Que?

Shades of autumn in Copenhagen's Fælledparken.

Life in the last couple of weeks has settled into a bit more of a rhythm, its been kind of nice. Tuesday and Thursday nights are Danish lessons. Monday and Friday nights are free, is the weekend. And Wednesday is Spanish. Yes, Spanish. You're surprised? Why? What is this? I wasn't expecting some sort of Spanish Inquisition?

NooooooooooBODY expects the Spanish Inquisition! Our chief weapon is surprise... surprise and fear... fear and surprise.... Our two weapons are fear and surprise... and ruthless efficiency.... Our three weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless efficiency... and an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope.... Our four... no... Amongst our weapons... Amongst our weaponry... are such elements as fear, surprise... I'll come in again.

Dorthe and I are taking Spanish lessons - considering that we are going to be spending six months in south america, we thought that it might be a good idea. So, wednesday night has been spanish night. The classes are taught at a local polytechnic / community college / call it what you will. Spanish is not too bad a language too learn - nice easy pronounciation, and not too bad a grammar (so far), but there is one complication that I have found: the classes are taught in mainly in Spanish, but the second language is, of course, DANISH! Arggghh!!! So he will say a word in spanish (e.g. mantequilla), and then say what it is in danish (smør, which is danish for butter). And of course the translation is from Spanish to Danish, and the text books are in danish, so my danish gets a good solid work out too. And then there are all these danish cultural references that I haven't picked up on yet either eg. "¿Que vende Ecco?" (what does Ecco sell?) Having no idea what Ecco is (apparently its a shoe store) makes it a little hard to answer the question. On the up side though, my danish is about two weeks ahead of the spanish, and you pretty much learn the same things to start with whenever you learn a language (my name is, I come from, how to count to ten, that sort of thing), so my rather limited danish is kind of keeping pace with it ok. In some ways, its kind of fun, but it does give your brain a good workout, trying to learn a third language in a language that you barely speak yourself - I've only mixed it up once, when I walked into a danish flower shop the other day and said "¡Hola!". D'oh!!!

Talking of Danish, the last two weeks have been a bit of a revelation on that front. Somewhere, somehow, things have suddenly clicked into place, and I can start understanding sentences and things around me eg signs on shops and buses. Suddenly the world has gone from being covered in meaningless scribbles, to being a bit more friendly and understandable. It's great, its like someone just switched on a light! As a result, whenever I'm with Dorthe I'm babbling away in Danish like a four year who has just learnt to read. I often get it wrong (I made a complete ass of myself on the bus the other day when I said something rather rude by complete accident) and my conversation and reading skills are a loooong way off. But just being able to read what is going on in the world around you is suddenly incredibly exciting after being deprived of it for so long!

"¿Que?"
"Oh don't mind him, he's from Barcelona."