Six Words That Rule The Streets Of Mexico

Having more Spanish speakers than any other country on the planet, Mexico naturally holds the lion’s share in vernacular creativity. Mexican slang lexicon is not only matured and complex but also as colorful and diverse, if not more, as any of its counterparts. Given the proliferation of Mexicans in not only entertainment but rather every aspect of life and trade in the Western world, we already enjoy a healthy exposure to its slang vocabulary. Although an exhaustive study of any country’s colloquialism would be overkill, learning some of the most common expressions is mighty fun and useful. Here, we explore six of them from Mexico.

So Many Ways “To Pull” In Spanish!

Languages don’t always work in predictable ways. They have rules and they break their own rules. They have more than one word for the same thing and the same word for more than one thing. This makes them frustratingly complex and it is this complexity that makes them beautiful. This complexity is the very hallmark of an organic language setting them apart from the likes of Klingon and Dothraki. One such fun aspect of Spanish is its translation for the English verb “to pull.” If you’ve just started out with the language, it’s a no-brainer: halar. But there’s more than meets the eye. Turns out, Mexicans and their neighbors don’t even like the word!

Comprender Vs. Entender: Do You Understand?

These are words that get mixed up by even native speakers, let alone noobs like us. Going by the dictionary, both are synonymous and have the same translation in English. However, the two have quite dissimilar connotations. Now the good news here is that mixing up comprender and entender is not a exactly deal-breaker like mixing up, say, ser and estar or por and para. So depending on how far ahead you are in your Spanish learning program, this might be a non-issue. However, if you’re like me and suffer from an itch for perfection, knowing where to use one instead of the other is surely the difference between a rookie and a native.

Cool Trick For The Spanish Imperfect Subjunctive

Subjunctive, let alone imperfect subjunctive, has been terrifying rookie Spanish learners ever since the beginning of time. Why do we even need to deal with those cryptic conjugations anyway? Do they even matter in regular conversations? Well, you’ll be surprised to know that they not only do but do so way more than their English counterparts. Much has been written before on this subject and the grammar of Spanish subjunctive is as plenty easy to access. This article is not about reinventing the wheel. Instead, what we’ll do here is learn some super-cool tricks to nail the conjugation without a single minute wasted toward rote rehearsal.

Spanish Vocabulary Tricks And Fun Christmas Trivia

It’s that time of the year again and Christmas is in the air! Given the insane commercialization of this season across the world it’s hard to see anything particularly Hispanic about it. However, no part of the world is more Catholic than Latin America, which gives Christmas a particularly special significance in those communities. Of course Christmas is hardly Christmas without the Christmas tree and Santa Clause. But to our Spanish-speaking friends, it’s a lot more than just that. So let’s explore some of the lesser known aspects of a Hispanic Christmas and also have a lot of fun learning some relevant Spanish along the way.

The Essential Black Friday Spanish Vocabulary

Read this article on PeppyBurro.

Show Off Your Spanish Skills This Thanksgiving

This post is for our American friends learning Spanish. Thanksgiving is just around the corner and we just can’t wait for the big turkey dinner with friends and family. Now, although the occasion isn’t exactly observed by the Spanish-speaking world, a fiesta is a fiesta. Let’s face it, Thanksgiving is all about food and so are the Latinos! So, now would be as awesome a time as any to brag about your Spanish before an audience of clueless folks. The millions of Spanish-speakers who call America home enjoy the day as much as you do if not more. And why not! A day off is a day off, after all. And the turkey dinner. So let’s dive in and get it over with.

Este, Ese, Aquel – One Trick To Nail’em All

It might sound extremely simplistic at first glance but the demonstratives in Spanish often stump learners well into their programs. The problem is they sound too similar and there’s usually no memory hook offered for one to remember them by. Oh and in case you’re wondering, demonstratives are words like this, that, those, these, etc. Spanish has three of them – Ese, este, and aquel. English has just two – This and that. That’s another problem with Spanish demonstratives – Why three when you can make do with just two? It’s like teaching a fourth dimension to non-physicists who can only comprehend three. So what’s going on here?

Read the whole article at the PeppyBurro blog.

Tricks To Nail 6 “Day Of The Day” Words Instantly

The Day of the Dead, or el Día de los Muertos, is how the Latinos, Mexicans in particular, celebrate their loved ones who’ve crossed the rainbow bridge. The concept of celebrating death is not unique to Mexico; Germans have their Walpurgisnacht and Americans have their Halloween, for instance. What’s unique is the way they do it. In Mexico, the event goes back to the pre-Hispanic days of the Aztecs and thus reflects a lot of indigenous traditions not found elsewhere. This article will attempt to get you up to speed with this event’s vocabulary and help you nail words like cempasúchil as effortlessly and painlessly as possible.

Easy Trick To Remember Aun Vs. Aún

Spanish is notorious for its accent marks. An accent mark is the little tick you see above certain letters in words like tú and sí. Quite often, these ticks are a source of serious confusion among Spanish noobs, especially in cases where their presence or absence can entirely change the word’s meaning. Take the aun-aún pair for example. The two words look completely identical if not for that little tick on aún. But the words still mean two very different and unrelated things. To make matters worse, Spanish has more than one ways of saying what each of these words mean. Here, we’ll attempt to kill this confusion once and for all.

