It’s been a while since I really attempted to learn another language. I had a one semester foray into Arabic as a senior in college, and more recently learned some (very) basic Biblical Greek, but living here in Nicaragua, I’ve been thrust into a whole new level of language acquisition.
I learned how to say “I’m the 2nd of 6 siblings” last week and tried to squeeze that into every conversation I could. Cassie started laughing whenever I took a deep breath and haltingly began “Yo soy la segunda…” Yep. Here we go again! It took a lot of mental energy and usually came out wrong at first, but at least I was sharing something about myself.
Trying to tread water in a sea of new words is hard. So I talk to the three kids we live with. Big J., A., and Little J. are 8, 6, and 4, and are great language helpers, especially because we can discuss things on my extremely basic level for a short period of time. We’ve talked about how eating a lot of cakes will make you big. Another day, we debated what food ketchup is good with and what food you should not put ketchup on. There was some sharp disagreement on that second topic.
My sentences are broken, and my English-y accent leaves much to be desired, but we are communicating, and I love it. Last night, I curled my lips around my teeth and told A, “I don’t have teeth.” Soon no one at the table had teeth. Then fingers and hands started to disappear. General hilarity ensued. We were all laughing and having fun.
And not in English. 🙂
Made for Eternity 
BRILLIANT! So few people I know actually ENJOY language learning! What a blessing you are! Nancy Love