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myohmy.25

Hello everyone!

My husband and I just recently moved here in San Juan Puerto Rico from Alaska because of his job relocation.  His job is mainly catering for cruiseship tourists so he doesnt need to speak spanish at work. Just our main concern is speaking with locals, tho some locals can speak english but majority we encounter speaks spanish.  We are trying to break the language barrier so we consider attending spanish class in groups or one on one tutorial.  Im starting to learn some basics from youtube tutorial videos but I think its better to practice it in actual conversation.

I hope somebody can give me recommendation for my continuous learning. Gracias!

trekrider520

When we were stationed in PR, I took a two week course at ISLA in Hato Rey to help dust off the cobwebs of my high school Spanish. Highly recommended!!  Teachers were great and there were only 6 people in the class for lots of one on one.
What part of AK?  We were stationed in Anchorage and hope to get back!

myohmy.25

Hi! Thanks for the response and recommendation.  I heard about ISLA,  just a little distance from where we currently living, in Old San Juan.  I'll see if they also do flexible time, like during weekends instead of doing straight days of classes.  And hopefully just staying here for more than a year can get me adjust to the language naturally.  Thats the advantage of some Puerto Ricans, they are bilunguals.

We do seasonal jobs in Juneau, Alaska..been to Skagway too. And weather here in PR is a warm big change.

trekrider520

We lived in Old San Juan also - Capitolio Plaza. It’s pretty easy to get to the Hato Rey facility via the bus and Tren Urbano (provided that it's back and running after Maria). You can take the bus to the Sagrado Corazón station, then the Tren to the Hato Rey station.
You can also ask around OSJ - there might be tutoring options that might be able to give you lessons there.
We love Juneau and spent lots of time there. The AK duty stations are Anchorage and Juneau - we’d take either one!
Best of luck!

Leap1205

I'm flying over on Wednesday.  Hopefully staying, if not, this is at least 2 weeks groundwork for the permanent move.  Did take 3 years of college Spanish, but can't really speak well yet, and only understand very slowly, lol.   Right now I'm just using the free duolingo app as much as possible. It might not help with the Puerto Rican accent and idioms, but at least you can pick up some vocabulary and get a sense of the grammar and verb tense, etc.   Good luck!

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