I'm on it though - back to the old hour a day routine. Or at least trying. Not necessarily finding the time what with all the adventuring we're doing around Ireland (of which more next week when I get back).
Still finding it fun though. Season 1 of Coffee Break Spanish focussed mostly on phrases used by tourists, which was great since my original idea had been to just get the basics so I could get by. Season 2 though has moved onto the grammar rules and this is brilliant. I love languages and knowing how they work, I find, makes them easier to understand. It means I can take an educated guess at what someone might be saying, even if their words aren't always ones that I recognise.
Of course, it does help that I studied Latin at school and there are some similarities in verb endings and in the verb roots themselves. For example, present tense verb endings are as follows in Spanish vs Latin:
OK, so they're not entirely obvious, but they feel like similar patterns to me and it's helping me to remember them.
One of the best things I'm finding with this programme though is that the tutor gives both the Spanish and South American pronunciations where they differ. This is great for me because one of the major reasons for me learning Spanish is to get by in Peru and Chile, which will of course use the South American pronunciations.
Once I've got through Season 2, I might take another break from Spanish for a while. I fancy trying another language. Radio Lingua offer French, German and Italian for free as part of the Coffee Break series, so I could try one of them. I already know quite a lot of German and enough French to say I don't understand, so maybe Italian?
I'm thinking though of the places I plan to visit on the Grand Tour that aren't English speaking. The next non-English speaking place after Chile is Cambodia. How hard do you think it is for an English speaker to learn Khmer? Anyone know of anyone good resources for basic phrases?
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