - a common rallying cry in Spanish.

When back in Quito, I made a trip to a university bookshop, eager to find books for learning Kichwa. Much to my delight, I was able to find plenty, covering Kichwa language, culture, and history. On the final weekend before leaving, I planned to wake up at 4am to get an early bus to the market town of Otavalo, where people speak both Spanish and Kichwa. In the days leading up to this, I used some of my spare time to learn some basic Kichwa phrases in the hope of having a conversation in Kichwa in Otavalo. I'd both read about and seen videos covering the lack of self-esteem sometimes felt by indigenous communities. Not through a lack of pride in their culture, but through the erosion of their language that has taken place at varying rates and intensities since the Spanish Conquest of the Americas in the late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Aside from the general joy of speaking to someone in their first language, I also wanted to have a conversation in Kichwa to show whoever I spoke to that their language mattered to a stranger from another continent.

Otavalo is an old market town, nestled between volcanoes, and with beautiful lakes nearby. The respect shown by Ecuadorians to such natural wonders is evident here. Its watchful volcanoes, Imbabura and Cotacachi, are seen as guardians of the area and its people, and are often referred to as Taita Imbabura and Mama Cotacachi - Kichwa for ‘Father Imbabura’ and ‘Mother Cotacachi’. Many myths abound of the relationship between the explosive couple, the most famous of which is about a stone in the nearby town of Peguche, known as Achilly Pachacamac. Considered sacred by the local Kichwan people, it is said that Imbabura threw the stone at another nearby volcano, Mojanda, as they were fighting for the affections of Cotacachi. However, the stone fell short of its target, apparently because Imbabura had grown weak from womanising. Otavalo and the surrounding settlements are blessed with an array of lakes, which also carry their share of folklore. A famous legend of Otavalo tells that an Inca prince and princess threw themselves into the Mojanda volcano after they were forbidden to marry. The lovers then resurfaced as lakes Cuicocha and Yahuarcocha, straddling the towns of Otavalo and Ibarra.

The market at Plaza de Los Ponchos, in the heart of Otavalo, is a chance to see the crafts of the Kichwan people of the Imbabura valley. All sorts of foods, embroideries, clothes, hats, ornaments, and paintings are available to buy, and though bartering can take some getting used to if it's your first time, it adds to the atmosphere of the place.

I’d arrived around eight in the morning, and as I turned a corner a hub of life came into view, in the form of stalls at the corner of the square. Though the rest of the town still seemed asleep, Plaza de Los Ponchos already appeared to be close to full swing, with smiling traders greeting me warmly as I perused their wares. The people were dressed in the typical Andean fashion. The men wore white trousers, ponchos, and felt hats, from which protruded their ponytails. The women were dressed with even more charming colour, their white blouses adorned with woven flowers. They also wore long skirts and fachalinas (headscarves), as well as gold beads and red coral bracelets to guard against evil spirits. Their braided ponytails completed the picture of Andean craftsmanship and beauty. 

Though there’s an array of hand-made crafts on sale, the most well-known are probably the woollen ponchos and alpaca sweaters, as well as the famous Panama hats. The hats are made from paja de toquilla, a soft but sturdy straw found in the coastal province of Manabí. The hats have been made as a shield against the rain since before the Spanish Conquest, and the misnomer only emerged after it became a popular form of headgear for workers digging the Panama Canal at the end of the nineteenth century. I bought one as a souvenir, as well as several other gifts for relatives. It hadn’t been in my plans, but I felt compelled to buy something extra. On a stand that sat along one of the plaza’s borders, a beautiful collection of ornate miniature chess sets cast their eye over the rest of the market. I had no intention of playing chess, but I bought a set for its beauty and skill alone. The small board was colourful and compact, able to fold and store the pieces, which were brilliant, painted figures of Kichwan people on one side, Spanish conquistadors on the other. 

Passing through some stalls in the middle of the market, I smiled and nodded at a group of traders.

‘Alli puncha’ (‘Good morning’)

‘Alli puncha’, they replied, with smiles that quickly widened to astonished grins. ‘¿Hablas kichwa?’ (‘You speak Kichwa?’)

I’d planned a short dialogue from the Kichwa books I’d got earlier in the week, and, though our conversation had already veered off this hypothetical course, I was delighted moments later when, in response to my explaining why I was in Ecuador, one of the traders asked,

‘¿Mashna tiempo?’

