Back to the Faculty

Over the last two months I (Martin) have been doing the Entrance Course for the Language Faculty, in order to start a degree as an English/Spanish Translator (see previous post for why). And in the last few days I have been doing the exams.

I sat the written English exam on Monday, straight after the ABUA camp, and then the Spanish exam on Tuesday. So there hasn't been a great deal of preparation time. On Wednesday we went in to get the results of the written English exam. They had us stand outside the room, and then they called into the room those who had failed the written exam. They got to look at their papers before heading home- they can sit a recovery exam next week. Then they called the rest of us in in groups of 4 to sit the oral exam. Although it was in English I was surprised how nervous I became. Imagine the nerves for those (every one else) who don't have English as their first language.

Today I went in to get the results of the Spanish exam... and again it was nerve wracking. But I got through. Thankfully there was no oral exam!

It is interesting to reflect that out of everything in the two exams, my worst section was English grammar. I guess that reflects the philosophy of the Education Department in NSW during my primary and high school. They taught us very little grammar- nothing more than verb, noun, adjective and adverb. I have learnt all of my grammar learning other languages, Greek at Moore College and now Spanish. It is strange to think that although I may well speak English better than I speak Spanish, I actually understand the grammar of Spanish far better!  (And those lovers of Grammar can probably go through my comments and observe lots of grammatical errors!)

So I am almost enrolled as a student in the Facultad de Lenguas... I just need to sit some high school equivalency exams in Argentine Language, Literature, Geography and History.