Posts tagged with "travel"

Spanish Lesson Beginner 21 Travel

Posted by Laura 2 Comments
Aug 24 2011

¡Hola a todos!

Today, we are going to see how to manage when travelling in a Spanish speaking country. When you are on holiday or on a business trip in Spain or Latin America you have the perfect opportunity to really speak with the locals as you find your way around the country. In this video lesson I will provide you with essential vocabulary and phrases that will help you to ask for information, buy tickets and understand prices.

Let´s see first some basic travelling vocabulary:

• Transporte: Transport
• Billete: Ticket
• Ida: Single
• Ida y vuelta: Return
• Billete de ida: Single ticket
• Billete de ida y vuelta: Return ticket
• Bono: Travel card/Season ticket
• Precio: Price
• Taquilla: Ticket office
• Plaza: Seat
• Información: Information
• Día: Day
• Salir: To leave
• Sale: It leaves
• Llegar: To arrive
• Llega: It arrives
• Reservar: To book
• De ……a………..: From….. to…….
• De Barcelona a Madrid: From Barcelona to Madrid

Let´s see now how to buy a travel ticket and how to ask for travel information in Spanish:

• Necesito información sobre…: I need information about…
• Necesito información sobre el tren de Madrid a Sevilla: I need information about the train from Madrid to Sevilla
• Necesitamos información sobre…: We need information about….
• ¿Para qué día?: For what day?
• Para el día (date): For the (date)
• ¿A qué hora sale el tren de Madrid a Sevilla?: At what time does the train from Madrid to Seville leave?
• ¿A qué hora llega el tren de Madrid a Sevilla?: At what time does the train from Madrid to Seville arrive?
• ¿Puedo reservar una plaza?: Can I book a seat?
• Quiero un billete de ida y vuelta de Madrid a Sevilla: I want a return ticket from Madrid to Seville
• ¿Cuánto cuesta un billete de ida y vuelta de Madrid a Sevilla?: How much is a return ticket from Madrid to Sevilla?
• ¿Cuánto es?: How much is it?
• Aquí tiene: Here you are
• Vale/Bien: OK

With all this information I hope that you will feel much more confident the next time you travel in Spain or Latin America. Try to get stuck in and speak Spanish right from the start. Speaking well is a lot about confidence and the best way to get over any nerves is to jump right in. Don’t forget that you can always ask the person to repeat something you haven’t understood by saying: “¿Puedes repetir?”. Or ask them to speak slower by saying: “Más despacio, por favor”. For sure they will really appreciate you trying to communicate in their language and you may surprise yourself at how much you know!

Enjoy your Spanish studies and any future trip you take to Spain or Latin America. I hope that the locals look after you and you have a fantastic time!

¡Hasta pronto!

At the airport: the check-in

Posted by Adir 5 Comments
Jul 30 2011

Traveling is great, isn’t it? You get to meet people, be in places other than your regular city and learn a lot while traveling. So in this post I’m going to give you some useful expressions for when you’re at the check-in counter at the airport.

Su pasaporte, por favor.
Passport, please.

¿Cuántas maletas lleva?
How many bags are you checking?

Coloque la maleta en la balanza, por favor.
Place your bag on the scale, please.

¿Tiene usted equipaje de mano?
Do you have any carry-on luggage?

Lo siento, pero tendrá que pagar exceso de equipaje.
I’m afraid you will have to pay for excess baggage.

¿Prefiere ventana o pasillo?
Do you prefer a window seat or an aisle seat?

Aquí tiene su tarjeta de embarque. El embarque se realizará por la puerta 12.
Here’s your boarding pass. You’re boarding at gate 12.

Se dará inicio al embarque a las 9.
The plane starts boarding at 9 o’clock.

Lo siento, pero el vuelo está atrasado.
I’m afraid the flight has been delayed.

Lo siento, pero el vuelo ha sido cancelado.
I’m afraid the flight has been canceled.

¡Muchas gracias y tenga un buen viaje!
Thank you very much and have a good flight!

Nos vemos prontito.

Tricky prepositions case: means of transportation

Posted by Adir No Comments
Jul 19 2011

Hi, there! How have you been?

I’m sure you’ve learned in your Spanish class or by studying by yourself that some means of transportation are used with certain prepositions, right? Let’s refresh your memory!

en coche – by car
en ómnibus/autobús - by bus
en bicicleta – by bicycle
en barco/navío – by ship
en avión – by plane
a pie – on foot
a caballo - on horseback

Now I’m going to give you some pairs of sentences so that you’ll see that these means of transportation are used with other prepositions too. Check them out.

Salió en su coche. (He went out by car.)
Salió de su coche. (He got out of his car.)

Juan se acercaba a la chica en su moto. (Juan approached the girl by motorcycle.)
Juan se acercaba a la moto con la chica. (Juan approached the motorcycle with his girl – they were together.)