It was both Kichwa and Spanish. Mashna is Kichwa for ‘how much’, and tiempo is Spanish for ‘time’. Though I’d expected to use ‘mashna’ whilst pointing at a poncho, it was incredibly rewarding to have heard it and been able to understand the question - ‘How long [are you in Ecuador] for?’

The most gratifying thing about the whole moment, though, was seeing how pleased they were that someone had bothered to speak to them in their language. It was why I’d learnt a dialogue ahead of the trip to Otavalo, and I was glad to find it had been worthwhile. Since returning from Ecuador, I’ve come across a youtube channel, Apak Otavalo, which seeks to promote Kichwa in light of the erosive influence of Spanish. The presenters interview local people, often at the market, about how they perceive their own language and how often they use it compared to Spanish. A recurring theme of the answers is that they lean towards Spanish - such as through giving their children Spanish, rather than Kichwan names - as the wider world sees it as more prestigious. If you are at all interested in the Kichwa language, Kichwan people, or just want to see Otavalo in all its splendour, I’d recommend following the channel and supporting their work.

If you're curious about experiences like the ones I've mentioned above, I'd recommend looking at International Volunteer HQ's Ecuador Programmes.

How I Maintain My Spanish

In the years since Ecuador, the time I've spent actively learning languages has centred on Mandarin Chinese, Vietnamese, and to a lesser extent German and Russian.

To maintain my Spanish, I've just focused on enjoying the language as much as possible. I've done this through a variety of ways:

1. Watching series and films from across the Spanish-speaking world: such as Argentina 1985, Mar adentro, and Roma.

2. YouTube videos on interesting topics: such as this one by the actress Yalitza Aparicio about how chocolate is made in the Oaxaca region of Mexico.

3. Learning about current affairs in Latin America: following the work of CELAG (Centro Estratégico Latinoamericano de Geopolítica), news channels like teleSUR, Página12, El Faro, La Jornada, and the videos of Atilio Boron.

4. Reading Spanish: I've enjoyed reading various works of fiction and non-fiction in Spanish - most of which I brought back from Ecuador. These included two of the most famous works of Ecuadorian literature, Huasipungo and La Emancipada, as well as Leyendas Ecuatorianas - a collection of Ecuadorian folktales. I've also spent time reading the beautiful prose and important arguments of Eduardo Galeano, particularly in Las venas abiertas de América Latina ('The Open Veins of Latin America'). A book I've enjoyed flicking through whenever I have a spare five minutes here and there is Igancio Ramonet's long biography of Fidel Castro - which is easy to dip into on account of being formatted according to the hours of interviews the author conducted with Castro.

It's worth noting that my spoken Spanish is not as automatic as it was during my time in Ecuador. This is simply because I haven't had the time or occasion to practice speaking the language much since then. But that's fine, it would only take a few conversations to get back to the rhythm of speaking Spanish, and if I'm fortunate enough to have opportunities to do so in the future, it's something I'll look forward to.

Conclusion

I feel incredibly lucky to have had such a diverse range of experiences on my journey learning Spanish, and they're memories I'll always treasure. But whilst spending time in a country where a language is spoken is certainly helpful, it isn't essential. You can learn a language from anywhere, creating your own immersion environment, practicing with people online or with expats in your community, and actively learning through the abundance of resources available online. This is how I've learnt other languages, including Mandarin Chinese, and it's something you can do to.

If you'd like to learn Spanish, I'd recommend the How to Learn Spanish Guide, where I provide you with a flexible, step-by-step plan for learning Spanish based on everything I've learnt from my experiences learning languages. In the guide, I also introduce you to the history of the Spanish language and provide you with all the free, online resources you need to reach fluency. If you feel confident about how to learn a language but just want access to these resources so you don’t have to waste hours looking for them yourself, then Resources for Learning Spanish is the perfect eBook for you. Both eBooks cover Castilian and Latin American forms of Spanish, enabling you to focus on whichever form of Spanish you prefer, or to use a variety of resources from across the Spanish-speaking world.

Take that first small step toward your goal today—every effort counts. And I'd love to hear from you - what's the one thing that excites you most about beginning your own language-learning journey?

And remember, if you ever have any questions about learning Spanish - or indeed any language - please feel free to email me at contact@howtolearnlanguages.info, and I'll get back to you promptly. I'd be more than happy to help.

Enjoy learning Spanish.

¡Buena suerte!

(Good luck)