Studying abroad felt like trying out a new exercise routine: it worked muscles I never knew existed and challenged me in ways I never could have fathomed. As I leave Madrid after nine incredible months, I feel like a trained athlete with a Ph.D. in problem-solving. This global experience has equipped me with tools to conquer any challenge I may face and a level of confidence that seldom wavers in the presence of obstacles.
I left for Madrid with the goal to become as fluent in Spanish as I could. In order to achieve this goal, I consumed as much Spanish material as possible: I spoke with locals, read books, listened to music, watched TV, and took classes in the target language. I always considered language acquisition to be a fairly active process; I believed that remaining cognizant of the learning process was the most productive way to gain fluency in a language, but I learned it is far more nuanced than that. I found that when I stopped focusing on what I didn’t understand and instead assessed my level of understanding of a certain conversation or text that I grew more. It certainly wasn’t a passive effort; I stepped out the door every morning knowing that communication would automatically be more difficult than it was back in the US. But as time passed, that muscle strengthened and adapted. It started with memorizing my coffee order and practicing saying something as simple as “¿Me puedes dar un café con leche de avena?” or “¡Hasta luego!” with the Spanish accent I heard around me. I learned which syllables to quicken and which sounds were pronounced more subtly. I often encountered locals who heard my American accent and automatically switched to speaking English to me, which sometimes lowered my confidence, but I persisted. Speaking Spanish the second I walked out of my apartment every day no longer seemed daunting but rather second nature.
Something I never expected about my study abroad experience was the development of my language skills, but more specifically, how they developed compared to one another. I thought all areas of my Spanish skills would grow equally, but I was very wrong. Ranking my skills before I left for Spain, I would say I was most confident in my reading/writing, followed by speaking, with my weakest point being auditory comprehension. Never would I have imagined my auditory comprehension to skyrocket the way it did while abroad. I guess it makes sense in retrospect, as I was exposed to a whole variety of speakers every single day, ranging from professors to shop owners to random people on the street. I heard various different accents and vocabularies and speeds, so I had to adapt in order to understand. I think my reading and writing have improved tremendously while abroad, and an honorable mention goes to my speaking, more specifically my broadened vocabulary and accent. I am so proud of the progress I have made during my time abroad and will never stop practicing and getting exposure to all the Spanish I can. Now my focus is to honor my love for Spain and use my knowledge of the country to compare it to other Spanish-speaking countries in my studies.
While I feel I could go on forever talking about how incredible it has been to better my Spanish-speaking skills over the last year, I feel it’s important to mention how life-changing this year abroad has been for me. The change in perspective when moving from one country to another was tremendous and led to many discussions with friends and family about what I wanted to pursue career-wise, how I felt about the world around me, and my overall perception of how I fit into this vast world. It was a very existential year that was incredibly challenging yet unequivocally rewarding, and I implore any university student with the time and means to study abroad for a full year. I feel incredibly lucky to have an international network of friends who supported me immensely throughout what was, at times, a really difficult year, and now I feel I have a place to call home all the way across the globe. A piece of my heart will always live in Madrid, and I hope I can return again soon.