The time has been flying by! This week I wanted to go more in depth about one of the biggest adjustments of my learning experience thus far: moving in with a host.
It was my first day in Oviedo. I was running on 4 hours of sleep, and traveled 5 hours by bus to enter my new city. My host mother went over the rules of the house when I arrived and gave me a lot of information in Spanish, which I was struggling to understand. She even showed me how to work the doors and locks, and made me practice using the keys. Afterwards, I went out to walk around town with my friends and came back at 11pm. I was able to unlock the street door, but when I went upstairs to unlock the apartment, I couldn’t do it. I tried for 10 minutes, knocked on the door, yelled her name, and called her a few times and got no response. I started panicking that she was asleep, and I was going to have to sleep on the floor outside her apartment, or that my director would have to drive over from his house and help me unlock the door. I was uncontrollably sobbing (and I am not one to cry), when she came out to open the door. She had simply been hanging the laundry on the terrace and wasn’t able to hear me. Then, she hugged me, made me some tea and chocolate to calm me down, and we both laughed about it. In this moment, we went beyond linguistic boundaries and were able to understand what happened with few words. I couldn’t quite express what I was feeling in Spanish, but she knew exactly what I meant. I felt very connected to her here, and very embarrassed. After a long day with a lot of new information, I was just tired and overwhelmed- and naive to think any Spaniard would be asleep by 11!
There have definitely been highs and lows to living with a host family. It is great to appreciate the cultural differences, especially at mealtimes. I have been able to try a variety of Spanish home-cooked meals, and meal traditions (like small breakfasts, bread with every meal, and turning seriously everything into a sandwich). Another highlight has been her grandsons; I can appreciate the (grand)parental struggle and see the similarities across cultures. Even if I don’t catch every word, I know when she is upset with them for watching too much TV, or not practicing their table manners. And I know when they are being extra polite because their grandmother is upset with them! It has been difficult though, when she tries to communicate a rule with me and I don’t fully understand but don’t want to break it—and there can be a lot of frustration in these moments. Communication has been much harder than I expected because I get nervous and blank on a lot of the Spanish I know, even though in my head I can form sentences perfectly.
A highlight of language learning has been vocabulary breakthroughs. Sometimes my host mother will explain something, and I will nod my head even if I don’t fully understand. But, when I finally come to understand a specific word, it is such a rewarding feeling. For example, my host mom explained unfamiliar Spanish terms like pipas (sunflower seeds), or words like Keifer or Brad Pitt that I couldn’t quite pick up with her accent at first. It is such a unifying feeling when she is able to express something to me and I completely understand. Now that initially unfamiliar household terms are obvious to me now, it is much easier to understand what she asks of me. The adjustment took time, and I always felt embarrassed to have her show me exactly what she wanted when I did not understand, but the challenge has been a learning experience because I know things like bajar la persiana para los lorries (to close the blinds for her pet birds) or colgar la ropa en el tendedero (to hang the clothes on the clothesline).
Many of my friends studying abroad live in dorms, but I would recommend a homestay a hundred times over. Being able to use Spanish in the home has been excellent practice for my listening and speaking, and for getting a real grasp on the culture. Without a homestay mom, I wouldn’t be able to get an in-home glimpse into Spanish lifestyle, their cuisine, or familial relationships. Certainly, adjustments have their challenges, but this one has been crucial to my linguistic success and I could not recommend a homestay program more!
Read more about the homestay experience from other Storytellers in Temple’s abroad programs.
wow!! 13My key takeaways from a summer in Spain