Provided by Fluenz/August 28th
I love traveling throughout Latin America because it gives me the opportunity to practice the Spanish I spent 4 years studying during college but rarely used in my daily life, yet the further away I am from graduation the more I can't remember my Spanish and the less confident I am in starting a conversation with a Spanish speaker.
Two years ago, while traveling in Mexico City, a PR friend told me about a week-long Spanish immersion experience with a company called Fluenz. I'd been meaning to try it for myself ever since, and finally took the plunge this summer when I inquired about booking the experience.
What is Fluenz: It's a program started by Sonia Gil that uses three tools to help users realistically achieve their goal of fluency: the Fluenz app, one-on-one Zoom lessons, and immersion trips. While the app offers modules in Spanish, Portuguese, German, Italian, French, and Chinese, the immersion trips are only available in Spanish and include destinations throughout South and Central America, from Argentina to Colombia, Costa Rica, Spain, Peru, and multiple cities in Mexico. The hardest part is picking the location. Once you've decided, the Fluenz team will take care of everything from accommodation to hotel transfers, group bookings for dinners and excursions, and personal requests like extending your stay or setting up private tours.
structure: Over the course of six days, you'll spend a total of 20 hours (two in the morning and two in the afternoon) learning and practicing Spanish in sessions tailored to your level, either paired with other students or one-on-one with a language coach. You'll be given a workbook to take physical notes, and your coach will save digital notes from your sessions in a Google Drive folder so you can refer to them throughout the week and after your trip.
Outside of the classroom, you'll eat lunch with fellow program participants on-site (you can sit at the Spanish table if you want more practice, or at the English table if you want to give your brain a break), dine together at a top restaurant on select nights, and enjoy free time to mingle with locals as you explore the city's cultural hub.
Travelling with: The time and cost required for Fluenz ($6,920 for a single room in Mexico City) guarantees that you'll be traveling with colleagues who share a common goal: learning Spanish, many of them for work reasons. My group was made up of lawyers, medical professionals, professors, psychologists, and other business owners who employ Spanish speakers. Language ability ranged from students so advanced that most of their classes were spent perfecting their pronunciation, to those who had never studied Spanish in their lives and decided to take the plunge on their trip, to those who had just taken an immersive trip in Oaxaca a few weeks prior.
Who can tell me: Our coaches' backgrounds are equally diverse and include an architect, a musician and a former journalist from different parts of Latin America. Coaches rotate throughout the week to suit your schedule, exposing you to a variety of Spanish accents and teaching methods.
Things to know before you go: Before your trip, you will be sent a questionnaire to assess your level of Spanish, from which a Zoom assessment will be scheduled and, in discussion with your coach, you will decide at what level of modules you will start practicing in the Fluenz app and where you will begin your Spanish journey once you arrive. You will also be provided with hotel information, pick-up details and a weekly itinerary. Every evening you will also receive an email detailing the schedule for the next day.
Thus, my immersive trip to Mexico City unfolded.
Day 1: I arrived at Benito Juarez International Airport early on a Sunday morning and was promptly picked up by a driver who held a sign outside baggage claim and took me to the Pug Sierra Anatole France, where I'd be staying for the week. Located in the upscale neighborhood of Polanco, this boutique hotel is charming with its antique décor and its incredibly spacious suites. It felt more like I was renting an apartment for an extended stay than being cooped up in a tiny hotel room, which enhanced the experience. Additionally, the hotel's food was fresh, flavorful, and plentiful at every lunch, including a delicious soup made from a recipe created by Fluence's founder.
I spent the afternoon walking around the neighborhood, stopping for a quick lunch at Goy's Plant-Based Burgers, and dinner at La Única, a contemporary Mexican cantina recommended by Fluenz. The menu is sophisticated and extensive, with meat, seafood and veggie dishes.
