Bus Conversation

Today on the bus, I was sitting with Will (a guy from England) when an older Mexican man wearing a sombrero and striped button down shirt moved from the front of the bus to where we were sitting and said, “can I practice my English with you”. Immediately we both responded of course! People have told stories of others being friendly on the buses, but I have personally never experienced it until today. It was nice to know that while being in his country, he wanted to speak to us in OUR language. I am pretty sure if I heard someone speaking Spanish on a bus in the US I would not have the courage to ask them I could practice with them. Now this man (whose name we never got) was a GREAT speaker. He was fluid, used eye and hand movements and told great stories. He did not act at all as I imagine I act when I speak Spanish. I want Spanish to become more of a hobby of mine as it seemed English was to this man. It amazes me still that I am able to understand as much as I can, but am still paralyzed when it comes to speaking. In a way this man gave me a little bit more courage to speak Spanish and practice because I want to become better at it and gain the confidence to use it more often. I have to start speaking more here in Mexico because or else when I get back to the United States when I have even less opportunity to speak I will be even more scared. The man asked where I was from and I responded with Pennsylvania, (I wonder I he had asked me in Spanish if I would have responded with the United States?), and immediately he started speaking of the weather there, and how he spent time there only in-between NYC and DC. One of the interesting things about our conversation was when he attempted to say a word in English that he wasn’t quite sure of  he would attempt to turn the Spanish word into an English one. This is something that I do in Spanish all the time, and sometimes it gets me by and sometimes it doesn’t. Well today, he did this many times and each time I was able to fully understand what he was saying even if the word was not an English cognate. For example, asked I lived in the countryside outside of the city. Since he did not know the word for countryside, he said the campo which is Spanish for country. I immediately knew what he was taking about and Will did not and so responded by saying, “no I do not like camping”. Anyway, it was nice knowing that the two languages are becoming fluid for me and it is something that I have noticed many times while in Merida. For example, on the tour of historical Merida the tour was given in both Spanish and English, and to me it sounded like they were just repeating each fact twice. My brain did not discern between the two languages it merely understood what was being said. It is nice to know that I can understand that much in Spanish, the next step is speaking and maybe I will learn from this nice older man and talk to someone on the bus sometime soon.