Telenovelas Revisited

While Mary and I were trying to troubleshoot her TV problems last night, we accidentally turned on a Spanish soap opera. I haven't done a thing with Spanish since I left Pamplona (or, okay, Miami), so I was a bit surprised at how easily I understood it. Then again, they were speaking slowly. I switched to Spanish news. I understood everything. The stories, the advertisements. And all the time I was worried that I wasn't really learning anything.

Just now, I turned on the TV again. Because I sort of miss Spanish. I don't know how to describe it. Just understanding easily, but without it being boring. If English is so natural to me that it fades away, tasteless like pure water, then Spanish is something different, chicken broth maybe. It flows, but it's got a bit more flavour. I can see through it, but it leaves something of itself, its own texture and sound. And I enjoy it.

And the little things. Like the guy on the soap opera says, "me voy a pudrir en el infierno." And I giggle, because I know it's just, "I'm going to rot in hell", but it's not just that. It's a different language, different words, and different grammar that has slightly different connotations. And I'll never understand them, not 100%, as a native speaker would. But that's okay, because I understand them my own way as the native speakers wouldn't, and that's what makes me giggle, because to me it's something like, "I'm going to putrefy in the inferno."

It makes life more interesting, is all.