阅读下面短文，在空白处填入一个适当的词，或填入括号中所给单词的正确形式。

Some people say it is not easy for a middle-aged person to learn a foreign language. But is it ___（1）___（real）true?

Several years ago, I worked for ___（2）___ English newspaper which was doing such a research. They asked me to learn a new language for one month. Then I had to go to the country and do some “tests” ___（3）___（see）if I could “survive（挺过来）” in different situations.

I chose Spanish（西班牙语）and did a one-month course at a language school and ___（4）___（find）that some Spanish words are very similar to English ones. ___（5）___ example, hola isn’t very different from “hello”. Of course, there are other things which are more difficult. In Spanish you have to change the verbs（动词）for each person. But my ___（6）___（big）problem of all was the pronunciation. I found ___（7）___ was very difficult to pronounce some letters in Spanish, especially r and j. So I had to download ___（8）___（sentence）onto my phone and I listened and practised them again and again.

A month later I went to Spain. A Spanish teacher ___（9）___（call）Paula came and began the test. “Will I survive?” I wasn’t sure enough but _____（10）_____ I wished I would!