Spanish Word of the Day

Quote: Wizard

I am genuinely pulling my hair out trying to find a fun and efficient way to improve my Spanish. It shoudln't be this hard. There should be more books by good translators like Joe Hayes out there. How is the rest of the world getting past beginner Spanish?

Clearly the answer is immersion. Move to Latin America for a year!

Quote: theodores

El transporto publico del RTC funcionaran in horario del Domingo el dia de accion de gracias.

I should ride the busses more often, as I clearly omitted the de accion part.

Quote: Wizard

I am genuinely pulling my hair out trying to find a fun and efficient way to improve my Spanish. It shoudln't be this hard. There should be more books by good translators like Joe Hayes out there. How is the rest of the world getting past beginner Spanish?

Any language is always actually two languages: the spoken part and the writen part. Spoken langauge tends to be less formal than writen language. In Spanish this is often taken to an extreme. If you read a newspaper in Spanish, you'll notice pretentiousness all over it, particularly in the editorial pages. One columnist I read often, Sergio Sarmiento, not only has views clsoe to my own, but writes in a simpler, unpretentious style. This gives him a big advantage, as more people understand his point as compared to other columnists.

My advice is to read, yes, but also to watch TV in spanish (if you can stomach the contents; I don't watch any Mexican TV, except for NFL games adn ocassionally the news). You could try reading books by authors who write in Spanish rather than translations, too. Just eb careful. Some atuhros go too far the toehr way and adopt a lower-class, iliterate way of writing. You see some of this in "La Vida Inutil de Pito Perez," for example, though the author could write a lot better than that.

You could try Juan Rulfo, for example. His stories aren't what I'm interested inr eading, but he wrote well.

Quote: Wizard

Every gringo knows that dinero means money. However, how many know that there is also adinerarse for to get rich, and of course adinerado for rich as an adjective. Meanwhile in English we have money, rich, and wealthy, which don't seem to share a common root at all.

And like English some of the forms exist, but are not commonly used. We have the words vast, vastness, vastitude, and vastity but the last two forms are almost never used.

The word "rich" is related to the German "reich", and the word "rex" implying the correlation between power and wealth. The word "wealth" is a cognate of "well" which implies that the word can be more inclusive than just having money, but having well being. The English word "money" has a cognate in Spanish, "moneda".

I am not sure what is the difference between dinero and moneda.

El peso mexicano es la moneda oficial de México.

Quote: Wizard

Take for example today's SWD. Every gringo knows that dinero means money. However, how many know that there is also adinerarse for to get rich, and of course adinerado for rich as an adjective.

I had to look that one up. I know "adinerado." It's not common, but it gets some use.

Quote:

Meanwhile in English we have money, rich, and wealthy, which don't seem to share a common root at all.

To enrich?

Quote:

¿Como puso adinerarse Sr. Howell de todos modos? = How did Mr. Howell get rich anyway?

Hmm, a tough one... Let's see... "How could put Mr. Howell become rich any which way?" That's not exactly it, but it's close.

BTW, in Spanish when you're talking about someone and using their title, you put an "el" or "la" before the full title and name (in that order). So, for instance, Mr. Spock in Star Trek is known as El Señor Spock. So:

"¿De que forma puDo adinerarse EL Señor Howell?"

"anyway" is a problematic word without a good translation every time.

Thanks for all the advice. Regarding watching Spanish TV, I do some of that. However, I find they talk too fast for me to get much out of it. I think I just watch it as an excuse to look at the latinas hermosas. In particular the weather girl on Univision Las Vegas.



Fecha: 24-11-12
Palabra: Guacamaya

Today's SWD means macaw.

The question for the advanced readers is to identify or refute a common root with guacamole.

Ejemplo time.

La selva está llena de guacamayos. = The jungle is full of macaws.

Quote: Wizard

The question for the advanced readers is to identify or refute a common root with guacamole.

The word "āhuacatl" is Aztec (Nahuatl) for avacado. "Mole" is a very common word for stew or mixture, also based on a Nahuatle word.

Guacamayo is from the Caribbean Indians. The languages are very distantly related. The word is often associated with the red color of these verbs.



I would say the answer is no, but I may have missed something.

Fecha: 24-11-12
Palabra: baúl

Today's SWD means trunk, like the kind usually kept in a bedroom for storage. The word for the kind of trunk in a car is maletero, which obviously is a place to put maletas (suitcases).

The assignment for the advanced readers is to identify or refute a common root with bautizar (to baptize).

Ejemplo time.

¿Qué vas a hacer con todos trastos? ¿Todos los trastos dentro de su baúl? = What you gon' do with all that junk? All that junk inside your trunk?

Quote: Wizard

Fecha: 24-11-12
Palabra: baúl

Today's SWD means trunk, like the kind usually kept in a bedroom for storage. The word for the kind of trunk in a car is maletero, which obviously is a place to put maletas (suitcases).

The assignment for the advanced readers is to identify or refute a common root with bautizar (to baptize).

In Argentina, Columbia, Cuba, Guatemala y Honduras it also means a "car trunk", but not in Spain or Mexico.

If there is a common root it is buried in Proto Indo European. The word "baúl" seems to come from a now archaic French word the directly referred to a type of furniture. The word "baptise" comes directly from the Greek.

I often think I shouldn't correct you, only to se what happens when you venture into Spanish-speaking lands :)

Quote:

The word for the kind of trunk in a car is maletero, which obviously is a place to put maletas (suitcases).

Oh, that varies so much from country to country, you should go with the majority. In Mexico it's a "cajuela."

Quote:

¿Qué vas a hacer con todos trastos? ¿Todos los trastos dentro de su baúl? = What you gon' do with all that junk? All that junk inside your trunk?

"Trastos" does mean "junk." But no one uses that term. It's too similar to "trastEs," which means "dishes" and/or "cookware." So your example reads "What will you be doing with all dishes?"