Mike in Chayofa

Una lengua fácil – an easy language

(OOna_LENgwah FAHthil)

OK .. the capital letters are where the stress is and a ‘_’ means that you run one word into the next. One of the problems of listening to Spanish speaking people is deciding where one word finishes and the next one starts. You do it instinctively in English ….. I’vejustseenBill

I hope that you find this useful and also entertaining. Learning a language is never easy, but Spanish is easier than most. If you have ever listened to any music or watched any films, you will be amazed at how much Spanish you already know:

adios amigo fiesta señorita hasta luego siesta etc

You have also probably come across:

buenos días buenas noches gracias tapas por favor vino etc

There are words used in English that have been imported from the Spanish language:

lasso (bow, knot) mosquito (little fly) patio (courtyard) vamoose (let’s go)

To make things even easier for you, because Spanish is derived from Latin and 60% of English is too, you will find that a lot of words are very similar:

aeropuerto banco restaurante hospital tenis música televisión guitarra

Don’t we know a lot already!

As a matter of interest, in Spanish there will always be an upside-down exclamation mark at the beginning of the sentence and a question will have an upside-down question mark at the beginning as well as at the end of the question … it makes sense if you think about it.

If you are not working on a Spanish keyboard, I’m afraid that some of the punctuation may appear as gobbledygook. If this happens, I’m sure that if you post a message, someone will be able to answer your problems.

On a non-Spanish keyboard, the following keys should give you the punctuation that you need:

á é í ó ú – to get the accute accent, press … control, the apostrophe sign and then the letter that you want to accent.

ñ (n tilde) … press control, shift, the tilde symbol and then the letter n

¿ (upside-down question mark) … press Alt, control, shift and then your regular question mark symbol.

¡ (upside-down exclamation mark) … press Alt, control, shift and then your regular exclamation mark symbol.


Before we start to learn new words and start speaking Spanish, we need to know how to pronounce those words … here’s the boring bit:

You will find that on Tenerife, you actually come across very few ‘tinerfeños’ (teenerFENyos) and that you will hear all sorts of different pronunciations, and indeed different words used to describe the same thing, depending on whether the person is from one of the islands, from the mainland or from Latin America, so what follows is Castillian (which should be the norm):

There are (arguably) 26 letters in the Spanish alphabet.

There is an extra letter than in English, which is ñ and comes between n and o.

Technically, there is no w – although it is in use because of imported words eg wáter, whisky

For the last ten years or so, to bring Spanish into line with European spelling norms, CH and LL are no longer treated as separate letters – although it’s probably a good idea to keep in mind that they used to be.

(With one or two exceptions) Spanish is spelled as it is pronounced. The general rule is: one sound per letter, and one letter per sound.

I am going to list the Spanish alphabet and its pronunciation on a separate sheet. I will assume that you know how to copy and paste anything from this forum onto a new ‘Word’ document, but if you want to receive anything as an attachment on a regular email – let me know.

I will try to keep the boring bits to a minimum. The easiest way to learn a new language is to surround yourself with native speakers continually, so that you have to learn it. This is not usually an option for most of us, so I’m afraid that there will be a bit of work to do.
There is always a temptation to rush and proceed. Make sure that you are comfortable and fully understand one section before moving on to the next.

Good luck. Let me know how you get on.

Mike