Google, Twitter and Spanish users

Google estaría construyendo un buscador de 'twitteos' - reads a post on a website that purports to be all about Google in Spanish. (acerca de google en español). Quite a fascinating site for a Google power user learning Spanish it's possible to learn twice as much at one time!

The Great Wall of Spanish

In a class I recently attended, the topic was Spanish indirect object pronouns, a heretofore difficult subject for me - and one of my fellow students spoke of her time in an immersion program in San Miguel de Allende. Her teacher there described the inability for English speakers to understand them as "The Great Wall of Spanish" - those students that got over the wall and understood how to use them, were basically on their way to full conversational fluency in Spanish. I want to climb that wall. Quiero subir aquella pared.

I'm not quite to the top yet, but I've found myself using them more, and hearing them spoken. I get it: Darme isn't some new word I haven't seen or heard before it's dar-me: give me. Puedo hacerlo! ¡Démelos, por favor! ¿Tengo que practicarlos más, verdad?

ME to/for me
TE to/for you
LE, to/for you, to/for him, to/for her
NOS, to/for us
LES, to/for upu (plural), to/for them

Verbs that require indirect object pronouns are easy to spot - if you can say "to" or "for" after the verb in English, it takes "le" in Spanish. por ejemplo:
I spoke to him: Le hablé.
I sang to her: Le canté.
I bought for him: Le compré.
However it doesn't sound right to say:
I visited to her.
I invite to him.
I kissed to her.
So these types of verbs take "lo" or "la", not "le".
I visited her: La visité.
I invite him: Lo invito.
I kissed her: la besé.

Test the verb: if you can say to/for with it, then it take LE.

Another aspect about using LE is that in Spanish you must use both the noun and the pronoun with verbs that take "le". Por ejemplo:
I wrote to my mother: Le escribé a mi madre.
Literally you are saying "To her I wrote to my mother" notice that the "a" is a personal a and not "to".
It works the same when asking a question.
¿Le compró una camisa a su primo? Did you buy a shirt for your cousin?

Things get a bit more complicated when you combine pronouns, ¿pero bastante ya, verdad?

The Personal A in Spanish

Use of the personal a is unique to Spanish and is not included when translating into English (or another language). It is only used to refer to a person, and can be thought of as a more respectful way to acknowledge another person - that is to say that an individual is more important (to you) than say their house.

Por ejemplo:
Yo amo a Lucy - I love Lucy
Yo amo la casa de Lucy - I love Lucy's house.
Buscó a mi hermanas - He looked for my sisters.
Miramos a Jorge lugar fútbol - we watch George play football.
Miramos una película anoche - we watched a movie last night.

Excepciones:
Spanish does not use the personal a with the verbs ser (to be), tener (to have), or hay (there is, are):
Jose es columbiano - Joe is Columbian.
Tengo tres tios - I have three uncles.
Hay una chica en la casa - There is a girl in the house.

You do not use a persoanl a when the direct object is an unspecified person:
Espero un amigo bueno - I'm waiting for a good friend.
Necesito un trabajador concienzudo para ayudarme - I need a hard worker to help me.

Spanish Visual Dictionary

As I've mentioned in previous posts the local library is a good place to expand your learning of Spanish - and the children's section can be a great source for easy to read books in Spanish along bilingual stories that ensure your comprehension. Another reference work that I like to check out is The Firefly Spanish-English Junior Visual Dictionary. This is a pretty entertaining way to expand your vocabulary as well as your mind.

Being a visual learner (and, besides, I like the illustrations) I think this a better way for me to lock the association of an image and a word into my brain. Here are four flying friends that would be good to ID should you need to tell the front desk about a bothersome infestation "en su habitación"!

1001 Most Useful Spanish Words

A very declarative title for this post, and not really one I think I could ever make. It's actually a title for a very worn, almost tattered, book in my collection that in itself has proved useful to me. As one strives to expand one's vocabulary, one may be tempted to read a dictionary, but this can get old really fast and usually it's not presented in a context that solidifies comprehension. What I like about Seymor Resnick's little tome is that every word in it is presented in an example sentence, and many of them are just a bit dry or quirky (we're not sure if dry and quirky were Seymour's intent). A few examples:
Pecado. m. sin No es un pacado tan grave. It is not such a serious sin.
Vida f. life ¿Qué es la vida? La vida es sueño. What is life? Life is but a dream.
Asado roasted Me gustan las castañas asadas. I like roasted chestnuts.
Cuerpom. body Sacaron varios cuerpos después de la explosción. They carried out serveral bodies after the explosion.
Tirar to throw, pull No tires arena, chico. Don't throw sand, kid.

I really came upon this book in a roundabout way - I was making a purchase a few years ago on Amazon.com and was a few dollars short to qualify for free shipping - Seymour stepped in to help me with this low price keeper. And he's helping me still. ¡Muchas gracias, Seymour!

Ponerse La Pilas - Spanish Idioms

Sometimes I ponder how phrases, particularly the slangier ones, might translate into Spanish. Obviously some cannot make the cut with a literal translation. Take "to bite off more than one can chew" - literally that would come out as "morder más de un puede masticar" but blurt that out and your amigos might think that you are " loco en la cabeza", but they'd get your drift if you said "miterse en camisa de once varas", literally to "put yourself in a shirt of eleven rods".

There are "many ways to skin a cat" but it's not one that can be translated into Spanish literally with any sort of comprehension. Many English/American phrases have an equivalent in Spanish that conveys a similar concept but can't be transliterated - take our expression "have your your cake and eat it too". A friend tells me the counterpart in Italian is "your wife's drunk but the cask is full" expresses the same concept. I can't find Spanish equivalents for this idiom or for cat skinning...if a reader knows them, please comment.

So "get with it" (ponerse las pilas) and find out what your favorite idioms are and how you might express them in Spanish.

Los Libros de Niños - Books for Children

I enjoy the challenge of reading in Spanish - it certainly can be a vocabulary expander and it also can be very satisfying when you precisely figure out the meanings. Especially so when you don't have to do any translating, you just read and get it.

Unfortunately, my vocab is still on the small side, perhaps 2000 plus words, so serious articles and long stories are a bit difficult - it's just too slow to really enjoy. So my buddy Scott at Bike-RX here in Mill Valley, suggested I read stories for children - ¡Qué idea tan buena! Pensé. So I a few days ago I hit the children's section at the local library and selected a few books of interest. On my way home, while making a detour for coffee, I ran into another student from "mi esculela" Spanish in Marin, Andrea, and told her about my "discovery". As you can read from the email she sent below, she found it as engaging as I:

"Muchas gracias por tu idea – el próximo día, yo fui a la biblioteca en Mill Valley y saque ocho libros para niños en español que estoy leyendo ahora.

Aquí son dos ejemplos del libro que se llama ¿Qué Sera? (What Can It Be) – un libro de los acertijos (riddles) tradicionales:

Una dama muy hermosa con un vestido de oro, siempre volviendo la cara, ya para un lado, ya para otro – A very beautiful lady, wearing a dress of gold, is always turning her face, now to this side, now to the other [La Luna]

Pájaro pinto paso por el mar; ni el viento ni el agua lo pudo alcanzar – A brilliant bird flashed o’er the sea; neither wind nor water could overtake it [El Relampago – Lightning]"

Books for children are also good for adults - Los libros de niños están también bien para Adultos.