Hola

In hindsight, I had quite a linguistically rich upbringing.  My mum's an English teacher and has a Masters in English Literature.  My dad is a theologian and has lectured in ancient Hebrew and ancient Greek.  Both did high school French, and Latin was a normal part of conversation (as in, "what does this word mean?" "well, it comes from the Latin root ... ").  When I was a toddler I know dad was speaking German.  In primary school we did a semester each of French, German, and Japanese, and a term each of Italian and Indonesian.  I did German and Japanese all through high school.  Not to mention, music and all the language skills that provides.  After high school I went on a trip that included a visit to Montreal and Quebec, as well as France and Germany, so I have a bit of French (although I really don't feel comfortable with that language). 

The end result of all this is that I'm reasonable when it comes to working out translations of French, German, and Italian, and I feel I would not drown if I landed somewhere that spoke one of those languages.  Spanish, however, is another matter.  When faced with Spanish text, I'm mostly lost.  I can get a very little bit, but it's only a few words here and there. 

Last year, I decided I wanted to go Italy.  I've mentioned before that I started learning Italian, and I thought that I would continue that this year.  But, realistically, a trip to Italy is not going to happen any time soon.  Now, a lot of the time, my motivation for doing something is a feeling that I can't do it yet.  Having written that, I admit that looks a little odd, but I don't like having things on my "I can't" list.  So becoming more familiar with Spanish seems like a good idea.  Also, it is the 3rd most spoken language in the world.  Do I even need to mention, tangos...?  But the deciding factor really is, I don't know any Italian speakers - but Viola Man is a native Spanish speaker.  Every so often he'll include a Spanish phrase in a text, and while I can understand it, I'm sick of checking my response in iTranslate.  I want to be able to respond without thinking so much.

Having just spent more than my budget on clothes, I didn't want to spend lots of money on a language course.  My brother started a free online German course, and sent me the link.  Welcome to the language learning community.  Really, whoa!  As soon as I'd registered, chat requests kept popping up (in Spanish), and immediately after submitting a sentence for correction, I had oodles of responses.  The site I'm using is here and I'm not totally in love with it just yet.  The responses, and the total immersion, and the communication with native speakers (as well as being a native speaker) - these are all good things.  The use of pictures is also appreciated (especially the one for 'please' - they say a picture speaks a thousand words, this one had a bloke pleading with an obviously-annoyed, turned away woman).  However, I'm still having to use translation apps to work out what I want to say.  So, we'll see.