Although Andrew and I finished year 1 of Portuguese language class with good results, I felt overstimulated and my brain pleaded for a respite. Despite this, Andrew encouraged us to enroll in B levels for the subsequent year, primarily because we adore our professor and wanted to ensure that we would study with him again. We presumed his retirement is happening sooner than later and didn’t want to risk taking a gap year only to end up missing out on class with beloved Jorge. We also had concerns about losing some of the progress we had made if we didn’t jump right into lessons again.

School started in October and ended on the last day of May. Each session was two hours – three nights per week. Much like the first year, class was a mixture of students with different language levels, nationalities, backgrounds, and ages. There were 6 of us who had attended A level class together with Jorge and one student who had taken A level with a different professor. Quite a few students tested in to the class – some self studied, some are fluent in Spanish which is grammatically similar, and some have Portuguese jobs and speak well but wanted to improve pronunciation and grammar.

We began the school year with a ton of motivation. We studied almost every day for the first two months. We reviewed our A level material from last year, studied new B level lessons we had covered in class, completed online exercises assigned by our professor, and read aloud to each other. Towards the end of November when our cat went missing, concentrating in class became impossible. We kept attending diligently, despite our lack of energy.

Midway through the year we noticed that the chemistry between schoolmates wasn’t as vibrant as during year 1. Everyone was friendly and seemed focused, task oriented, and dedicated, but some of the camaraderie was absent. I jokingly said that class wasn’t as great because there weren’t any Ukrainians with us this time around, they definitely brought a ton of laughs and personality. Making it to class felt increasingly more like a chore and a bit less fun, even if parts of class were entertaining and hilarious. This was through no fault of our professor who kept things engaging and even started bringing in comic strips like “Mafalda” in order to liven things up.

Grammar lessons ramped up, we were assigned writing tasks much more frequently and interactive oral scenarios were much more complicated. We listened to audio, and had to answer nuanced questions – we were way beyond trying to suss out “this person is at an airport, not a doctor’s office”. We did a lot of reading aloud in class in an effort to improve pronunciation (apparently English speakers have a very difficult time with this part). Sometimes I felt like the worst student in class and that I didn’t belong. Jorge is a whiz at sensing when the class was frustrated with certain lessons or assignments and was a cheerleader for all of our successes.

Although we weren’t actively studying at home as much, we registered for cards at the Olhão library and began checking out books in Portuguese. My favorites are graphic novels which often have great narrative paired with extremely helpful visual clues as to what is going on in the story. Andrew has been especially dedicated to regularly reading Portuguese. We make sure that the movies and TV we watch have Portuguese subtitles on.

We also tried to improve our language skills outside of books and class. Andrew helps our 9 year old buddy Bianca with English and Math homework when she gets bored of hanging out at the café. We play video games and she teaches us new phrases to yell during tense gaming moments. We speak Portuguese with Jorge and our neighbors outside of class.

After Easter break I started counting down the number of classes. We might have whined a bit too much about school because a friend suggested we just quit since we don’t actually need a B level certificate for anything administrative like Portuguese residency or citizenship. We had already attended 7 months at this point and only had 1 month left, so we definitely weren’t giving up yet. “We’re not quitters” was our mantra and we repeated it often. Our thoughts kept drifting to a little terraced house in Urgezes.

As exam time approached, stress amongst students became palpable. Andrew and I had great attendance, had paid attention in class as much as possible, and tried to believe that it would all pay off in the end. We took a B1 exam the penultimate week of classes. The format of the test was the same as our A levels: reading and oral comprehension which were multiple choice, and 2 written portions. We both thought the exam was considerably more difficult than last year. The oral comprehension was quite a challenge this time around, not only was the dialogue much faster, but there were added bonuses like background music and ambient noises to make hearing the conversations even more difficult. Thankfully, we both passed and obtained a B1/B2 certificate in less than 2 years of living in Portugal!

Our last class of the year was a party in the school’s courtyard. We celebrated with music, international food, and too much wine. We fondly reminisced over our shared scholarly journeys. Jorge encouraged us to advance our language efforts (always with “speak more Portuguese”), and suggested advanced online courses as another option. We talked about future plans and promised to keep in touch. Leaving school for the last time was bittersweet. I was extremely relieved to be done, but sad to be saying goodbye to something that has been a major part of our expat lives here in Olhão.

Time will tell if we dabble in continued education. Before I jump into online C level courses I’d love to get back into reviewing both our A and B level material. I also need to keep practicing conversational Portuguese, which should be easier when we move to the North. Ultimately my goal is to continue improving my vocabulary, tweak my pronunciation and enunciation, and read more complicated literature in Portuguese.

Here is Andrew and I reading a dialogue from our B1 school book. During class Jorge was diligent about correcting our pronunciation as needed – I’m sure he would still have pointers for us.

Tip: If you are looking to learn a language, the most important thing is to find a class and a teacher that works for your level and learning style. We highly recommend an immersive class, but only if you are willing to let go of control and embrace the experience, for example over focusing on minute details like word for word translation will slow you and your classmates down. We know of quite a few people who enroll in an immersive class, become frustrated, turn into constant complainers, self-sabotage their progress, and ultimately have a poor result despite over 100 hours of classroom time. In these cases a slower paced, non immersive class or a private tutor may be a better fit.

In order to become fluent, you have to speak A LOT. You also have to be willing to make A LOT of mistakes. This is scary and a major hurdle for a lot of people. We found that having both a young person, like our café buddy Bianca, who still loves playing games like “I am your Portuguese elementary schoolteacher” (she especially likes to scold bad student behavior) and an older person who has the time and patience to speak slowly has done wonders for our language skills and confidence.

Thanks!! Our good friend and classmate (for both years of school!) Nelli took most of the amazing pictures in the post. She surreptitiously would snap a few shots here and there, risking the wrath of Jorge in the pursuit of the perfect saved memories.