Affordable Travel

Learning a foreign language is a daunting challenge for most people, and can take many years to master. It can also be hard to learn to hear and say the basic phrases necessary to get along nicely as a tourist in a place where you don’t know the language. So there are millions of companies selling practical  and not so practical  tools to help you with foreign language skill development. You can buy gadgets that translate words for you, and appear like a real geek as you type in what someone just said to you, to figure out how to reply. And you can find dolls that speak in another language, computer software to train you, and of course phrase books that teach you “vital language skills for tourists”. Some are lousy, some are okay, and others are excellent.

One thing to keep in mind when dealing with language is that if you can’t pronounce a word with the native accent, nobody is going to understand you, no matter how much vocabulary and grammar you learn. Pronunciation and accent is critically important. So pick books that help you with the phonetics of the words and phrases, if you are buying a phrase book. And keep in mind also that just because you travel - for instance - in a Spanish speaking country, the people may not all use the same version of Spanish. Even natives of Mexico have trouble understanding people in Buenos Aires, and Puerto Ricans drop whole syllables from words, leaving people from Spain clueless. So pick a phrase book designated for the particular region where you will be traveling, and you’ll learn the local way of speaking.

Although television is generally derided, and rightly so, for being a mind-numbing technology that makes us dumber by the minute, some aspects of the boob tube redeem it as an educational tool. One of these is not so much related to the content of the show you watch as it is to the availability of subtitles. If you are learning a new language, the subtitles displayed on the bottom of the screen can help you practice your skills. For instance, you can watch an English program and put on Spanish subtitles to practice your recognition of Spanish words and vocabulary, or you can switch to a Spanish program with English subtitles, to practice your Spanish pronunciation without losing track of what is being said during the television program.

Of course you can do this without traveling, by surfing your cable TV channels, but it is much more fun to watch TV in another country, so you are able to step outside your hotel room door and hear the native language spoken everywhere. Take along a phrase book, some language learning CDs, and you are all set to learn a new language, while seeing the sights. And when you come home at night – or back to your room – you can tune in for homework by using the subtitle technique to study while you lay back and become a couch potato – or pomme de terre if you’re learning French!