Blogger: Maria Jose. ¡Faltan días para que den comienzo las fallas en la ciudad de Valencia! Las fechas del 15 al 19 de Marzo son las más esperadas por todos los valencianos. Fechas en las que Valencia se tiñe de color con los monumentos falleros, la pólvora inunda las calles, las mascletás atraen a todo tipo de gente y el fuego es el protagonista al final de éstos cuatro intensos días. Una aventura que este año dió comienzo el 23 de Febrero con la primera mascletá y el acto de la...

When you feel like you deserve a break from all your Spanish studies and just want to relax and explore, you can always take a weekend or day-trip to one of Madrid’s neighbouring towns. The charming city of Toledo is beautifully situated on a hill above the river Tajo in the Castilla La Mancha region, approximately 70 km southwest of Madrid, which of course makes it a must-see when visiting Spain’s capital city. With a short and cheap trip by train you will get to see this beautiful town...

En el mes de Agosto se celebra en Buñol una curiosa fiesta dónde el principal protagonista es el tomate. Para todos aquéllos que queráis saber más sobre esta tradicional fiesta valenciana, aquí os incluimos información muy útil en caso de que estéis planeando un viaje a Valencia este verano. Esta fiesta tiene su origen en el año 1945 cuando unos chicos jóvenes estaban viendo un desfile de gigantes y cabezudos durante las fiestas del pueblo. Desafortunadamente uno de los jóvenes hizo...

It’s been a long cold winter and a weird moody spring, but the strong sun and humidity are starting to emerge in Barcelona. Terrace tables are already unstacked, and people are already stepping out without a jacket. The city’s beaches really come into their own: it’s hot, almost too hot to sunbathe, noisy and crowded; so getting a table for a cold beer and a plate of fried prawns can be a real ‘mission impossible’ in the beach bars (chiringuitos). I admit I am not selling the...

Beer at noon or vermut de la casa before lunch! As you get used to Barcelona, you will notice that the locals will enjoy a glass of wine, vermouth or beer at any time of the day. You may be thinking, “in my country we do that as well!”  Well, I come from a cold country where drinking beer in the middle of the day is considered only a step away from deep alcoholism, so after living in Barcelona for more than a year, I came up with the idea of writing about the drinking traditions in...

So we reach the final part of our series on ‘Common (& very funny) mistakes when learning Spanish’. In part 1 of our series, we looked at mistakes made when words sound very similar to each other, like coser and cocer. In part 2, we looked at mistakes made due to “false friends”. This is when you expect a word to mean something due to it sounding similar to a word in English, when actually it means something completely different. Our favourite example of this is embarazado, which...

In part 1 of this series, we looked at common (and funny) mistakes people make when learning Spanish due to two Spanish words sounding similar. For example, people might mix-up dolor and dolar (pain and dollar) or pesado and pedoso (heavy and farty)! In part 2 of this series on common Spanish language errors we will look at ‘false friends’. This is when you think a word will mean something due to it sounding very similar to a word in your language, in the cases we are going to look at:...

Probablemente habrás oído hablar del acento y particularidades del español de los andaluces, gallegos o catalanes, pero seguro que nadie te ha dicho que en Madrid también existen particularidades en la pronunciación, en la gramática o en el vocabulario que se usa. Por ejemplo, si oyes a alguien diciendo Madrid, con la /d/ final ¡seguro que no es madrileño! Ya que ellos pronuncian Madriz, sí, con zeta y similar con el resto de palabras que acaban en d. Una de la particularidades por lo...

  How to celebrate in Madrid: The traditional opening speech in Plaza de la Villa, Saturday the 9thof February at 18.00, marks the beginning of the 2013’s Spanish Festival. This grand festival will fill the city of Madrid with a joyful mood, party and fantasy. Just as previous years the festival contains events such as: The Big Parade, where fancy dressed professionals take the streets of Madrid, the Masquerade Dance, which is a program specifically dedicated to children, and much,...

Are you learning Spanish in Spain? Do you find that the Spanish spoken in the street isn’t quite the same as the Spanish you learn in the classroom? Sometimes it’s good know a few common slang terms that you can throw into conversation to impress locals you meet in plazas or at the shops or even to impress your Spanish teacher with. Here are some of my favourites with an example of how to use them:   1.      Cabezota : Stubborn This word is more commonly used as an adjective but...