Here's a fairly short interview with Anni B Sweet ... remember all the huge advantages you have .. unlike a real conversation, you can wind things back, listen over and over again, go away and look things up .... you know it will be Terrific For Your Spanish ... Here's another ... I don't have to tell you what to do ... ..and here's a longer one .... can you feel this doing you good ? .. and after all that hard work, interesting and Terrific For Your Spanish though it was, here's the song I promised you ..." Tumbado en moqueta azul "... ..and here's a words video for it too ...
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Telenovelas, Spanish "soaps" are, it must be said, Terrific For Your Spanish. So when I found out about yet another of these monstrous shows, how could I resist bringing a little slice of it onto here ..... well, all I could find was this, a short and rather loftily-announced "promo" ... usually for any telenovela there are zillions of clips on youtube. Oh well ... aa Aha ! you're hooked already ! But where's the rest of it ? It must exist, because Wiki says so " Cara o cruz, is an American telenovela created and produced by Telemundo and Argos Comunicación in 2001." .... What I did find was this song by Sinopsis called, amazingly, Cara o Cruz .... Also, I've found out where the phrase comes from ...
" En la época colonial las monedas que circulaban en el Imperio Español tenían obviamente la cara del emperador y en el anverso una cruz. Cuando se produce el proceso de independencia hispanoamericana los nuevos estados, como una manifestación de su soberanía, acuñarán sus propias monedas pero la costumbre popular de llamar "cara" o "cruz" a los dos lados de las monedas se mantiene en algunos países. En otros describe las características de las actuales monedas. El caso de águila o sol se debe a que las monedas mexicanas o pesos tienen un águila real y un sol azteca en el anverso." I was puzzled by this .... " se me ocurrió la idea de echar a cara o cruz quién iba a darle el regalo. " Cara o cruz ? Well, it turns out it is the Spanish version of " heads or tails", presumably because Spain had some coins with a cross on one side and a face on the other. Well, the "cara" bit is easy, because of kings and queens and so on, and judging from that picture up there, there have been Spanish coins with a cross on them. BUT ... I also found out that Cara o Cruz is the title of a Telenovela ! Ha! Ha ! indeed .... I think I will bung a few episodes on here sometime .. those dark winter months when we all need a bit of a laugh..... at the very least they will be Terrific For Your Spanish .... OK ... now it's music time here at LSi88Y ... no, it's not the theme tune for Cara o Cruz, it's going to be Esther Zecco and " Sácame de áqui " .... Notice the G chord she's playing there ... #11 in "The Observers Book of Guitar Chords"
LATER ... this blog platform has occasionally swapped the pictures and videos around so they finish up in different places ... like it has up there. BUT .. it has become far more frequent in recent weeks. Does anyone out there know why, or what I can do to minimalise it. Often this can happen after the post has been on the blog for weeks or months ... suddenly things get switched around ! I've got loads of Spanish dictionaries ... and I expect you have too ... I've got lots of HUGE ones ..... .... and then I've got about 6 copies of this little Collin's Gem one ... but in a much more old-fashioned format ... But what I could never find, and what I really needed was something in-between ... bigger than the Collins Gems but smaller than the blockbuster ones .... the only ones I saw of that size were poor-quality books that were on flimsy crappy paper and looked as though they would fall apart rather rapidly. But ... I think I have found the right one at last ... It's sort of the next size up from the Gems, and thicker, and it's got ... wait for it ... rounded corners. All books should have rounded corners in my opinion. It is beautifully produced and looks pretty robust, it's got a very crisp and clear typeface .... smashing. By the way, I suppose you know that there are two sorts of bilingual dictionaries. Oh yes ... and it tends to divide people into two opposing camps. Looking at it from the point of view of an English speaker. there's dictionaries that put the "other" language first, so the first section is ,say, Spanish -to- English, then the English-to-Spanish is at the back.That seems to be the usual setup. Then there's some that do it the other way round ... English-Spanish first, then Spanish-English. The Penguin one up there is set up like that. It's the only one of mine that does it that way. To give you an idea of its size, you know you can get those posh boxes that have two packs of cards in ... it's about that size, and a bit thicker. It fits a jacket pocket, but would be a bit big for a trouser pocket. Well, time will tell with this Penguin one, but for now I love it. I reckon it's music now at LSi88Y .... it's an astonishing live acoustic performance of Club de Fans de John Boy by Love of Lesbian .... but you can hardly hear Sr Balmas, because the audience sing it perfectly ! In the previous post I showed you a memorisation technique .... but we used it to remember some English first ... start with the easy stuff . It's probably a good idea for you to scroll back and take a look. This time I'm going to try the same thing with a bit of Spanish. I suspect it