Mnemonics Trick For Nunca, Nada, Nadie, Ningún, and Jamás

Ningún, nadie, nada, and jamás – I don’t know about you but I always kept mixing them up despite having learned them so many times. To be fair, English has its fair share of issues with negation too; it’s just that we are too comfortable with the language to notice it. Ask any rookie English learner and you’ll see how they struggle with their nobody, no one, none, and nothing. This article is all about these three Spanish words of negation and a simple trick to ace them effortlessly. And while we’re at it, we’ll also nail the two ways of saying never in Spanish. Confused already? Bear with me, it’ll all fall in place.

How To Learn Spanish Reading The Bible

You don’t have to be Christian – or even religious for that matter – in order to read the Bible. Well, it might not fascinate you much if you’re not particularly “godly” but if it helps your cause, why not? Who cares what the philosophy is as long as it can teach you what you are aiming to learn. I know what you’re wondering: Of all the gazillion books around us today, why Bible? I mean, Bible is difficult and archaic enough in English, how could it possibly be any good for learning some “practical” and contemporary Spanish? I had the same doubts when I started out but as I started reading, it actually made sense. Let’s dive in and find out.

Where Do I Begin Learning Spanish: 5 Steps To Get You Started

Over the past few weeks, several readers have written in seeking advice on how to get started with their Spanish learning program. The Internet is a rich source of information and there are more answers on it than one would care to read. Problem is, information out there is far too abundant and far too amorphous for one to even begin comprehending. Same is the case with a question like “how do I start learning Spanish?” A thousand sites present a thousand different solutions ranging from wacky and controversial to conventional and predictable. To pick the right advice from the lot is an ordeal and this post attempts to simplify the process.

My Tryst With Spanish: What Worked And What Didn’t

Do you know how many languages are spoken in India? Well over a hundred! Needless to say, most Indians are bilingual, or even trilingual. And yet when it comes to foreign languages, we mostly wind up with the short end of the stick. So how did I manage to not only choose Spanish but also follow through on that choice? This is my story of how I began my journey with Spanish? There are countless stories of how people around the world have achieved their big and small language learning dreams; this one is mine. I wouldn’t stake a claim to fame for this feat but it certainly does feel good to be able to speak a foreign language finally!

5 Steps To Turning Facebook Into A Spanish Learning Machine

Facebook – don’t we just love to claim how much we hate it and how it’s ruining our daily routine? Feel free to rant but we both know who’s having the last laugh. With close to a billion users and counting, this phenomena is not going anywhere anytime soon. So you have two options: Either use it to share breakfast and cat pictures and make zero positive impact to your life; or turn the tables and make every minute you spend on it count. What do they say about life, lemons, and lemonade? Yes, it’s more than possible to turn Facebook into a solid Spanish-learning machine and make your social media hours productive! Here, we’ll learn how.

Start Making Sense Of Spanish TV In 45 Days!

Learning Spanish can have a whole bunch of fun reasons one of which is being able to make sense of those oh-so-contrived telenovelas from Mexico and the rest of Latin America. Now imagine being able to do so in a space of one and a half month. Now, wouldn’t that be something! This might sound like black magic or science fiction depending on which way you sway but it’s actually neither. All it takes is a strategy, the tools, and the oil of your elbow. Oh, did I forget money? No, I didn’t. What we’re going to learn today is as expensive as the air you breathe. So, stop worrying about money and prepare yourself for the six-week challenge. Are you ready?

The Witchcraft Of Spanish Vocabulary

The very first step to conquering a language is to tame its vocabulary. And sadly, that’s the part that puts off most novice learners because memorizing strange-sounding words is too darn boring! A never-ending chant of rote rehearsal and a nervous prayer can see you through an upcoming test, but the process just won’t cut it if your goal is to actually use the language in the street. It’s a mystery how this incredibly inefficient method has survived this long and still continues to be perpetuated by schools and educators around the world. So is there any nirvana around this assault of monotony in our miserable lives? Anything that could make learning foreign words less painful?

Can Learning Spanish Feel As Rewarding As Sex, Gambling, And Chocolate?

What is the link between gambling, chocolate, sex and…learning Spanish? You might be surprised to hear that the same part of the brain’s reward centre activates in response to all four stimuli, but that’s what scientists in Barcelona recently discovered. Participants in an experiment were encouraged to decipher new words in a foreign language whilst experts measured the chemicals in their brains. The results lead scientists to claim that those who felt more rewarded from learning new words were able to learn more. In other words, participants who naturally feel good when they learn, are more likely to learn more!

The Cause-Effect Trick To Remember Your Por And Para

Be it Spanish or any other language, the most painful aspect invariably turns out to be the appropriate usage of its prepositions. To us English speakers Spanish prepositions might seem way too unruly and chaotic but that’s how the Spanish speakers feel about English too. Try explaining to them, for instance, why you live “in” the house but are “at” home! Grammar rules, more often than not, defy all logic. Fortunately, when it comes to the Spanish por and para, there still exists enough logic to save your day. Mastering this logic is key to proficiency in Spanish as these prepositions are just too damn indispensable.

Should You Really Learn The Spanish Future Tense?

The future tense is vanishing from the Spanish language; perhaps more rapidly than in the case of English, French, or German. Native Spanish speakers are often heard using the present tense while talking about future actions. This brings us to the question almost every learner starting out with Spanish faces at one point or the other: Should one really learn the Spanish future tense? The answer is almost a “no” if your aim is to just be conversant with the natives. Really? Does it mean we can just do away with the future tense conjugations and happily use the present tense instead in all situations? Well, let’s find out.