Reason 526 to learn Spanish:

to understand flat mates! It's one thing needing to understand Spanish in order to survive, i.e. take the bus, find a flat, and buy groceries. It's another to not be able to understand conversations. I'm someone who loves to talk about life, experiences, and the day-to-day details, so it gets quite depressing when my lovely flat mates are having a conversation that they are including me in and I can only understand about 50% of what is said and contribute less than 10% myself! I LOVE living with people who use Spanish as the common language, but after a long day, it is really rough for me to communicate at all. Knowing that our newest flatmate speaks better Spanish than the other two (who speak really, really well) means there are going to be many more situations like this one. I think needing Spanish in order to be social is even more motivating to me than needing it for day to day survival! :)