might not work so easily in a second language ... but we won't know until we try, so off we go.... we'll use the first three lines of a Zahara song ....En la habitación ... Read this out loud several times .. Fumo sola en la terraza del hotel recuerdo el humo y la cerveza en tus manos. You've read it out loud quite a few times ... now scroll down past the picture, which is just a spacer so you won't see what's next ... Well, I've missed a little bit out this time ... I hope you remember what it was .. if you can't remember, put your finger on the spot where it was ... that can jog your memory ... if all else fails, go back and have a look.. Fumo sola en la terraza del .......... recuerdo el humo y la cerveza en tus manos. OK ? Read the whole poem out several times more, out loud, including the missing bit that you have, I hope, remembered. Then scroll down to the next bit ... This time there a second liitle bit missing ... as before, read the whole thing, putting in the missing bits, several times out loud... Fumo sola en la terraza del .......... recuerdo el humo y la ............ en tus manos. OK ... I hope you're getting the hang of this. According to the experts, this is not simply a memorization exercise, but it encourages your brain to recognise the structure of the language to help it recall the missing chunks. A few more read-throughs, then scroll down .. Sure enough, I've missed out another bit ...a dinky two-word section .... off you go doing the usual thing ... Fumo sola .... ..... tereza del ........... recuerdo el humo y la ............. en tus manos Excellent ... usual thing... a few out-loud read-throughs, then on to the next bit .... Another word has gone ... you know what to do .... Fuma sola .... ..... tereza del ........... .................. el humo y la ............. en tus manos Read-throughs, then scroll down .... You don't need any more instructions ..... .............. sola .... ..... tereza del ........... .................. el humo y la ............. en tus manos Another word gone ... don't forget to keep reading the whole thing, even though you can't see most of it now ! .............. sola .... ..... tereza del ........... .................. el humo y la ............. en tus ............. I'm doing all right by the way ... I've remembered everything so far ... don't forget I'm doing this "live" as I write it ... Another little two-word chunk is disappearing this time ... .......... sola .... ..... tereza del ........... .................. el humo y la ............. ..... .... ............. moving on ... nearly there ..... another word is going ..... there's precious little left ! .......... sola .... ..... ........... del ........... .................. el humo y la ............. ..... .... ............. remember to say the whole thing out loud a few times before moving on ... two more littlish words gone .. it's getting exciting !! I'm still remembering it all .... .......... sola .... ..... ........... del ........... .................. ..... ......... y la ............. ..... .... ............. ..another word has vanished ... .......... ....... .... ..... ........... del ........... .................. ..... ......... y la ............. ..... .... ............. ...almost done ... keep saying the words out loud .... A two-tiny-words bit has gone, and there's only 1 word left ... crumbs .... .......... ........ .... ..... ........... del ........... .................. ..... ......... ... .... ............. ..... .... ............. Well, I wonder what's next boys and girls .... Hey... you're reading a totally blank script ! .......... ........ .... ..... ........... .... ........... .................. ..... ......... ... .... ............. ..... .... ............. Well .... I did it ! ...and I don't think it was any harder than it was with the English poem. .... which is a surprise to me. A big surprise that it works at all, and that you actually can read the whole thing from what is effectively a blank sheet of paper! Of course, in real life you would do this with a sheet of paper with the words on, and just cross them out or rub them out one at a time ... which would be a lot quicker . In its original form it was for teaching a class, so it would be written up on a board and the teacher would rub bits out... until the class could read the whole thing from an empty board.... magic ! As a reward, here's Zahara singing this lovely song in its complete form ... there are so many videos of this on't net it's hard to know where to begin ... .. and here is the most subliminal words video you'll ever see ... Here's that " Grammar Games" book I mentioned a couple of posts ago.. I was irked that an idea I thought was mine was in there, but I've got over it now.... it's about learning English grammar, but the ideas in it can be applied to any language. Here's another idea from it that I have heard about before, but didn't really believe would, or could, work. Sceptical old me ! Let's try it out ( in English first) right here and now, live .... Read this section of a poem out loud to yourself a few times .... it's the last bit of a Carol Ann Duffy poem called Prayer..... Pray for us now. Grade 1 piano scales console the lodger looking out across a Midlands town. Then dusk, and someone calls a child's name as though they named their loss. Darkness outside. Inside, the radio's prayer - Rockall, Malin, Dogger, Finisterre. You've read it aloud a few times ? Now scroll past this