Hello, my name is Ryanair

I had my first U3A (University of the Third Age) Spanish class on Tuesday.

It's a big class with around 22 students, some of whom are spending their third year in basic Spanish! Either they are very slow learners or we have a very bad teacher. Judging from my impressions of the first class, it is the former that applies, but having said that I am struggling to remember one Duolingo lesson for more than an hour!

I sat next to a couple who are learning Spanish because their son is marrying a Catalan woman; we had something slightly in common, although Ecuador is more exotic, so I felt I had the upper hand.

The chap on the other side was a committed South American traveller. He's done Chile, Peru, Bolivia, Cape Horn and Easter Island - the only Spanish he knows is: "can you speak English?" Next year, he is off to Argentina, the Falklands, Drake's Passage and Chile. He plans to drive all the way up Chile. I couldn't get away from him at the end, he was very keen to tell me about his adventures. I think if I'd asked him if he had any pictures, I'd still be looking at his smartphone. I'll ask him next week.

The "dunces" in the class included one woman, who claimed she couldn't remember anything she learned last year and couldn't introduce herself in Spanish; also a chap who can't roll his rrrs. They both seemed very happy to still be in basic Spanish and not in any great hurry to leave. There was also an odd chap called Pinder, who won't tell anyone his first name and who got very grumpy when it was suggested we buy textbooks on Amazon. "What was wrong with bookshops?" he wanted to know. Also, Pinder couldn't work out what he was called when it was his turn to introduce himself, which is a bit poor considering he's already ditched 50 per cent of his name. You'd have thought three words: "me llamo Pinder" would have been easy enough.

Our tutor, John, was very good; he explained things clearly, he's laid back and has a sense of humour. He knows Spanish through working as an engineer in northern Spain during the 1990s.

We started by going through the alphabet, which has good, clear rules, but more nuances than English. I learned that I drive a bay emmay oobay doblay (BMW), but most Spaniards call them bay emmays and, amusingly, a VW is an oobay, oobay doblay. I also learned that my name is Ehric Ryanair (rolling both Rs) Littleh. I'm not very happy about sounding like a budget airline, but what can I do?

We are learning to speak Castellano, which has slight differences in pronunciation from South American Spanish, but I think that's the least of my worries right now. I have to miss next week's class because I'm in Jersey, but John has promised to mail me the exercise sheet. I'll have to swot up on that, plus my Dualingo if I'm ever to escape to the intermediate class.