Effective Language Learning Habits and Venezuelan Spanish (Interview with Mari Polyglot)
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Effective Language Learning Habits and Venezuelan Spanish (Interview with Mari Polyglot) Episode 59 Summary: In this episode, I interview polyglot Mari Salvestrini. Mari is originally from Venezuela and speaks Spanish, English, Dutch, Portuguese, Italian, and German. In our conversation, Mari shares her advice for creating effective habits for language learning and enjoys the learning process. She also shares some Spanish words and expressions you'll only hear in Venezuela. Time Speaker Transcript 00:34 – 01:08 Tamara Hola y bienvenidos al episodio 59. Welcome to episode 59 of the Learn Spanish con Salsa Podcast. In this episode of the podcast, I’m interviewing Mari Salvestrini, and she is a polyglot who speaks several different languages. She is originally from Venezuela, and she currently lives in the Netherlands, she’s a language coach and shares content in her YouTube Channel every week about how to learn a language effectively, how to create the right habits and also how to enjoy the process while you learn. 01:09 –01:50 Tamara We cover so many different things in this conversation but because Mari is from Venezuela, I asked her to share with us not only some tips about language learning, but also some characteristics of Venezuelan’s Spanish, as you know, I’m really interested in different cultures and dialects and I like to expose you all on this podcast, conversations that would give you more inside in the Latino culture and not just the language itself. We will be talking about Venezuela and some uniquely Venezuelan words that you only hear in the country. I hope you enjoy this conversation with Mari, let’s get started. learnspanishconsalsa.com/podcast 01:54 – 01:57 Tamara Thank you, Mari, for taking the time to join me in the Learn Spanish con Salsa Podcast. 01:59 – 02:00 Mari Thank you for having me. 02:01 –02:33 Tamara Yeah, I know we’ve been trying to get this together and coordinate for a little bit, sorry, I really appreciate your time and I always like to have different people to just kind of share their language experience because some of my listeners who are thinking about becoming fluent in Spanish, they’re trying and they’re not really there yet, it can be inspiring to hear from someone like you who’s already learned different languages, we’ll talk about that in a second, so I really appreciate you taking the time to come on so, if you could just kind of tell us a little bit about you and how you got started with language learning. 02:34 –03:02 Mari Yeah, for sure. So, my name is Mari, and I’m original from Venezuela but at the moment I’m living in the Netherlands, I started language learning languages, actually it wasn’t my choice, my mom send me to a bilingual school and that’s how I started, I also have Italian family so, I was interested in many different cultures because I was exposed to it and then as an adult I decided to keep learning languages and that’s how I learned Dutch, Portuguese, and further, Italian. 03:03 – 03:06 Tamara Okay, so you have a family that’s from Italy as well? 03:07 – 03:13 Mari Yes, my grandfather was from Italy, so we have some of the traditions on my father’s side. 03:14 – 03:44 Tamara I heard you say that it wasn’t your choice to go to bilingual school, so it’s something that your parents’ sort of forced? I know, some of friends I have that are in the US and maybe they’re trying to raise their children to be bilingual, sometimes children can be resistant to the idea, they want to speak the community language, they don’t want to be seen as odd or different, so, did you struggle with that growing up? Or were learnspanishconsalsa.com/podcast you open to the idea at the beginning? Or learning languages, something that you sort of slowly had to grow to love over time? 03:45 – 04:26 Mari So, when I started with English, I was only 2 years-old, so I wasn’t very conscious, but my mom always tells me that I didn’t like it because I couldn’t understand, but I was learning. So, then when I was 5 years-old my mom took me to DisneyLand, to Walt Disney World in Florida, and I heard English been talked and, you know, in order to talk to all the characters, like the little mermaid, and everything, I had to speak English so, that’s when I started to realizing what a language was, and when I started been interested in languages, because it was useful. So, I always tell parents like, if you show your kid why they’re learning the other language and you give them a valid reason they will be motivated. 04:27 – 04:39 Tamara Yeah, that was kind of the genius of your mom’s part, all the Disney characters, right? So, you’ll be naturally motivated, it wasn’t like she was trying to force you to learn grammar, she’s like “do you want to talk to the little mermaid? 04:40 – 04:40 Mari Yes, yes! 04:41 – 04:41 Tamara She speaks English! 04:43 – 05:00 Mari She also bought me a Backstreet Boys’ album and started throwing the lyrics, so… It was just hilarious, the whole experience, but it really helped me to understand why it was important to learn more languages. 05:01 – 05:13 Tamara And as you mentioned the Backstreet Boys, did music play a role in your language learning at all? Or was it just that one song that you were trying to learn, or did you continue to use music as you learned other languages as well? 05:14 – 05:30 Mari Oh, I’ve always been super interested in music, I’ve always been a musical person, so it always plays a role, I cannot learn a learnspanishconsalsa.com/podcast language without music, that’s the first thing I do when I start to learn a language, I search for the music. If I don’t like music, it is way harder for me to learn. I’m super motivated by music. 05:32 – 05:59 Tamara And it’s funny too because part of my experience is really how I got to learning Spanish was through salsa music, and just kind of wanting to know what were people saying and being involved in the dance community as well, is something that really just pushes me naturally to learn, because I wanted to know so, when I started to learn Portuguese, I did something similar because I love Samba and I was really trying to learn the dance, which is hopeless for me, I can’t dance Samba at all. 06:00 – 06:01 Mari Is really difficult. 06:02 – 06:41 Tamara It is, my hips do not do what they’re supposed to do in Samba, but I still love the music, there’s a song Malagueña so, when I went to Brazil, that was another thing that really kind of drove me as well, really getting into some music from Portuguese as well so, very cool, yeah, I always like to ask that because I had several people in the Podcast and they all mention music in some way, and I feel like it’s almost like the best kept secret of language learners because is not something people talk about a lot, they take it for granted, like “Oh, yeah, I listen to music” because it’s like breathing, but it really can help you when you’re trying to learn the language, especially with some of the sound, some of the subject matter that may be particular to that culture. 06:42 – 07:02 Mari Yes, and it has many aspects like the culture, but also the grammar because music are like poems, so, they have like grammatical tenses, that you not normally hear when you’re speaking and that you have to learn as well, so, I think is very interesting, music overall to learn languages, and it’s fun, that’s the most important, it’s so much fun. learnspanishconsalsa.com/podcast 07:03 – 07:10 Tamara Do you have any other tips for…? How many languages do you speak, again? You mentioned Dutch, Italian, obviously, Spanish, English… 07:12 – 07:14 Mari Portuguese and a little bit of German. 07:14 – 07:38 Tamara So, for someone who might be listening, “oh, my god, I’m trying to learn a language, just trying to learn Spanish”. What are some of the tips that you would give that you feel had worked with you? No matter what language that you picked up. What are those principles that you noticed that have been consistent throughout you acquiring different languages? 07:38– 08:08 Mari So, I figure that I’m only successful when I focus on the day to day and not on the peak and gold because it is not… You know, fluency is not like something that you can see or something that is tangible, is something that you know either when you have it, I rather not focus on that but focus on enjoying every single time I’m exposed to the language and just be consistent so, it’s just a matter of like enjoying every day and be consistent every day.