picture, which is just a "spacer" so you don't see what's next .... This time there's a bit missing... read it through a few more times, putting in that missing word that I hope you have remembered. If you can't remember it, put your finger on the place where it was... it sometimes works. If all else fails, but I don't think it will, nip back and read the poem again.... Pray for us now. Grade 1 piano scales console the lodger looking out across a Midlands town. Then dusk, and someone calls a child's name as though they named their loss. Darkness outside. Inside, the ............... prayer - Rockall, Malin, Dogger, Finisterre. OK ... read it out loud again maybe, because I'm going to do it again after this spacer .... Now I've missed out another bit .... read the poem again a time or two, putting in both of the missing chunks.... Pray for us now. Grade 1 piano ........... console the lodger looking out across a Midlands town. Then dusk, and someone calls a child's name as though they named their loss. Darkness outside. Inside, the .............. prayer - Rockall, Malin, Dogger, Finisterre. When I first read about this idea, I thought it was just a memorisation technique .. an easy way to learn the words of a song perhaps .. .. but it's also a way of using your knowledge of language structures as a sort of scaffolding to help your brain piece it all together ... Anyway, here we go again ..... Another little bit is missing ... off you go ... Pray for us now. Grade 1 piano ........... console the .............. looking out across a Midlands town. Then dusk, and someone calls a child's name as though they named their loss. Darkness outside. Inside, the .............. prayer - Rockall, Malin, Dogger, Finisterre. have you read it through with all the missing bits ... next step then .............. another bit's gone .... you know what to do ... Pray for us now. Grade 1 piano ........... console the .............. looking out across a Midlands........... .Then dusk, and someone calls a child's name as though they named their loss. Darkness outside. Inside, the .............. prayer - Rockall, Malin, Dogger, Finisterre. Well, you should have the idea by now .. I suppose you would normally do this with a written copy of whatever you wanted to memorise, crossing bits out as you went through the process. It certainly seems to be working so far ! Of course, besides the rubbing out stuff, by doing this you are reading the poem lots of times, which must be a help, but having to recall a little bit extra each time is making the memory task do-able. In a classroom it's done on a board, so it's easy to rub out ..and rewrite if necessary .... one bit at a time. I hope you will carry on with this poem ...as will I ... to see if it works right the way through, so eventually you are reading a blank sheet of paper ! Strange. I strongly suspect that this will be harder with a Spanish text. But that's the next step. If any of you out there try it, let me know ( with the comment thingy) if it's worked. And now, after all that instructional-type stuff .... a song. Yes ... " Fotografía" with Juanes and later on that Nelly Furtado .... One reason I chose this song is because the "words" video does more or less the opposite of what I've been doing up there! Well, almost-ish ... At the back of my ancient " Chamber's English Dictionary" there is a section where it has a list of " Quotations from Latin, Greek and Modern Foreign Languages" subtitled " Single foreign words, and certain phrases often used in an English context, are given in the main dictionary." I was actually looking up French phrases ( there were about 150 of them!) .... but was (fairly) astonished to find 3 Spanish ones. Three ! Crumbs. I've had a quick look to see what sort of words that subtitle is about ...well, burro is there in the main dictionary, so are sombrero, chicle, chihuahua, chinchilla, hasta and so on... But my challenge for you is a pretty tough one ... what do you think those three Spanish phrases might have been? Meantime, here's that Shakira + Michael Bose and "Si Tu No Vuelves" ... ... Some of my more diligent readers might remember this neat idea ... you start with any old sentence .. like this one from Isabel Allende's "Walimai" ... then you subtly (or drastically) change it, one thing at a time... and eventually you will get something completely different. Of course, the trick is to make sure that the sentence makes grammatical sense at every stage ... Un día llegó un grupo de hombres pálidos a nuestra aldea. Un día llegó un grupo de elefantes pálidos a nuestra aldea. Un día llegó un grupo de elefantes pálidos a nuestro yate. * Un día llegó un grupo de elefantes quisquillosos a nuestro yate. Un día llegó un par de elefantes quisquillosos a nuestro yate. Un día estalló un par de elefantes quisquillosos junto a nuestro yate.