Katie’s Quick Guide to Spanish

As you all (hopefully) know they speak Spanish here in Mexico, meaning that I must speak Spanish here in Mexico. I’d like to give everyone a taste of what I’m learning here and share some of the more interesting language miscommunications I’ve come across. In words of Brian Hogan[1]  ‘There’s really nothing like language learning to build humility into the Man of God.’ This is ridiculously true.

First, everything in Spanish is said exactly how it’s spelled. You just have to know what letters make what sound. There is no ‘Hooked on Phonics’ in Spanish. So your crash course into pronunciation:

There is no “H”. It exists, but you do not pronounce it. Seriously, I’m not sure why it exists.

However, “J” sounds like an ‘H’.  For the first two weeks I spelled ‘jefe’ (boss) as ‘hefe’ because that’s the way you say it, if you’re saying it in English.  In Spanish, ‘Hefe’ (pronounced ‘efe’) is the letter ‘F’.  Confused yet? It gets better.

“Ñ” which most people refer to as ‘That weird ‘n’ with the thingy on top’ is an ‘Enya’. It’s pronounced like you say the Irish singer Enya’s name.

Both “V”and “B” make the same sound (B, like baby). There is no way to tell which to use when spelling. Most people just guess if they don’t know. Like the sign in the cafeteria asking you to use ‘Antivacterial’ soap.

A “P” sounds a lot like a “B”. So let’s just take count, there are now 3 letters in Spanish that sound like a “B”.  In truth it’s a little different, but for my level it’s pretty much the same. ‘Papas’ (potatoes) sounds like ‘Babas’.

Also ‘Z’ sounds like an ‘S’. I find this very funny mostly because of the words ‘casar’and ‘cezar’. These two words are pronounced very similarly however the first one is the verb ‘to marry’ and the second one is the verb ‘to hunt’. Coincidence?

Spanish “I” = “EE” in English.  Spanish “E” = “Eh” in English. Spanish “A” = “Ah” in English.  There are many others.  These are the ones I have the most trouble with.

As for some ‘Language miscommunications’ I’ve had a few. One of my favorites was my second week of school. I had to write a report in Spanish on my favorite book. I chose “Murder on the Iditarod Trail.”  I chose it so I could talk about the Iditarod Dog Sled Race and not have to talk about a million different literary themes. Easy, right?  Well I started going through and translating terms I didn’t know and came up with this for dog sled race “una raza del perro de trineo” literally translated as ‘a race of the dogs with sleds’.  Okay, close as I’m going to get. Well about halfway through my report my teacher stopped me and asked what the heck I was talking about. I explained. He laughed. Then he explained that in Spanish ‘raza’ refers to race as in a person’s culture.  ‘Carrera’ was race as in competition race. Basically for the first half of my report, he thought I was talking about the dog people of Alaska who pull sleds.

During my first week in Villahermosa my fellow trainees worked hard to help me learn some of the common words they used.  One of these terms is ‘Fuga’. It was explained to me as like ‘let’s go!’ (I just used my dictionary and one of the translations was ‘escape from prison’.  Someone is hearing about this.) Anyway, we were in a shopping mall and we were ready to leave. “Okay Katie, what do we say” oh I so have this, I thought ‘Fuego!’ I said very enthusiastically. They burst out laughing. When they stopped laughing they told me not to start yelling fuego at the end of things because it means fire and it could panic people.

 

My all time favorite did not happen to me, this was someone I met studying in Guadalajara. When he first arrived in Mexico he was under the impression that ‘mierda’ meant ‘middle’ or ‘half’.  So he would go into Subway and ask for “Un mierda sandwich con queso”.  Unfortunately for him, this means “A shit sandwich with cheese”.  ‘Medio’ is half. ‘Mierda’ is shit.  It took three months before his Spanish teacher heard him say it and corrected him.  This story has left me with a mild fear of not being sure that what I’m saying is actually what I’m saying.

Anyway, I hope you’ve enjoyed your crash course into Spanish pronunciation. Anyone out there have their own language mix-ups and misunderstandings? Embarrassing incidences of ordering shit sandwiches at Subway? Please share! 

If you’d like to hear about a particular aspect of my life down here, just let me know and I’d be happy to work it into a post.

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[1] “There’s a Sheep In My Bathtub: Birth of a Mongolian Church Planting Movement” – I devoured this book in about a day. It was an amazing story about what can come from following God’s plan, despite opposition and doubt. It also completely changed my impressions of what foreign missionaries do when church planting.