Between the ages of 7 and 10, I watched tons of Latin American telenovelas. Years later, without ever taking a single Spanish class, I could just… understand Spanish.

Well, mostly the essential phrases, like “¡Desgraciado, me dejaste embarazada!” and “¿Quién es mi verdadero padre?”

My language CV in a nutshell

Apart from my dramatic Spanish skills, here’s my language CV in a nutshell:

• Romanian: my mother tongue. Yes, in Moldova we speak Romanian. The “Moldovan language” does not exist.
• Russian: mandatory at school, and learned by force, because you hear it everywhere in Moldova.
• French and English: learned at school.
• Danish: I moved to Denmark at 19, learned it in under 2 years (yes, including “rødgrød med fløde”).

Why Spanish, and why now

In my work as an accountant and tax advisor in Denmark, the clients who most often ask for consultations in their own language are Spanish speakers.

On top of that, Denmark has no double tax treaty with Spain. For anyone with income, property or a pension across the two countries, that makes things complicated, and it’s exactly the kind of case where explaining it in someone’s mother tongue makes a real difference.

So I thought: I’m going to learn Spanish properly. Not from telenovelas.

So, for the past month, I’ve been in Valencia learning Spanish completely from zero.

I’m staying a few more months to practise, so I can help more and more hispanohablantes in Denmark. And honestly, it’s also a way to dodge the cold, rainy Danish season.

¡Hasta pronto!
Irina