In your back pocket: "vos" does not equal "vosotros"

The lessons keep getting more interesting and more informative. They are finally starting to make some headway and momentum is moving forward. ¡Más adelante! This lesson started with explaining moods and the difference between tener and estar when referring to your moods. Basically, you use tener when you need something. When you need to sleep it’s “tengo sueño”, but it can also be “estoy consado”. Pretty much just different ways of saying the same thing, and it helps for understanding others when they talk to you. I mostly always say “necesito dormir”, so it was nice to learn some other useful Spanish phrases.

They also quickly went over the difference between estar and ser, which both mean “to be”. Estar is temporary, whereas ser is permanent. “Soy ingles”, because I will always be English; but “estoy hambre”, because I won’t always be hungry. It is a small spec in the grand scheme of things we need to learn, but it is a huge difference linguistically. We also went over some other smaller things that I’m sure will continue to be reinforced later. For example, we learned how some adjectives proceed nouns, like in English, but generally they follow the noun. In Engish we say “beautiful girls”, but in Spanish it would be “girls beautiful” (chicas bonitas). We went over the shortening of nouns, formal and informal uses, and finally were introduced to the ever-important present tense. For practice we used the 3rd person plural (ustedes/ellas/ellos) to distinguish cultures, based on some very rough stereotypes, haha. Nonetheless, it was pretty funny commentary, along with the handing out of golden stars to David (the gringo). They provide a nice break from the class and keep you laughing while learning some stuff that can easily clutter your brain.

In Castellano (Spanish dialect of Argentina) they use “vos” for the “tu” form, which can be confusing. The program does a good job of introducing the form, and showing the way it conjugates formally and informally. It was confusing to me, because in Spain they use “vosotros” for “y’all”, but it isn’t used at all in Latin/South America. Thus, the first time I was in Buenos Aires and a waiter asked me, “vos quierés pollo” (with the double L pronounced as a –sh, instead of a Y) I had no clue what he was talking about. After some time you get used to it though. The class really is only for Buenos Aires slang Spanish, though. It’s different than places in the interior of the country. For example, everywhere else I have been the double L has been pronounced as a J. Apparently there is some animosities and differences between Portaños (people from Buenos Aires) and people from the rest of the country, both in language and culture.

Lastly, we went over comparative words. We learned about the differences between the same, identical, and similar (mismo, identico, parecido), each having its own characteristic. Oppositely, we learned distinct, different, rare, and unique (distinto, diferente, raro, unico), with raro having a more negative connotation that is more similar to “strange” than “rare”.

Again, the story lines provide for some nice and needed entertainment throughout the class. David’s mom is still at his apartment, and you can tell the story is going somewhere. I find it pretty entertaining.

"Tengo una hermana... ella vende ella." "se vende?!"

This class was probably the most informative so far. First, like always, we quickly went over the ideas from the last class to reinforce them. I really like getting into this habit. The class tells you that language is not math, in the sense that it does not always work to an exact science, because there are always exceptions. In some ways, though, I treat it the same. For example, I appreciate the program strengthens what you learn by reiterating what you have been taught before moving on. I see learning Spanish, like math, as building a pyramid. You have to have a strong base before moving on, because as the course progresses you are constantly building on top of old knowledge with newer, more complicated material. Thus, I think it’s important to make sure that you have a strong base before moving on. In math, I think, this is the case as well. If you don’t understand the basic principles you will be completely lost when the material starts to gain momentum.

The class mixes in grammar, but the majority of it is spent teaching slang Spanish to really help you talk to people in the streets. It was funny that we learned the word “boludo” (asshole, jerk, prick, etc.), because earlier in the day my friends here in Cordoba were trying to explain to me that sometimes it can be used jokingly in a good way, and I really didn’t understand how. But after the classes commentary I kind of get it. We also learned “ballbreaker”, which is “rompepelotas”. I think it’s cool that they supplement necessary information with some funny words to keep you entertained and give you a little break from the general knowledge stuff.

We also learned the names for body parts, even slang for the private parts. It was nice, because I haven’t known anything other than “los manos” and “la cabeza” this whole time I’ve been in South America. We went over numbers from 1 to infinity! Maybe not infinity, but we learned basically how to pronounce numbers in the hundreds, thousands, and millions (including how to say years). It’s still kind of shady to me, because some of the numbers in the hundreds are similar and others are completely different. For example, a lot of them follow a pattern, but 500, 700, and 900 have names that you just have to learn. I also had no idea that numbers could be feminine and masculine as well. I am going to go back and learn them again. Lastly, the class went through the different words for members of the family from mom, dad, sister, and brother to uncle, aunt, grandson, niece, etc. For the most part the words are easy, but difficult to remember, just because there are so many. But I am sure that we will reinforce it at the beginning of next class. The context in which they talk about their family members is really funny, too (just look at the title of the blog). It for sure helps to remember some of the more basic words. Lastly, we learned that when speaking of things or people in groups, if there is one masculine thing or person, the entire group is referred to in the masculine context. Like the question says, if there are 99 women in a room and 1 man you would greet them "Hola chicos!", because of the one man. It seems sexist, but it's just the language. I'm trying to learn it, not judge it! Here's a screen shot for an example:


Even though not all four children are male they are referred to as "hijos", because at least one of them is.

There was a short introduction to the conditional and to irregular verbs, too. I know they are just introducing these topics, but I think that the class should try to hammer verbs into the student’s head before mentioning the conditional. People need to know how to speak in the present before they can even think about moving on to other tenses. Like I was saying before, learning language to me is like building a pyramid. You HAVE to have that base before building on top of it. With my small background in Spanish I was still kind of lost when they brought in the conditional; I didn’t understand its importance in the lesson. Even if there was a solid base there, I think the preterit (past) or future tenses are more important than the conditional. We’ll see what happens.

Next class is more verbs, which is good, and vocabulary for moods.