WANTED: Spanish speaking person to converse with

WANTED: Spanish speaking person to converse with
Current mood: stressed

Midterms are here and boy do I feel the heavy weight of burden upon my shoulders. I foolishly thought that by only taking half of the classes I'm used to that it would by half the stress. HAHAHAHA!!!! Silly Kaiti! Anyway, today was my Spanish midterm. I'm in a critical reading and applied writing class that is required for my minor (which by the way I only have to take this and two more classes and I will have completed). I had no idea how to study for this test. So, I read, re-read, re-re-read, and (for good measure) re-re-re-read the 7 essays we have covered just to make sure I could answer any question asked about them and I also reviewed the main grammar points the teacher has discussed. All of my studying was a waste. The test consisted of a fable and a one page essay by Rigoberto Minchu (or something like that) and I had to answer some questions.

The problem is this...all of my Spanish knowledge has been gained on a university level and my vocabulary is limited. What I have found is that once you complete the beginner and intermediate level courses and move onto the advance classes there is an invisible line that no one warns you that you are crossing. YOu are crossing from professors using specific vocabulary, speaking at a very clear/very slow speed, and most of the class is native English speakers to the professors speaking a mile a minute and the class is predominantly native Spanish speakers. I feel so lost and the main reason is that I don't have the vocabulary to understand half of what is being said.

There's only so much I can learn from a book. It almost makes me want to stop and talk to some of the latinos building houses in my neighborhood. Almost.