Today I escaped the house after a week home with my sick punkette.
First stop was the hairstylist for a long overdue hair cut. My stylist was a bit chatty, which is difficult for me because I need to use a whole different subset of words. Words outside of my usual elementary school or supermarket banter. But I put up a good show and the conversation ensued.
From there, I went to meet a group of expats for our first get together. Lots of new faces, and lots of talking. It took a while for me to convince my brain to just relax and speak English. Like easing it into warm honey. No really... just relax for awhile, I've got it all under control. My mouth finally gave my brain a few hours off.
And now I'm horse. Apparently my vocal chords are out of practice. After just a few hours of casual conversation I have a sore throat. It made me realize that I probably don't talk very much anymore. Maybe I should take up singing or read my emails out loud while my brain tries to catch on to this new language. What's going to happen when I visit the states in the spring for my brother's wedding? How will I socialize with all the long time no see relatives?
Obviously my brain is still on holiday.
LOL. How long have you been over there? The Innocent Bystander and I have a fantasy of doing the expat thing in Europe but with our parrots and the residency permit requirements it is a logistical nightmare, so for now all we can do is visit. I just wonder how long (ballpark figure) the immersion technique of learning a new language would take.
ReplyDeleteI need to get out more like you did. It's nice to spend time with other expats in a relaxing setting where you can be yourself. :)
ReplyDeleteWe writers do forget how to speak from time to time. Glad your mind could relax like "honey" nice! Ciao Bella & Aloha from Waikiki-
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comments! I was complete toast last night so it's nice to see the post still came out coherently.
ReplyDeletederfina, you should check out this Italy expat web site. They have a lot of good information about ways to move to Italy.
http://expattalk.com/groupee?s=7600090262
I've been here a year and a half and it took (is taking) longer for immersion to do it's magic than I expected. I can walk around in an English bubble all day if I let myself. I work in science, so most of the people I work with have a good command of the language and welcome the opportunity to practice with a native English speaker. I've insisted that we speak Italian at lunch and I also had to convince my colleagues that don't know English to just speak to me in Italian rather than go through someone else.
This was the first time that I met a group made up entirely of native English speakers. It was different in that the conversation would never have to jump to Italian at any point. I used to avoid such groups, but I appreciated the time to just converse without the struggle of finding the words and never really quite expressing things in the way I'd like to.
Buona Domenica!