¿Como estas? Sehr gut, und einen?

We are having a great time learning Spanish. Remarkably, all of the instruction is in Spanish, and we must ask our questions in Spanish. I cannot describe how this actually can work, but I do know that I am getting more confident with this new language, and I have been in a variety of situations where I can actually communicate to strangers in Spanish! This is not to say that in class we cannot use our native language as a backup, but our instructor, a university professor, speaks only Spanish. One of the students in my group of three was from Germany. When he would get stuck on a word, I found myself translating Spanish into German. Go figure!