My first day in Spain, I had to go to the bank. Now remember, going to the bank in the United States can be stressful. Everyone is in a hurry, there are lots of rules to remember, and in general I don’t know what I’m supposed to be doing. In Spain, that’s all still true, but everything is also in Spanish.
I speak Spanish fairly well—I’ve studied it for almost 9 years now—but because I’ve mostly learned it in school, I've struggled to develop a clear accent. I learned a little bit with a distinctly estadounidense (American) accent, then some with a madrileño (Madrid-based) accent. Then I worked with a mexicana (woman from Mexico) before studying the dominicano (Dominican or Dominican-American) and other Carribean accents. Basically, I sound like I’m from nowhere, but also a little bit like I’m from everywhere.
The Canarian dialect is beautiful and unique; it is a mixture of peninsular castellano (Spanish) words but more Caribbean sounds. For instance, a greeting in the US would often include something like, “¿Hola, cómo estás?” ("Hi, how are you?").