* * Notice here that I've had to change nuestra to nuestro because "yate" is masculine ... when I said that you can only change "one thing at a time" it allows for necessary adjustments like that. Similarly, at line 6, having made the elephants explode, they needed to be on, by or maybe above or under the yacht, so I needed to put "junto a" to make it right. I suppose some purists might say I could have changed "a" earlier on to "junto a" on a previous go, ready for the later explosion! Fair enough. Enough of that technical stuff ! As you can see, the sentence gets transformed, slowly but surely, into something completely different, as it is gradually doing up there. Well, I thought that this was my idea ! A comforting, important sort of thought , a feeling that I might leave this world a better place ... however, the other day I was reading a book about "grammar games"** and there it was ..... some other b******** had thought of it before me. He calls it " rub out and replace" which describes it pretty accurately. I wasn't too worried because I have thought up all sorts of things ... birds that don't exist like the Spring Crosby, the Fartridge ( which escapes from shooters with its extra-boost propulsion system) and the Busticle, a new variant of chess called Norfolk Chess ( every 8 moves the left-hand strip of board falls into the sea, and all the pieces on it go with it ... very exciting) , lots of songs and poems, a bird-feeder you can switch off with a remote when you go out, a world-record Welsh pangram...... still, it's a bit of a blow. But I'll get over it. OK ... music .... here's one of those "Toy Songs" where you perform a song with ( some, many) toy instruments ... here's El Pacto with "La Reina de los mares " ALINEACIONES: ESTUDIANTES DE LA PLATA : Flores; Aguirre Suárez, Madero, Manera ; Togneri, Cremasco; Rudki, Bicardo, Conigliaro , Flórez y Verón. REAL MADRID: Betancort; Calpe, De Felipe, Sanchis; Pirri, Zoco; Fleitas, Amancio, Grosso, Velásquez y Gento. Arbitraje : A cargo del francés Kitabdjian, que jusgó con criterio excesivamente meticuloso y con frecuentes errores en la interpretación de las faltas un partido difícil de juzgar por la pelegrosidad de las entradas de los jugadores argentinos. Hubo abundancia de faltas y el árbitro pitó todas y algunas más. En general, un mal arbitraje. Goles; A los cuatro minutos Sanchis da un pase largo a Fleitas, éste centra, recoge Amancio, que se queda solo ante el portero, y lo desplaza de una carga violenta el defensa Aguirre Suárez dentro del área. La falta es sancionada con penalty, que Gento transforma en el primer gol del Madrid. A los cuatro minutos del segundo tiempo avance de Velásquez, que cede a Amancio, y éste en jugada individual regatea a dos defensas y evade después la salida del guardameta argentino para tirar a puerta libre y marcar el segundo gol del Madrid. A los vientineuve minutos, Aguirre Suárez lanza un golpe franco contra el Madrid, tira raso y el balón cambia de trayectoria al dar en un jugador de la barrera y llega a la red de Betancort. Es el gol del Estudiantes. En el minuto cuarenta contraataca el Madrid a la salida de un córner, escapa Gento, que pasa a Amancio. La defensa argentina se adelante para intentar dejar a éste en posición de "offside", pero el árbitro considera que Amancio no queda fuera de juego y deja que continúe la jugada. Amancio, solo, regatea al portero y marca el tercera gol. Resultado del primer tiempo : Real Madrid ,1 ; Estudiantes de la Plata, 0. Resultado final : Real Madrid , 3; Estudiantes de la Plata, 1. ABC ( España), 31- viii - 69 I hope you liked that... times haven't changed very much in the intervening decades have they. Refs get criticised , Suárez causes problems, Real Madrid score goals, Offside traps are set ..... no change there then.
This was "borrowed" from an excellent little book, the Penguin Spanish Reader by R. A Pemberton, who has collected loads of bits of Spanish from all over the place ... poems, newspapers, novels, magazines .... as he says " most of the passages will provide a basis for discussion, and some may even provoke controversy." That's another way of saying that they are interesting. There's lots of notes to help you with tricky bits too. I don't know if any of you lot out there have ever played blow football, but I can tell you it's rubbish, it's unhygienic and you spend all your time picking the ball up off the floor or retrieving it from underneath the sideboard. Amazingly, I couldn't find any images of this smashing on the net, so I've had to make my own... oh ... it hasn't worked... that, and the music, will have to appear later on. A little while ago, for no real reason except that I liked it, I put this up ... Well, I've now found what is presumably an updated version, to take into account the expulsion of Pluto from the official list of planets. I've also found out that these two brilliant little poems , "elegante" in themselves, are by Elena Fernandez. so, here's the " No Pluto" version ... POEMA DE LOS PLANETAS Los planetas del sistema solar por el espacio salen a pasear. Mercurio y Venus tan cerca del sol, no pueden vivir de tanto calor. En cambio la Tierra muy contenta está porque todos los niños la van a cuidar. Más pequeño y rojizo es Marte y Júpiter es gigante. Saturno con anillos es muy elegante. En lo lejano está Urano y queda uno que es Neptuno. Todos los planetas giran y el sol los vigila. Aren't they smashing ! And, very appropriate , because yesterday the Pluto spacecraft went by Pluto ( and Charon and all the other dinky moons) and today it should send back some photographs. |
AuthorI'm just somebody learning Spanish like most of you reading this I suppose. This blog is mostly what I'm thinking about as I go along. There is some serious stuff on here, grammar, vocabulary etc, but there is also a lot of mucking about, peculiar insights and lots of homework and games and puzzles, and how could I forget, music. Lots of music..Whatever I do, I hope it will all be Terrific For Your Spanish! Archives
September 2018
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