Good Morning!

I am packing for my trip to Chile. I am heading to Chile to work an apprenticeship for Lapostolle wines during this year’s harvest. I am super pumped up. I will blog the entire time during the trip and will post pictures and videos, as often as possible.

I won this apprenticeship through Lapostolle and it is called Uncork Your Passion. I can not wait to see the country and learn everything I can about the culture and people and of course the wine. One of the fun things about this trip is I have made a real effort to learn Spanish. Learning a new language is tricky for me. I feel like I have had some sort of mud put in my brain and now it works very slowly. I have to think about everything I say and how I think while putting together a string of words that will make sense.

I do not hear out of one ear, so what I think I hear sometimes is not at all what was really being said. I have attended classes for 10 weeks and have many one on one tutoring sessions with my teacher and she says I read, write and comprehend Spanish at a very high level but I am hesitant to speak the language. So she forces me to speak to her constantly. I always feel silly.

After our last session she said next week bring me a list of the questions you will want to be able to ask when you are there. Here is my list:

Hello, what is your name?

My name is_.

It’s nice to meet you.

How can I help?

Where is the bathroom?

Thank you!

I do not understand.

I understand what you are saying, but I have no idea how to respond.

I speak very little Spanish.

How are you?

I don’t know.

Can you help me find_?

When do we get to drink wine?

These were the basic questions…then I had my more advanced questions:

I have never been here before, please show me everything.

I make wine at home.

I am thirsty and hungry.

How did the earthquake affect your business?

I make wine at home.

How do you do this?

Cheers.

I love it here.

I am learning so much.

You get where all this is going. My teacher wants me to learn formal Spanish and not just go on the computer and look up videos and memorize everything. She pelts me with the correct ways to say he, she, them, they and using the proper endings and pronunciations. I get it, I get it…but at some point I will be somewhere and all I want to say is wine please…or vino por favor!

I hope you have a great day, tonight I will enjoy more Chilean wines to get me in the mood and hopefully finish packing.

Much LOVE and wine,

Tammi