The Northland's language gem

It's not that easy to learn another language when you are well past your schooling.

For five years, I've watched my husband, Rod Walli, learn Finnish, his parents' first language. Motivated by the desire to speak with non-English-speaking cousins of his generation in Finland, he plunged into every route he could find.

Down the road from us, at our Villa Vista-Cardinal Court for elders, he convened a Finnish language table, learning from those who had spoken it as children at home. More recently, he's been watching films in Finnish with no English subtitles. Later this month, he'll be spending a week at Concordia Language Villages near Bemidji, his third or fourth adult immersion.

Inspired by his diligence, I decided to improve my Spanish. I hadn't spoken since college, except to navigate (poorly) during short trips to Spain, Peru, Chile and Mexico.

Last week I joined El Lago del Bosque, the Spanish village at Concordia. A dozen young counselors from Mexico, Argentina and Spain lavished their energy, smarts, and patience on our group of adult learners - about 18 of us. Every day, we spent four hours in class, spread over three time slots.

Classes were grouped around three savory meals, each from a Spanish-speaking culture. Before dinner, a counselor presented on topics such as gambling addiction in Argentina; Basque and Catalonian independence movements; flora and fauna of Latin America and the history of emeralds in Columbia. The remaining hours were interspersed with activities we elected (cooking, doll- and jewelry-making, dancing, sports, hiking, etc.).

In my group were two younger women - both married with children - and one man. Our teacher Caspi, a vibrant young woman from the Spanish Basque Country, worked hard to help us speak fluently and learn grammar. Besides drills, we played games, and wrote about short topics Caspi chose.

I'll admit that I'm not that good anymore at memorizing grammar rules. Like children, I now learn best by listening and attempting to speak. Many, many words came back to me, buried in my memory. I could convey meaning, if imperfectly. By day three, I pledged publicly to speak only Spanish all day!

The Concordia Language Villages are a northern Minnesota gem. I sat down with Kristen Addison, Concordia's dean of Spanish Academic Year Programs, on the final morning. She related the Villages' history.

In the early 1960s, Drs. Jerry Hokobaho and Charlie Mayo, working on a U.S. Air Force base in Germany, taught American kids German. They discovered that the children were learning best by playing. Why not, they thought, create a little Germany here, in Minnesota? Hooking up with Concordia College, they taught future German teachers on site in Alexandria, Minn. Their German slots filled by 1964; they then added programs in Spanish, Russian and French.

The Concordia team decided to expand, adding languages and building a village for each. They found a patron in Pablo Hoff, who had first come as an 8-year-old to Concordia's language camp and returned thereafter as counselor, teacher, dean and instructor, where he met his future wife, Nuria. With royalties that Nuria earned from her work as one of the first photographers for Spanish textbooks, the two donated generously to buy the land in northern Minnesota.

The Spanish village, Addison explains, is less about heritage and more about contemporary Spanish-speaking culture.

"Everything we do has to have a cultural component," he said. Before every meal, for instance, a counselor explains the dishes we are about to eat, their ingredients, and what country they are from.

"We try to pull verb formats and tenses into activities," he added.

This includes the more active hours. I'll admit, I didn't realize this while I was trying to master a tango step. But since I learn best by hearing and not reading or memorizing, it was stealthy work for me!

The counselors are outstanding. Fun, hard-working, creative. Applicants from all over the Spanish-speaking world have earned hard-won spots by documenting their education and work experience, and in face-to-face interviews via the internet. They work well together with lots of mutual respect and laughter.

Every evening for five nights, we were treated to a telenovela our counselors created and performed for us. About an unhappy rich family, with money problems, infidelities and murder, each episode provoked much laughter. The acting was as scintillating as the script, heightened by lights and snippets of music.

The Concordia Language Villages program works for campers at any age and any level of exposure. There are summer camps for kids, for families, and for college students. Whatever your prior exposure, learning a new language is a very powerful experience. It will improve your English, too. And you'll have a lot of fun along the way.

Ann Markusen is an economist and professor emerita at University of Minnesota. A Pine Knot board member, she lives in Red Clover Township north of Cromwell with her husband, Rod Walli.