Duolingo Taught Me to Tap. I Still Couldn't Order Coffee.

I was proud of my Spanish. Two years of daily practice. Top 1% of my league. 847-day streak. Then I went to Mexico City and discovered I'd been lying to myself the whole time.

The Moment of Truth

It happened at a coffee shop in Roma Norte. The barista asked me something. I knew all the words. I'd "learned" them dozens of times. But my brain went completely blank. I panicked, pointed at the menu, and said "esto" like a tourist. Two years of daily practice, and I couldn't order a cortado.

What Went Wrong

I'd spent 730 days training my brain to recognize Spanish. I'd matched thousands of pictures. I'd typed millions of characters. But I'd almost never spoken. The few times the app asked me to speak, I could skip it. So I did. Because speaking is hard and tapping is easy.

The app rewarded me for the easy path. It gave me XP and streaks and dopamine hits. It made me feel like I was making progress. But progress toward what? I could ace any multiple choice test. I couldn't have a conversation.

The Lesson

Fluency isn't about knowing words. It's about producing them under pressure, in real time, to real people. If you've never practiced that, you haven't practiced the skill that actually matters. That's not the app's fault. But it's also not yours. The app was designed to keep you engaged. It just wasn't designed to make you speak.