Thirteen hours at UCA

It's pretty nice only having school two days a week. I head down to class Tuesday, then Wednesday, and then I'm off to enjoy a five-day weekend. Some might say I have a lucky schedule, however, no luck was involved, my friend. I spent two full weeks tinkering my schedule, collecting syllabi, even going to class on my birthday until I found the perfect equilibrium between easiness of classes and perfectness of timing.

What I ended up with was a Wednesday with three classes, each of which lasts between three and four hours, and keeps me at UCA from 9:30 a.m. until 10:15 p.m.

So, what goes down on a typical Wednesday in my world? Let’s start from the beginning:

Spanish progress report

With less than a month and a half remaining in my semester in Argentina, the time has come to evaluate my progress in the Spanish language.  I have certainly come a long way — I remember how during my first week I was thrilled when I produced the pronominal phrase "nos pagan." Now, it takes more complex structures to shock me, like tonight, when I dropped "Lo podrias haber usado" when talking about a fork my roommate could have used, and then quickly started a conversation with a British friend about our Spanish progress to reaffirm how awesome I am.

The moment made me realize I've been venturing more and more into complex sentence territory. I'm not hanging out as much in the present tense like I used to. My weeks-old sentiment that I feel I use the same 25 or 30 verbs every day still applies, although the exceptions are beginning to come more frequently.

I found out "por lo tanto" means "therefore" and not "for the most part," which is how I've been using it for three and a half months.

Argentinafication update: I played basketball the other day, and as it was my first time playing in months, I was a little rusty. Every time the ball slipped or I missed an easy rebound, instead of groaning "Ugh," I let out the unmistakably Spanish "Ay!"

I've come to appreciate the language for the nuance in its expressions. For years I viewed Spanish as inferior to English when it came to description. And while it's true English has a more expansive lexicon — mainly because it tends to absorb the words of every other language — there are some tricks you can turn in Spanish that you can't in English. I love the "able" words: You can say a photo is "unshowable" or a party is "unmissable." I love how you can put the subject in any position in the sentence ("Yo comí el chorizo," or "Comí yo el chorizo,") or eliminate it entirely ("lo comí) depending on where you want the emphasis. And I love how you can tack on up to two pronouns to the end of any verb — "Dámelo" expresses "give it to me" in six letters.

There are certain English words that are untranslatable, such as "quaint," or the quasi-slang concepts of "awkward" and "random." But I've come to realize  that the discrepancy isn't a failure on the part of Spanish. It's just one aspect of what makes English, or any other language, unique. It will probably take years before I grasp all the subtleties and nuances of Spanish speech, although I'm now intrigued by the prospect of learning them.

And, to not end on a cheesy note, here is what Dominican baseball commentator Ernesto Jerez shouts every time someone hits a home run. It's the baseball equivalent of "GOOOOOOOL!"

I have decided I will scream it the first time I correctly say something in the imperfect past subjunctive.