more than 20 since I worked with real live Mexicans.

Wow. Real live Mexicans...I thought they were an endangered species. After all, why would they want to come to AmeriKKKa? Their country is so prosperous...

:-)

OK, here's a real knee-slapper that was in our Spanish textbook. Just imagine the proper punctuation and spelling, because I'm too lazy to put it in.

A: Como se dice, "Montevideo es en Paraguay," o "Monetvideo esta en Paraguay"?
B: Ah! Se dice, "Monetvideo esta en Paraguay."
A: No!
B: No?
A: Montevideo esta en Uruguay!

Try that out on the SB.

Oh, and try spelling "Montevideo" consistently for added humor.

Heh heh--my aunt is married to a "real live Mexican" (my uncle). SB would enjoy watching DVD's with the Spanish subtitles on--it's funny watching Veronica Mars and seeing the subtitles demonstrate there's no direct translation for the frequently used (and apparently American) expression "Keep me posted." There also was a problem with the fact that her pit bull is named "Backup" and at one point the dad says, "Let Backup take care of the dishes." The subtitle said something completely dull about leaving them. Talk about sucking all the wit out of the writing.

The young Panamanian-American teacher I had in 10th grade was the one who played us pop songs and taught us a ton of slang and vocab. (The 11th grade teacher was a nun who spoke *Spanglish* in a sweet, high-pitched voice.) It is lamentable that I understand far better than I can speak. I soaked up any and all vocab like a sponge, which was helpful when I had to go to the doctor's in Mexico City and just needed to answer yes or no. But my aunt was like, "Why did I even come in to translate? You don't need me!"

Angie--our favorite textbook line in college was, "Si, lo quiero, pero como amigo solamente." When my roommate and I started snickering and were forced to reveal the joke, our professor went off on a long ranting tanget against that expression and it was hilarious. My roommate made a poster of it and we wrote "Libre finalmente!" underneath. The irony was that during that semester she started dating the man who became her husband.

Ha ha!

My (Irish-surnamed) high school teacher told about the time he visited some friends in Mexico. He drove for many hours, arriving about 3 in the morning. The lady of the house got him some soup and a blanket, and in gratitude, he wanted to say "Tu me haces sentir bien." Unfortunately, what actually came out was "Tu me sientes bien."

What a knee-slapper. Email if you need a translation.

"Monet video" sounds...kinky.

Angie, there's actually a U.S. version of that joke:

Q. "Is the capital of Louisiana pronounced 'New Or-luns,' 'New Or-leeeens,' or 'New Or-le-ans'?"

A."No, the capital of Louisiana is pronounced 'Baton Rouge.'"

I took French in high school as well. It was mainly useful to me for elucidating aspects of English grammar (like the subjunctive) that I was not explicitly taught in English (but as a native speaker, I suppose it was presumed I already knew).

My teacher was Welsh. Yes, really, a Welshman like from Wales. He had a wonderful accent when he was speaking English.

I've used it a few times...on a family trip to Montreal, to translate a scientific paper for a friend in grad school.

But yeah, Spanish would be more useful to me now. But I also kind of chafe at learning it...I have so little free time, and there are OTHER things I want to be learning...I don't like it when the one-worlders go, "Yeah, but in 10 years this will be a Spanish-speaking country, and in 25 years we'll all speak Mandarin." (Over my cold dead body on that second one).

Bings - I had a Montevideo Card once upon a time, but the place closed down.

Ken--ha! I'd have been blushing for sure. That reminded me of the time the Spanglish-speaking nun asked my friend "Marta" the odd question, "Con quien se lava?" She meant to use "que"; obviously to a bunch of teenage girls this was hilarious. Marta never forgot that one.

Ricki--that's a great point about how learning another language can give us a better understanding of our own. If I had money to burn I'd love to see if Rosetta Stone could teach me Italian. Our pastor preaches a completely different sermon for the Italian-speaking members of the parish on special feast days and most of it goes over my head.

The thing with Spanish, as it is spoken here in the states is that it's all dialectical. Each country in South and Latin America as well as the Caribbean where spanish is spoken has it's own dialect and language nuances.

Trust me folks, you need to be real careful in a city like Miami, where you have spanish speaking people from all over the place.

Once, while at the parent's home of a Puerto rican girl I was dating, a bug lnaded on my arm and I used the Cuban term "bicho" for it, as in: Mira este bicho aqui en mi brazo. (look at this bug here on my arm.) Turns out the term bicho in Puerto Rican has a whle other meaning altogether which I cannot say in mixed company. I was thrown outta that house, post haste.

Hehehe, I love stuff like that, Val.

I've learned a lot of useful words and phrases from the various Spanish-speakers I work with (Mexico, Puerto Rico, Ecuador, Colombia, El Salvador, Dominicans...all those folks get mighty creative with their dialects! And the Brazilians have some good phrases in Portuguese as well).

That reminds me of when Alex asked me if Livan Hernandez was black and I said no, he was Cuban*. He looked at me and said, "What does he speak, Cubish?"

(I know I've told that story before but it always cracks me up.)

*I'm assuming that the Cubans who are "black" are decendants of former slaves. Correct?

Along the lines of what Val wrote, I worked for a certain national photography company as a print buyer in the 90s. Marketing received a request for a spanish only flyer from one of our offices, I don't remember if it was Miami or Los Angeles. We produced the flyer and it was well received at the location that requested it, but when it was used on the other coast it created a minor storm. I don't recall the exact translation, but it seems that in one area the spanish that was used for "preserve the memories of your children" was taken as "make preserves out of your children's heads/minds" or something like that. That was a bit of an education.

Lisa,

Cuban "blacks" can be descendents of slaves for a myriad of native tribes like Tainos, Syboneys, etc...or any combination thereof.

Sheesh, that should be slaves "or" a myriad of tribes....

Thanks, Val!

About the extend of my Spanish:

Señoras y señores:
nosotros tenemos más influencia con sus hijos que tú tiene...
pero los queremos.

Creado y regado de los ángeles,
Juanas Adicción...

Oh yeah this too:

Entro las Pinones y la ola es pequena,
Oh my Golly!

When my sister was an exchange student in Oaxaca years ago, her group was warned not to attempt to "make up" Spanish words. Case in point: if you're embarrassed, don't say "yo soy embarrassado"! :-) That has a whole other meaning!

er, I guess that should be "embarrassadA", not o... oh well. Par for the course today.

En boca cerrada no entran moscas.

Yeah, want to watch them plurals too. Case in point: esposa and esposas.

Cullen, I could only translate a little of that, and it didn't make much sense. But then, I've never much listened to La Adicción de Juana.

Ni moscas ni pies.

De gustabilis non disputandem.

Aw man, don't go all Latin on me. I only know the scientific words.

My favorite line from middle school Spanish:
Hay mantequilla en la silla!
Translation: There's butter on the chair.
This was hilarious because of the way the guy on the CD sounded.