Beyond the Plateau

Tienes hambre? Subtle differences can really affect meaning.

jpeck — Tue, 01 May 2012 02:04:00 +0200

We´re back for another installment of Misunderstanding Mondays.

In Santiago there is a popular destination called Mercado Central. It´s a beautiful old factory-type building that has been converted into an open-air den of seafood restaurants with fish mongers and vegetable stands along the periphery. Because there are so many restaurants, competition is fierce and each one tends to employ one or more agressive head waiters who duke it out with each other to win diners in their chairs.

A foreign exchange student with basic Spanish skills, we´ll call her Liz, went to the picturesque mercado to take some photos. She was approached a few times but told the buzzing waiters that she wasn´t hungry and just wanted to take some photographs. Much to her consternation, more and more men continued to approach her, asking her to their restaurant and talking to her, but she kept trying to brush them off, insisting that she wasn´t hungry. They KEPT coming, and kept coming, in spite of her increasing annoyance and insistance that she didn´t want any food and was only there to take pictures. By the end of 20 minutes she was so frustrated she just started yelling at all of them, and eventually had to give up on taking photos and stormed out.

The following week she relayed this story to her Spanish teacher and was asking whether it was a cultural thing that these men just wouldn´t leave her alone. Turns out when she tried to brush them off what she thought she was yelling, "no tengo hambre" turned out to be "no tengo hombre"! Whoops! Apparently there were a lot of takers, and Liz was blushing for a week thinking of herself in the middle of the market yelling, "I don´t have a man!! All I want is to take pictures!" This lessons serves to not only mind our p´s and q´s, but our a´s and o´s as well. Do you have a story about trying to communicate when learning a language, but doing so badly or to an unintended but humorous effect? Write to jenpeck@loogla.com and we´ll publish it.

Suerte, chicos!

(Whether you ´tiene hambre´ or ´quiere hombre´ will determine which you see in this photo.)

La hiprocesía sigue

jpeck — Sun, 08 Apr 2012 03:08:00 +0200

Here's a great example of "hipocresía" and "contradicción" in action from the Argentine governement. Both of these words are considered cognates and are easy words to learn since they're a simple shift from their english versions 'hipocracy' and 'contradiction'.

These two cognates in particular are relevent in this case because the Argentine goverment has put a ban on importations (of books, electronics, etc.), making it exceedingly expensive to buy and maintain electronics within Argentina, yet Vice President Amado Boudou has tweeted this concerned and sympathetic message to the people with his imported iphone.

Beneficios de la bicicleta

jpeck — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 22:37:00 +0200

There is a growing love for riding a bicycle in the world, and with increasing congestion on the roads and air pollution, it's easy to see why! Practice your spanish with some more reasons to love your bike!

Todos son buenos, pero "Sientes como que vuelas" es mi razón favorito. No olvides tu casco!

What a difference one letter makes

jpeck — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 22:25:00 +0200

Pay attention to spelling, as sometimes one letter can make all the difference! This fabulous play on words is the name of a mattress store in Bariloche, Argentina.

La colcha de tu madre... Get it??

Nos gustan mucho los preservativos!

jpeck — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 20:44:00 +0200

Misunderstandings and miscommunications when learning #Spanish are all too common. Because in Spanish there are lots of words that are cognates of words in English (such as proposition = proposición), plus there's the simple (funny, lazy) habit of many English speakers to put an 'o' at the end of a Spanish word. Here's a funny story thanks to Angela Seita:

So one day I was talking with the 70 something year old woman, Gladys, I was living with about food in America. I said something along the lines of "Comemos muchos preservativos en Estados Unidos". Her jaw dropped and she about keeled over from a heart attack. I went on to explain "it's not fresh". Little did I know that "preservativos" meant condoms in Argentina so I was basically telling her we eat a lot of rubbers!"

If Angela had used the word "conservantes" instead of "preservativos" ol' Gladys woulnd't have batted an eye. Have you ever had a miscommunication in another language? If you want to share or have your story featured, please send an email to jenpeck@loogla.com and we'll publish it!

Regional dialects

jpeck — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 06:27:00 +0200

If you’re thinking of traveling somewhere to do an immersion course in Spanish, one of the key things to think about is the predominant accent spoken inyour preferred destination. Argentina is a popular place to come and take classes, largely because Buenos Aires is a bustling city with thriving arts culture, famous parillas and fabulous ice cream, and of course the lure of the tango (which helps work off the extra calories). But one thing that isn’t usually a consideration when choosing Argentina is the accent!

It’s very helpful to know, and something to consider, that when you come to Argentina that the people in Buenos Aires speak what they consider Rio Platense Castellano and their most definite peculiarity in pronunciation where the double l (ll) is pronounced as a “shh” sound instead with a soft a rather than the “yuh” sound used in so many other latin cultures, and even outside of Buenos Aires. For example, lluvia, the word for rain, is pronounced ‘shoe-via’. Pollo is ‘po-sho’ instead of ‘poy-o’. If you can incorporate the “shh” into your accent in Buenos Aires (and try to drop a che or two) you’ll be quick on the path to earning points with the locals.

