Today, I would like to tell you about my life-changing experience with Habla Ya Panama Spanish School.
Unlike most people who visit Latin America, I never thought about the necessity of taking Spanish classes. I already spoke some Spanish (although I wasn't fluent), and I had been familiar with Boquete, Panama for over 6 years, as my parents had decided to relocate here. I managed to visit twice per year without ever hearing about Habla Ya - which is very strange, because EVERYONE over here knows about it - but one lucky evening at Zanzibar, I stumbled into Carlos, who is one of the owners of the school.
Carlos came up to me thinking that I was one of his future students (many students arrive to town the weekend before starting their lessons), and once he realized his mistake he explained to me what he and his partner Julio were doing in Boquete. They had started a Spanish school back in 2005 - and Carlos asked me if I wanted to take some lessons. This had never crossed my mind before. My Spanish was not that bad, and I could get by with what I learned in the street, but I agreed that my past and future tenses needed some (or a lot) of brushing up...
I have to admit that I liked Carlos a lot, and that was probably the main reason I dragged my mom to Los Establos Plaza the very next day to enroll in Private Spanish Lessons. My very friendly and funny teacher was Ismenia, and today we still share a special bond and like to remember how we met.
I only signed up for 10 hours, because I was flying back to London 3 days later, but it was incredible how much more secure I felt using the Spanish Language after those 10 hours! Ismenia was great helping me with my past tenses, and while I was learning Spanish at the school, I also got to know Carlos, Ismenia and the rest of the staff a bit better. Everyone was so friendly, and I was very sad to leave Boquete for the first time in my life. All the other times I just came to visit my parents, and didn't make any friends, but this time was very different.
I went back to London, to my investment banking job; back to my very stressful and un-meaningful life that I disliked more and more every day. I thought that I was wasting my time there, and couldn't stop thinking everyday about what it would be like to live in Boquete. This thought turned into an obsession, and staying in contact with Carlos fueled the idea more and more.
Four months later I was back in Central America, and Carlos and I became a couple. I never felt so happy in my life, and now the decision to relocate to this beautiful town and leave the grey, empty life I was leading in Europe just made sense. So I did it. I quit that "great job anyone would kill for" and bought a one-way ticket to Panama.
Long story short, Carlos and I moved in, got engaged and now we're happily married. His partner Julio, his wife Rachel and everyone at Habla Ya became my closest friends in Boquete. Today I am part of the Habla Ya Family, and I can proudly say that it is a true honor to be part of this extraordinary school which grows in quality and size every day.
Nowadays I'm a Language Travel Consultant and I advise people from all over the world who want to learn Spanish in Panama on how to make their Spanish learning vacation in Latin America a reality. As I'm fluent in German, French and Dutch I've helped with the translation of the website to these other languages and opened the door for Habla Ya to other markets overseas. And I am pretty good at it - why? Because there is no better person to promote a service, than someone who has been a (very happy) customer before. I love sharing my experience with future students, and when I am asked why they should come to Habla Ya, I just say: you might love it so much that you might end up not going back home - at least that is what happened to me!