Day 2: I'll be honest, I went into my first Spanish class feeling pretty confident, but left wondering what I'd done wrong. The great thing was that my teachers taught me exactly what I said I wanted to learn, so you could say I brought this on myself. That night, I relaxed at the hotel over tamales and mezcal, then listened to Mexican actor and screenwriter Adrián Pascoe give a talk about Mexico's famous political history.
Day 3: My frustration reached a peak during class on Tuesday afternoon when I was overthinking Spanish and couldn't find the words. My coach, Pepe, who was my fourth class coach, gave me some peace of mind by reassuring me about my Spanish and telling me that he is known for challenging his students.
That evening, we had a private tour of the National Museum of Anthropology. The museum is so vast that multiple visits would be required to fully appreciate all the wonders inside. It was a truly enjoyable experience to see the centuries-old artifacts and statues from the Mayan and Teotihuacan cultures on display and learn the stories of how these items were used and then discovered and acquired.
Day 4: By midweek, I was starting to feel more at home with my one-on-one lessons and was getting used to making small talk with my coach on the way to a session outside the hotel. That evening, I had dinner in a private room at Pujol, a Michelin-starred restaurant that's nearly impossible to get a reservation at unless you book months in advance. The menu takes Mexican cuisine to unexpected heights and will tantalize your taste buds, too. Expect unique ingredients like grasshoppers and mango sake sorbet that are surprisingly satisfying.
Day 5: Those courses (and wine pairings) at Pujol gave Thursday morning's class a laid-back vibe, but the day was heightened by a trip to Casa Gilardi, the colorful home built by Mexican minimalist architect Luis Barragán between 1975 and 1977. The red, blue, and pink pool hall has become Instagram famous, but the entire space is inviting, from the yellow hallway on the first floor to the railing-less staircase that leads to the upper floors.
Another field trip awaited us on Thursday afternoon. After a quick vocabulary lesson, we had the opportunity to use the Soumaya Museum as our classroom. The museum is home to more than 66,000 works of art, not including the building itself, a unique structure covered in silver tiles. All of the pieces in the museum were donated by the private collection of Lebanese-Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim Helu.
Day 6: By Friday, I felt I had made significant progress. I knew this because my morning session was a group class with two other students. Most of the time was spent practicing conversation skills using prompts. That afternoon, we had a celebration where each student shared a short story they had written, showcasing what they had learned that week. That evening, we continued the party with dinner at Silvestre, a colonial-style space where wine pairings again perfectly complemented the Mexican-fusion cuisine.
Day 7: Before my flight home on Saturday afternoon, I took an Uber to Chapultepec Castle. The castle is located in the Chapultepec Forest, a huge park filled with lakes, sculptures, walking trails, and botanical gardens. The 18th-century neoclassical palace sits on a hilltop, so it's a bit of a walk, but it offers great views of the city below, including the Paseo de la Reforma. Inside, you'll find paintings, jewelry, armor, and other relics from Mexico's past monarchs.
Perhaps most rewarding was when my driver, Oscar, noticed how much more Spanish I spoke to him on the way to the airport compared to when I arrived. I felt like I had achieved my goal for the week, and those around me were noticing the progress, too.
After the trip: When I left Mexico City, I brought back something of an unexpected souvenir: taleas (homework). At the end of the immersion, our lead coach will compile the homework for us to work on within a week of our return, to give our brains time to process all the information we learned during the trip. After our last class, I wanted to continue our sessions on Zoom, which we had just started last week. Between writing and other travel, I wasn’t able to study Spanish as much as I had initially thought, but meeting our head coach, Camila, for our first Zoom session helped ease my anxiety. It also had the same structure as our in-person classes, and the coach added notes and music and movie recommendations to my Google Drive, giving me more exposure to Spanish. The wide selection of classes makes it easy to fit coursework into my schedule, and the weekly reminders are helpful when other obligations arise. I have to admit that 90 minutes on Zoom fly by when I’m having fun and when I’ve finally achieved my long-term goal.