Hello All,
I'm planning to go to Spain next year for 5 months and study in Granada but I have a few concerns.
Firstly, I've heared that the Andalucian accent of Spanish is quite difficult to understand and grasp so I'm afraid that if I go, my Spanish will not imporve very much so I'm wondering if it might be better for me to study in a place like Madrid instead.
Also, I want to know how to make the best of my experinces in Spain and learn as much Spanish as possible. I'll be travelling and living there with my brother and he also wants to learn Spanish, but I feel that having someone with me who speaks English might hamper my learning a bit. Do you have any suggestions?
Thanks
Hi Mimi, I'm from Madrid, so I can give you some advice.
The problem with the accent in Andalucia is the same you'd get if you visit any other country than Spain, for example, in Latin America.
Moreover, the Andalusians are the most friendly, funny and humorous people that you can find around the world.
Besides, Granada, Seville and Cordoba as well as other cities of Andalusia are very beautiful cities and have spectacular temperatures during most of the year.
Nevertheless, if you prefer to come to Madrid, you must know that it's a lively city with a great nightlife and its people are very friendly. The population of Madrid, due to internal migration is a mixture of people across Spain, but Madrid also has 18% of immigrants from around the world, especially of Latin America.
So it's up to you to decide!
Hey I studied in Seville for four semesters, and the advice I would give is to find a place to make friends and simply ask them to speak slowly. It is true that Andalucians have a very tough accent. There is a lot of what linguists call "elision" in their speech, or the dropping of sounds from words. The interesting thing is that this tends to occur at the end of SYLLABLES in Spanish, not just the end of words. So if there is a sound missing from the middle of the word, don't be alarmed, just try to get used to noticing it.
Hola, yo vivo en Sevilla y he trabajado en varias regiones de España. No te preocupes por el acento. Granada es una ciudad encantadora y su gente maravillosa. Don't worry, Bill Clinto said, in front of Alhambra: "Granada has the most beautiful sunset of the planet".
I am a beginner inglish student so apology my answear. the spanish language has many accents arownd the word but if you have problem to comunicate the people from adalucia will willing to help you and speak slowly.
Of course, if you are alone and can speak with others only in Spanish your language skills will improve very fast. But as I understand both of you are interested in learning Spanish, so both of you will try to communicate with Spaniards as much as possible. Moreover, Spaniards are very friendly and communicative people, especially when you say that you are learning their language. I suppose you won't have lack of communication anyway and your Spanish will be improved very fast and easy.
Have a nice journey! I hope you'll enjoy this beautiful country and amazing, sunny and cheerful folk. :)
