In the third semester, we learnt to use past tense. Our Chilean teacher asked us how we passed our holiday. My friend replied that he slept the whole day. It was my turn to answer, I said, 'También dormé con él todo el día (I also slept with him the whole day). I was supposed to say 'También dormé como él todo el día.' (I also slept like him the whole day), but unfortunately I landed with a wrong word 'con' resulting a totally different and awful meaning.. In Spanish 'como' means ’like’ and 'con' means ‘with’. The whole class was shocked with my answer. Everyone stared at me and so did the teacher. After few seconds, realizing my mistake I covered my face with my hands with shame and corrected my line, ‘I meant to say like him, not with him'.

Moreover, few embarrassing situations were waiting for me in the final semester too. Our new Spanish teacher Ms. Vanesa Ledesma was appointed to teach us in our fourth semester. The teacher who had landed Kathmandu all the way from Madrid tried her best to polish our language.

We played different exciting word games in the classroom. While answering, we generally thought in English and spoke in Spanish. Our ‘profe’ always told us to think in Spanish and speak in Spanish. But our mind was always into English as most of the Spanish words are similar to those of English. So, we usually converted English words into Spanish. For examples, 'distinct' in English means 'distinto' in Spanish, 'studious'='estudioso', 'student'='estudiate', 'nervous'='nervioso', 'intelligent'='ingeligente', 'interesting'='interesante' etc.

My classmate Dikshya wanted to say 'I am embarrassed', so she thought that the word 'embarrassed' would be pronounced quite similarly in Spanish as the other words. She said,'Estoy embarazada', literally meaning ' I am pregnant’,(Estoy=I am, embarazada=pregnant). The teacher quickly corrected, ‘You have to say: Estoy avergonzada not embarazada. Embarazado means pregnant.' We all laughed our heart out.

Later I realized that learning is more than merely fun. Learning a new language is never an easy task. Passion, hard work, dedication, practice and carefulness are indispensible in learning anything. At the same time, one should know the meaning of the words, he/she is using otherwise it might drown him/her in the ocean of embarrassments. There is a saying, ‘Practice makes a person perfect. So, let’s keep practicing to avoid falling into troubles!!

http://www.parakhi.com/blogs/2012/06/20/new-language-buzz-part-ii