Yesterday Sweet Hubby and I decided to try a new Mexican restaurant for lunch. But that's not the entire Something New. The most important part of the event was that we spoke only Spanish to the staff, all of whom were most gracious about our clumsy accents and hesitant delivery (and our mistakes, since it's likely we made one or two).
We asked for a table for two, ordered our food and drinks, verified that my order didn't contain cilantro, specified flour tortillas and no rice for SH, asked the waiter his name, asked for more iced tea, complimented the food, and asked for the check, all in our primitive Spanish.
I rather despair of ever becoming truly conversational in this foreign language, even though I take a lesson every day and have for almost a year. I can certainly read a lot more of it than I used to be able to, and am even just beginning to dip my toes into past tense. But I know that true fluency will only show up if I/we actually speak out loud with other Spanish speakers. We run the risk of embarrassing ourselves, but not much is achieved without risk, after all. I'm grateful to our camarero Gabriel for being so kind and good natured about our attempts. And now we have another favorite Mexican restaurant, so it was a win all around.
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