No puedo oír

I often think that if the situation was reversed, that if I were a native Spanish speaker doing a temporary stint in an English speaking country to improve English fluency, an equivalent scenario could be my having taken formal education with North American teachers (and their accents) and a North American English curriculum, and then moving to Australia to practice my "advanced beginner" English. I might have a difficult time understanding my "teacha" at first, I would quickly learn to love a good flat white, and I would have no idea if the rest of the English speaking world ate capsicums or not. 

So, there's plenty about the Spanish-speaking world that I don't know (and am not actually worrying about right now), but I do know that I've had to work pretty hard to understand the Chilean accent in a way that I don't have to when I'm speaking with the Columbians or Ecuadorians I've met in Chile. I overcame the first round of challenges -- finally gave in to dropping my Ss (mas o menos becomes mah o menoh, Francisca becomes Francica, etc), changed my Bs to Vs that pretend to be Bs (Esteban becomes Estevan, but with a hint of "ban") and I can hear the difference between Pía and Tía now. 

Now I'm in the second round of challenges with vowel sounds and emphasis. 

Me: Ariel

Ariel: Ariel

Me: Ariel

Ariel: No, Ariel

Me: Ariel

Francisca: No, Ariel

Me: I'm saying Ariel
Ariel: No, Ariel.

I'm realizing that it goes both ways, though. My coworkers and housemates have a hard time with my name, for example. My coworkers said (and spelled) Katss for the first month, and my Chilean housemother called me Carmen for the first few days, Katee for the next few weeks, before finally settling on Gatita. When I say Minnesota (without using the Spanish pronunciation guide), people hear Venezuela. 

I would speak much better Spanish if I were from Venezuela. I would hope.