Portuguese – No More Pussyfooting Around!

I’ve not written anything about my progress with Portuguese lately. No prizes for guessing why. Coz I ain’t been doing any. Sigh. Since starting this project in March, it’s been all fits and starts. The underlying reason being that I’ve failed to fully commit to it.

I’ve been circling the task as if it were some snarling two-headed harpy. I stuck my fingers through the cage a couple of times, and it took a swipe at me with it’s terrifying verb system and an extra bloody subjunctive that Spanish has had the good sense to abolish long ago.

The inertia just kept festering like a suppurating bedsore, and I’d not been able to snap out of it for those past three months.  Then, a couple of weeks ago, one of my blogmates started setting himself a series of challenges in order to push his Hebrew and his French to the next level.

Now, this guy has a full-time job, a wife, two young kids (one of whom has special needs), and yet he manages to bash on with it undeterred, and even record YouTube videos sounding like a reincarnated Victor Hugo, while all I’ve got to do is fabricate a couple of articles a week about the market potential of bison meat in Kazakhstan etc, saunter down the road to meet people for coffee and, once the guilt starts to impede my breathing, call my mother once a month. And I can’t find twenty minutes a day to learn Portuguese??? This cannot be!

So, ten days ago I started easing myself back into the groove by taking up Duolingo again. My skills tree had atrophied down to a brittle sprig since the last time I touched the programme, and it took me an entire week just to get back to where I left off. And while competing with aforementioned blog buddy, I’ve uncovered his secret: The pesky blighter never sleeps!

I’ve also started tackling the second half of my long suffering Pimsleur audio course (Phase 1), I should reach the end of that in three weeks.

But I know that I need much heavier guns than this. I actually need to start talking to a real flesh and blood person, EEEEEEEEEEEEK!

Although I’ve tried to find a local intercambio to practice with, deep down I know darn well that this won’t work. It’s way too early. Compared to me, Tarzan would sound eloquent, even with a fistful of banana leaves rammed down his gullet, and I’d rather eat live tarantulas coated in slug slime than force even a single Portuguese word through my calcified lips.

So, I’m about to launch the ultimate in Linguistic Propulsion Systems: 1-2-1 lessons.

What I need is somebody who glares at me through slitted eyes and pins me against a wall studded with red hot iron spikes until I speak, while the money clock is ticking. It’s the only way. And that somebody is Teresa from Lisbon and I’m meeting her tomorrow for the first time at 6:30 pm.