PTL (Praise the Lord) 9-19-11

Today brought a lot of disappointment, and a lot of joy as well. Today we found out what class we were going to be in for the year out of three levels; intermediate, advanced 1, and advanced 2. The results were posted on the board in the classroom, and guess what class I got? If you guessed advanced anything, you guessed wrong.

I placed into the intermediate level of the classes, which doesn't sound so bad to start, but if you haven't noticed, there are no beginner level classes, but here, there are a few beginners. Seeing some of the others' abilities, I thought I would at least place in Advanced 1, yet here I was. The director said that we could talk to him about changing our levels, but it would have to be tomorrow. He wanted us to try out our classes for today, so we could know if we were where we needed to be. For me, one more thing that made it sting even more was that my friends who know less Spanish than I do, made it into advanced 1.

 I was humbled, embarrassed, and angry. At one point in the morning, I excused myself to the restroom and knelt down on the bathroom floor in one of the stalls, right in front of a toilet (emotions can make you do things you wouldn't normally do), and poured my heart out to God. It was supposed to be a quick little prayer, but it lasted much longer than I intended, because I had a lot to pour, mostly anger. I tried to hide it for the morning, and I think I did a pretty good job. We started classes right away, and my first class was the class of conversation. I can honestly say that I understood all but about seven words the teacher said the entire class period while we learned "hola, como estas", and "de donde eres"; lessons I had learned over and over in high school and at Walla Walla. I was actually frustrated to be in that class and to be learning the same easy material for my third time now. When the teacher asked where we were from, most said, in Spanish of course, "I'm from________", while I said something to the effect of "I am from Yucaipa, which is between Loma Linda and Palm Springs", and when the teacher asked "Que estudias?" most said "I study _____" while I said something like, "well, I am studying Spanish because I want to be a doctor and I live in Southern California, so I think it is a good idea". Normally, I really like easy classes, but this time, it actually pained me how easy it was. For me, it seems like I was put in a 5th grade math class learning fractions. Don't get me wrong, we all have to start somewhere, but that was not the place for me.

Next class was composition with Chelo, one of the dearly loved teachers on campus, and I can see why. This time, I only missed about three words in class that were said. I had had it: I wanted change.

When classes were over, I talked to the dean. The dean speaks little to no English whatsoever, so I knew it was going to be a big challenge to talk to him and say what needed to be said tactfully, and still make my case. We started talking, and he explained to me that my placement exam was terrible, and he even showed me so I could see for myself. Yep, it was awful. I talked about how I already knew the past tenses, the future tenses, the present tenses, the imperfect tenses and more. I talked about how I had already learned everything taught in that class, and how I needed to grow, I talked about how my adviser at Walla Walla told me last year that I needed to be at least in the 300 level (which is Advanced 1) classes, and I talked about how I went to Peru for two weeks and learned a lot down there. At one point, it was getting really difficult to think of the right words, and I even asked him if I could continue in English (which now that I think about it, wound not have helped case), and he told me to continue in Spanish, so I stumbled along. At one point, he pulled out my test, pulled out the answer key, and regraded it. Of course while he was doing that, I was praying that someone graded it with the wrong answer key or something, so maybe, just maybe I would get a much better score, but nope. Still awful. What made that even worse was that the whole time he was grading it, he was shaking his head, and I was sitting right there! We must have talked for at least 20 minutes, and when I say we talked, I mean I talked; tried to talk. I just kept on stumbling my way through the point I was trying to get across.

At the end of the time, he went into another room for a little bit, and I was sure that he would come back and tell me to just stick with the program and try again next quarter. When he came back, I was pretty much ready to hear the bad news; I was actually listening for the bad news, so I almost completely missed it when he told me I would be starting in Advanced 1 tomorrow. I barely caught enough to know what he said, but I didn't need to hear it again! He told me that tomorrow I will trade in my Intermediate books for my Advanced books, and pick up with the class tomorrow. I was so excited, I almost wet myself (no really, I had to use the bathroom really bad at that point)!

When I left the office of the dean, I realized that while we were talking, I had demonstrated the past tenses, the present tenses, and even a few of the future tenses that I hadn't even really studied that much. I also realized that for the last twenty minutes I had talked Spanish well enough to convince a dean that I was ready for the next level. If I had started speaking English, I could have talked all I wanted, but he would not have had proof that I could do what I say I can do. Remember what I said about being a Windows 98 when it comes to speaking Spanish? I realized that maybe God was trying to teach me a lesson today, and reminding me that it is Him who works through me, and it is not my knowledge of Spanish that got me here. Here I walked up to that board cocky and confident, and I feel that God was reminding me that it is not by my strength that all things are possible.