The Bilingual Bonus

Tyler — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 05:27:00 +0200

I’m sure you don’t need to be reminded that we are in tough economic times. While most of us haven’t been reduced to hopping trains in patched up clothing in search of handouts, unemployment is at an all time high and smart job-seekers are finding ways to make themselves more appealing to prospective employers. Becoming bilingual, really bilingual, is one of the surest ways to improve your chances of finding, keeping and advancing in your career.

Many organizations are not only actively seeking bilingual employees; they are sponsoring employee training programs to improve their skills in the office. This is especially true in government. Unsurprisingly states with large Hispanic populations such as Texas are offering incentive programs like one in Dallas offering stipends of $110 to $150 a month extra for city employees speaking both English and advanced Spanish. San Antonio pays an extra $50 a month if using Spanish helps them perform their duties. The trend is growing fastest in regions traditionally less interested in promoting bilingualism. Maryland police officers may receive between $1000 and $4000 a year extra for their Spanish skills and state employees in Washington can often expect a pay boost of at least 5%.

Regardless of geography or industry, studies show that bilinguals are not only more employable and out earn their counterparts, they may live longer and have better mental longevity. Children who grow up speaking more than one language get higher grades. You don’t need to be born bilingual to reap all these benefits either. An adult learner may never be mistaken for a native, but he can effectively learn a language with the right guidance.

Even if you’re gainfully employed in the job of your dreams, mastering a second language may be the best gift you’ve ever given yourself.

Sources:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/education/3236188.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3794479.stm

The Phrase "al pelo"

Tyler — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 23:52:00 +0200

There's nothing more fundamental in learning a new language than the greeting. "Cómo estás" and "Muy bien" can be found in the first few pages of just about any Spanish textbook. But what about when you've outgrown "todo bien"? There are a limitless number of common responses you might give such as "todo tranqui(lo)" or "todo en orden". Here's another you might not have heard before: Al pelo (literally "bareback").

Like most phrases the seem to make little sense at first glance, "al pelo" has an interesting back story. During the time of the Spanish colonial rebellion, especially in the area of Columbia and Venezuela, the resistance forces were severely under equipped. They would often steal or raise horses to be used in battle, but they lacked the resources for saddles.

Only the generals had mounts and the common cavalry were often bareback. After a time, the phase "al pelo" came to mean heroism in the face of limited means. When askes how a journey was, one might reply "al pelo" to means they face obstacles but came out unscathed. Eventually the phrase became synonymous with strength, health and valor. Today "al pelo" means fantastic when referring to oneself.

So the next time someone asks you how you are in Spanish and you're feelign on top of the world, you might tell them, "Al pelo"!

The Context-Sensitive Subjunctive

Tyler — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 01:12:00 +0200

As you probably know, one of the most confusing concepts for an "anglo-parlante" to master in Spanish is the subjunctive mood. The subject is usually introduced by learning a series of introductory verbs and phrases or grammatical structures that usually take the subjunctive. The classic example is expressing desire as in “Quiero que vengas aquí”. That’s all good and fine as long as long as life follows the rules, but language is a living, mutable thing and context can be everything.

Take the following sentence:
Digo que mi madre [ser] buena.
How would you conjugate “ser” in this sentence? Es or sea?

The answer is that it depends on what you mean!

Let’s take the first possibility. Digo que mi madre es buena. What you’re saying in this instance is that your mom IS good (most are), something you’d do well to remember tomorrow if you live in Argentina where the third Thursday in October is Mother’s Day or “Día de la Madre”.

Now let’s take the second case and put ser in the subjunctive. Digo que mi madre sea buena. Now you’re saying that you WANT her to BE good.

It’s a subtle but important difference.

Let’s try with a few other verbs that might be either indicative or subjunctive.

indicar:
Indico que completa este ejercicio. – ask you to complete an exercise
Indico que complete este ejercicio. – state that you are completing an exercise

quejarse:
Los porteños se quejan de que no hay luz. -- The power is out.
Los porteños se quejan de que no haya cortes de luz en pleno. -- Not currently a loss of electricity. Projecting in the future eventually repeats.) Imagined time in the future, for example in Winter, might be imagining what will happen in the summer when all the air conditioners kick in.

recordarse:
Le recuerdo que siempre hace bien la tarea. -- declaration that something is happening
Le recuerdo que siempre haga bien la tarea. -- is a demando or a request

Starting up in Chile.

Tyler — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 08:04:00 +0200

CORFO, the economic development authority of Chile, has welcomed Loogla into Start-Up Chile. For anyone not aware of this innovative program, it attracts high potential startups from around the world to come to Chile and develop their projects. Applications are reviewed by a panel of industry experts, and we're proud to have been accepted. We at Loogla will be developing a better way to learn languages along with projects from some of the most prestigious intitutions in the world such as MIT, Harvard, Oxford and the Indian Institute of technology just to name a few.

After a long and interrupted development process to create the language learning system we would have wanted after moving to South America, it is invigorating to receive the endorsement of the Chilean government and a panel of specialists in entrepreneurial viability. Our participation marks the beginning of our ability to offer Loogla to the public. We are still accepting names for the closed beta so if you are interested in helping to make Loogla the best self-paced Spanish language eLearning platform out there, sign up for the beta using our no frills signup form.