Learning Spanish Update

The posts A New Language told you I was starting to learn Spanish. I thought it was time to give you a short update.

Spanish is referred to as a transparent language meaning that each letter or group of letters is always pronounced the same way. This makes it easy to read Spanish. Once you understand the sound of each letter or group of letters you can read anything written in Spanish without understanding what your reading.

But learning to understand Spanish is more difficult. The words said must be taken in context and you must pay attention to the inflection in the speakers voice. Sometimes the same words can be interpreted as a either a statement or a question. The words "es difícil" could either mean "It is difficult" or it could mean "Is it difficult?"

Another point of confusion for me was when I found there are two verbs to replace the English verb "to be". The Spanish verbs "ser" and "estar" both mean "to be". It was difficult for awhile but I finally read that "ser" is used for permanent traits and "estar" is used for temporary traits. When these verbs are conjugated "I am" becomes "Yo soy" and "Yo estoy". The phrase "Yo soy americano" means "I am American". I would never say "Yo estoy americano" because I will always be an American. Similarly you would say "Yo estoy enferma" meaning "I am sick" but would never say "Yo soy enferma" since I won't always be sick, at least hopefully not.

All nouns in Spanish are either feminine or masculine. I not sure how the nouns were officially assigned to be masculine or feminine and there doesn't seem to be any system that you can always use to figure out which they are. You just have to learn the gender of the noun when you learn the noun itself. To give you an example of how it really doesn't make sense, the noun for "dress" is "el vestido", a masculine noun. I doubt there was ever a time when more men wore dresses than women.

Notice the phrase "el vestido". The article "el" means "the", so "el vestido" means "the dress" and the article "el" indicates it's a masculine noun. For "the skirt" the Spanish phrase is "la falda" and the article "la" tells us it's a feminine noun. But wait, there's more. Other words in a sentence will change based on the gender of the noun. In Spanish, "the blue dress is pretty" translates to "el vestido azul es bonito" but "the blue skirt is pretty" translates to "la falda azul es bonita". Notice the words for "pretty" are "bonito" and "bonita" depending on whether the noun is feminine or masculine. And it get's even worse, "the blue dresses are pretty" translates to "los vestidos azules son bonitos" and "the blue skirts are pretty" translates to "las faldas azules son bonitas". In English we usually change the verb but in Spanish every word in the sentence can change.

My latest confusion, that I think I have about figured out, with the help of some Mexican friends here in the States, is the verb "to love". The English verb "to love" really doesn't translate directly into Spanish. Not that they don't "love", it's more like they "love" a lot. There are at least three verbs in Spanish that mean, or can mean, "to love". They are "querer", "encantar", and "amar". Each are used in different ways.

The verb "querer" can also mean "to want" depending on how it's used. For instance, "yo quiero agua" means "I want water" but "te quiero" means "I love you". Similar to this "te encanto" and "te amo" also mean "I love you". It's confusing but from what I have been able to decipher from my friends is that "te quiero" and "te encanto" are used more for loving things or platonic love while "te amo" is used for romantic love. I'm still not 100% sure I have these figured out so I think I will avoid saying "I love you" in Spanish for awhile.

You may have guessed, my learning Spanish can be frustrating for me.