Lets be honest. I am homely.. and well..

To be honest. I was not the life of a party from 1973 to 1996. During that time life happened and not so many people would or could will remember me. I am, after all, a ghost.

However, in 1996 I got placed some place with other ghosts. And? I was the gringo of a small Bolivian town.

And? I was invited as a guest of honor to their parties. And? I did go and had a blast yet again.

Some recall me for Water Claro. Where I dressed up as a water jug filled with wine and dances and toasted the whole community providing wine to them instead of water from my plastic water jug. Note to those in Peace Corps. I sold 543 water jugs and similar amount of claro or chlorine for water disinfection. Funny part? I could not do repeat business. Why? The chlorine caused the local bugs in their water of the local people to give them diarrhea. Meaning the chlorine hurt the users. Sad. Thus? I could sell many a first-time buyer of claro and water jugs. But second time buyers? I could only sell more water jugs. And? I did. However, this the time I was the man of honor at the local community. All the women loved me. Why? Let’s be honest, the week before I had streaked the whole community.. Seemed rather odd for me to do. But I had, and well. Seemed like people loved the local naked gringo, so they wanted to see if they could get me drunk again. And?

Well, I did not streak that time. However, I did have to apologies to the local ladies I had called witches the week before.

Why? Imagine the movie of the Game? I had woken up naked in a cemetery surrounded by women. And? Well, I had run from there to my home. I was worried I might have hurt someone. Thank God that person was okay. Anyway.. I joined the Peace Corps to serve my country. That I had taken two years of Spanish in high school due to requirements to get into college was a plus. I figured that Spanish might be something to learn during my stay in Bolivia. Getting there to the Bolivia Peace Corps provided three months of intensive Spanish classes. That helped a lot.

However, being stationed in a rural area where Aymara was used much more than Spanish brought about a little panic attack. Nevertheless, I was stationed in Caracato, Bolivia and there I learned the language enough to have fun.

The experience most brought about the most rapid language development was my desire to eat, and be part of the community. Being the only gringo there, I was a novelty for the children of the community. That helped a lot in development work. My three main projects: a library with over 2000 books went into the school, the second bathroom project worked fairly well getting both community and children involved with building an anew lantern, and a computer for the school were projects that only could be done by communicating with people to get their input and help in developing their projects. Meaning my language grew enough for me to write a development project for USAID and two other help organizations to get the funding for much of the work.

How did my language grow? Getting over my panic attack, I am a rather unique personality. If I am bugged enough about something, I tend to either change the situation or my place of location. Meaning in the town of Caracato, the school system at that time lacked a library. I know how much a library helped me as a child and went about setting one up. The community and school director had no idea who or what I was doing showing up and doing my presentations. Kind of makes me wonder about my poor Spanish skills to be honest. The lantern for the school had been full for two years prior to me getting there. Thus, a new bathroom was something for the community to work on for the school. And I helped there too. As for the computer getting it flown in from the States, I am not sure how that ended up, but they at least had an old computer when I left there. All this done by a person whose language skills are still questionable today.

Meaning? Language of helping others and serving others at times speaks much more than the actual language used. Find something you are passionate about and do something in the language you plan on learning and realize that while doing something to help others you are improving for at least that moment your experience in that language.

In the end? I ended up marrying the doctor that was working from that town. Lovely lady. Now after losing everything in the states due to health care expenses, etc. I am living again in Bolivia and find that still by being of service I still live a most interesting life even at the end of my life story.

The question is am I still growing and learning Spanish? Yes. I am still amazed at new words that are used around me daily at times. Do I learn them? Sometimes I show interest in the new meaning of a situation where I had heard one phrase used and now a completely new phrase is used. Other times, I realize language development does not always mean I have to know everything. What is at stake in my life is do I feel comfortable learning still? And the answer at times is yes and other times I the answer is no. Meaning like English development of language often requires a person to take an active interest in what is going on around them.

My plan to continue to learn English and Aymara at times requires me to talk and translate books. My last book was Ayer es Pasado. I worked with poet Filiberto Montecinos Avendaño to translate his poem then used subtitles in song by Marco and Heidi Andrés Balderrama Gallardo to get Ayer es Pasado into six film festivals. Why? At the time I was more interested in an experience I am still dealing with that is personal.

https://audpop.com/films/ayer-es-pasado-226969

The point being that there is a massive amount of poems, stories, and outside knowledge in Spanish and other languages that no English person will ever read, or a Spanish class in high school or college will ever translate that is beautiful and needs to be seen in context to those who read only one language.

Meaning? Find something you are interested in doing and realize that someone in a foreign language might already have done that work and only needs to be translated. Or find work in what interests you and work in that language to build up your own language skills.

This will force you to react to the language you are learning more than reading a book or talking to a teacher. Make the language alive for yourself by not focusing on the language but on what you want to do with that language.

Sure, my first book translated Aymara and Spanish into English was rough. I was still coming out of being blind for several months and going blind again. However, just focusing on the language part would not have made me realize there are other ways to communicate and sometimes just doing instead of talking forces yourself to learn just a little more.

Did my Spanish improve? At times yes. At times not. I am still lost in most conversations and just learn to listen due to going deaf along the way. However, forcing yourself to do it often makes the learning process a bit more interesting.

What is your passion? Find that passion in the language you are interested in and do something with language. Translate, learn a new skill in that language. Often instead of just learning a language you might help create a new passion that will communicate better about life than just another language.