Visual Link Spanish(TM) Newsletter - Volume 6 Issue 33

Current # of Subscribers: 190,888

This issue:
1. NEW - Cultural Spanish Recipes
2. Testimonial
3. Weekly Spanish Lesson - “Survival Expressions”
4. Words of the Week
5. Ask Dave Section - “Telephone Answering”
6. Culture Lesson - “Think in Spanish - Change Your Identity”
7. Responses to Past Newsletters

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Complete Course on Sale
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> Learn Spanish at YOUR own pace <

Learn from the comfort of your home or your car at the pace that fits
you best.

- Click for Sale Info! -

-http://www.spanishprograms.com/complete_newsletter.htm

This offer includes the complete Visual Link Spanish(TM) Course with
free shipping and a free dictionary! Remember your 6-month Money-Back
Guarantee - you’ll learn Spanish Guaranteed or your money back!

* With 30-60 minutes a day, five times a week, you will become
conversational in 30 days or less guaranteed - or your money back.

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NEW! - Cultural Spanish Recipes
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We are excited to implement a cultural Spanish recipe section to our
newsletter. We welcome your tasty Spanish recipes including the
originating countries (if available), accompanying pictures where
possible without copyrights and any interesting notes or comments
about the recipe.

We appreciate this important cultural connection around the globe
celebrating the all-important food traditions of the Spanish-speaking
people.

Please email recipes and pictures to: mercedes@learnspanishtoday.com

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Visual Link Spanish(TM) Testimonial –
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Hi Dave,

I want to say a big thank you, I bought your course, about 18 months
ago, and study with this every day, tengo dos personas cuando
trabajo, con quien estudio cada dia, tambien, hablo con una mujer en
Peru, ella ayudame mucho.

Thank you, its been the best course I know of, and I have recommended
you to others.

Derek Stewart

ps, The DLC is fantastic, I am enjoying even more words (mas
palabras).

Gracias

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Weekly Spanish Lesson—Survival Expressions
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For this week’s lesson, click below to learn 12 basic Spanish
Survival expressions with audio. You’ll hear María from Mexico model
each.

To check it out, click here:
http://www.spanishprograms.com/learn/survival_expressions.htm

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Words of the Week
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Taken from our complete CD-ROM course —–

Monday / He want / El quiere
Tuesday / You want / Usted quiere
Wednesday / to revise / revisar
Thursday / to write / escribir
Friday / a message / un recado
Saturday / a message / un mensaje
Sunday / a letter / una carta

Click Here to login and access your free membership and lessons.
http://www.spanishprograms.com/login.phtml

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The Official “Ask Dave” Section —–
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Question

Hola Dave,

Last year I purchased the full course and l enjoyed it and excelled
with my spanish. This winter I purchased the Add-on verb course…

The question I have, is I spent a short period of time in Cuba this
winter and picked up that when they answer the telephone there, they
answer “dime” rather than bueno or alo, is this just a local custom
or is it used in other latin american countries as well.

Thank you

Eugene

P.S. I would be scared to tell you how much money I spent on spanish
courses before I stumbled on to yours on line. Again thank you.

Answer

Hola Eugene,

“Dime” is a fairly regional way to answer the phone. However people
from other countries use it in every-day conversation. It means “Tell
me” as in “What’s happening?” or “Tell me how things are going”. When
a friend approaches another friend in every-day life, sometimes thy
will simply say “Dime”.

For more on telephone vocabulary, go to section “11. Telephone” in
your complete Visual Link Spanish™ course. If you don’t have the
course, click here for the current sale!

Hopefully that helps to answer your questions.

Gracias,

Dave

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Culture —– Think in Spanish - Change Your Identity
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This newsletter topic is a very interesting one for me; it is one
that I will request your feedback and participation on so we can see
more data on the subject.

As I was learning Spanish, I went to a two-month intensive training
course, then went straight to Latin America and lived among native
speakers. It was quite a challenge to immediately communicate only in
Spanish after arriving, but it definitely helped my language
progression. After about two or three months of living in the
country, I found I was able to understand about 75-85% of what was
being said. Around that time, as I was becoming more fluent, I
decided I was going to try to think in Spanish. If any of you want to
get to that point, it can very intimidating unless you think of
Spanish as just different vocabulary words used to express the same
ideas.

In other words, it can overwhelm you to try and think in a different
language, however if you just try to think using different vocabulary
words (ones in Spanish), it becomes a lot easier. Anyway, I was
surprised that after a few weeks, I could actually do it and didn’t
slip back into thinking in English that much.

I found that when I hit the point where I was pretty good at thinking
in Spanish, my personality in Spanish changed. I tended to express
things with more emotion and pitch in my voice. I was able to joke
with people in ways I couldn’t in English. However, there were
certain things that were harder to express in Spanish and took a lot
of work to try and master. In other words, I became better at
expressing certain things and not as effective at expressing other
things.

I love to talk to Latino people and joke around with them. They’re
great people and fun to talk to. My theory is that we become a little
more uninhibited when we become fluent in another language. We’re
able to talk to others more freely because we know they don’t expect
us to speak their language perfectly since we’re foreigners. We also
start out with no mental blocks (socially) in the new language and
country.

I don’t have any hard evidence to support my theory, but I do have a
lot of empirical evidence (gained by observation and experience.) I
have talked to many people who have become fluent in a foreign
language and just about everyone I’ve talked to states the same
thing–that their personality changes when speaking in their second
language.

Now, not everyone becomes more uninhibited. I know of a few people
who have done just the opposite. For example, one of my friends that
came here to the U.S. from South America became more reserved and
serious after becoming fluent in English. In Spanish he was a
fun-loving, joking person with a lot of charisma. Now people see him
as more serious and less personable.

Please e-mail me and let me know what your experience has been in
learning another language and watching others do the same. I would
love to collect more data on the questions of “if” and “how”
personalities change and specifics about what changes when learning a
foreign language. ¡Gracias!

Moral of the Story: To me, learning a new language is almost a
magical kind of experience where you seem to enter a new world. I
believe that learning a new language helps you gain brain capacity
and also helps you think in a whole new way. A while ago, I read some
research where people had problems and by thinking through the
problems in different languages, they were able to come up with
different solutions they wouldn’t have thought of otherwise.

Sneak peek at next week: “The Truth about Latinos Learning English”

¡Hasta luego! (”Until later”)

David S. Clark — President / Director
Visual Link Spanish(TM)
Fun, Interactive Spanish Courses
http://www.spanishprograms.com
dave_c@spanishprograms.com

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Responses to Past Newsletters
=============================

Response #1

My husband was suffering with a cold. Our wonderful Argentine
neighbor ordered a bowl with about 8 cm of water, matches, alcohol,
newspaper and a glass. I gathered the required items and then We we
tore the newspaper into squares of about 10 cm and folded them into
triangles and twisted the folded end. I held the bowl in 7 different
specific positions on his head and forehead. she dunked the newspaper
triangle into the alcohol and lit it and dropped it into the bowl and
had me immediately invert the glass over the burning paper. The fire
burnt the oxygen out of the air reducing the air pressure in the
glass and water surged into the glass because the air pressure
outside the glass was greater than the air pressure inside the glass.
The higher the water rose, the happier she was because it meant more
“heat” was leaving his head.

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