Vengo del barco. (I’m coming from the boat.)
Vengo en barco. (I’m coming by boat.)

Fuimos a caballo hasta la ciudade. (We went to the city on horseback.)
Fuimos por el caballo hasta la ciudad. (We went to the city to get the horse.)

Cruzaremos la frontera en bicicleta. (We will cross the border by bicycle.)
Quieres cruzar la frontera con la bicicleta pero ya tienes mucho equipaje. (You want to cross the border carrying/with your bicycle but you have too much luggage already.)

Prepositions are indeed tricky so I suggest you pay attention to how they’re used and try to understand and emulate the examples.

See you next time!

My one-day trip to Argentina

Posted by Adir No Comments
Jun 27 2011

Hey, there! How’s it going?

During Carnival here in Brazil I went on a sea cruise down to Argentina and Uruguay. We only had one day to spend in Montevideo and Buenos Aires, so we got off the ship at 9 am, hopped in a cab and drove along these cities. Montevideo is a beautiful and clean city but it was Buenos Aires that grabbed my attention completely.

Its architecture, squares, monuments, they’re all amazing. So we were there on a Thursday, a working day for Argentineans, and we had a three-hour drive around Buenos Aires. Taxi fares there are very, very cheap and we paid around 12 dollars each (4 people) for this sightseeing drive.

We had a little itinerary already planned out and we had the luck of having a driver who, even though he was young, was very knowledgeable about architecture and the city itself. So we asked him to take us first to see the Casa Rosada, the Presidential House. Cristina Kirchner, the President, was opening some public buildings so there were a lot of police there and traffic was extremely heavy.

One thing that struck me as highly interesting is that Argentineans protest for almost anything. In our three-hour drive around Buenos Aires we spotted at least five demonstrations. In one of them I saw this rainbow-colored flag so I asked the driver, ¿Es la comunidad gay que está protestando? and he gave me the dirtiest look ever and said, No señor, son los indígenas que a los que les quitaron sus tierras, that is, homeless indigenous people.

We also went to Caminito, which is a short street in the Boca district, where you can find colorful houses which date back to the 60s, when artist Benito Quinquela Martín decided to remodel the abandoned street, after the railroad was closed.

We saw a lot of historic and government buildings downtown and near Caminito our driver told me, Che, hay algo que quiero mostrarte (Hey, there’s something I want to show you). He drove us to this closed factory, which had a very unusual façade: a mythological orgy of people as beasts. So here’s one sight in Buenos Aires your travel agency won’t take you to. It is amazingly built and I’m glad the driver took us there. You can see the picture on the post.

So after driving for three hours we went to eat at the Puerto Madero area, near the Buenos Aires ports. They have a lot of good restaurants there and we ate at at Siga la Vaca (Follow the Cow). It is a self-service restaurant with a great menu of salads, rice, and you can go to the barbecue and order your meat. So here’s what happened, I’d had my salad, rice, beans, etc., and I went to the barbecue to get some meat. I ordered chicken breast and I thought the guy would serve me a small piece. Little did I know they serve you half a chicken breast, so when in Rome…

After eating we headed down to Calle Florida, a shopping street, to buy souvenirs. My friend Lavinia and I bought tons of alfajores Havana, magazines and some clothes at a good price. If you’re looking to buy leather jackets, that’s the place to go. One thing I noticed in Buenos Aires is that almost everybody speaks portuñol (portugués + español) and most establishments accept reais (Brazil’s currency) as payment method.

We had the hardest time getting a cab at rush hour, 5 pm, but we managed to arrive at the boat in time. I’m thinking of going back to Argentina really soon and spending some days there to walk around town and see the “hidden” Buenos Aires.

Language learning success: the story of Victor González

Posted by Adir 1 Comment
Feb 28 2011

Hey, there! How’s it going?

Today we have a guest writer here on the blog: Victor González. Victor is a Peruvian friend of mine who lives in São Paulo and he wrote something really cool about his experience with learning Portuguese when he came to Brazil. Victor is a translator and you can check out his blog with articles (in Spanish) on translation by clicking here.

¡Qué linda «camisinha»!

Pues sí, «camisinha» significa preservativo, condón, jebe, goma, en portugués; pero yo me refería a la linda camisa que había recibido de regalo el día que llegué a Brasil.

A pesar que había terminado mi curso intensivo de portugués antes de venir a Brasil, todo me sonaba muy raro, los acentos, etc. Lo que uno aprende en la academia de idiomas es una cosa, pero otra muy diferente es el día a día en un país de habla diferente a la nuestra.

Me sucedieron tantas cosas que no me las explicaba ya que eran de lo más inusitadas. La lengua portuguesa me encantó desde el primer momento de contacto y había sido un muchacho aplicado en el curso, además de eso, siempre recibía material de apoyo de una amiga brasileña, vía correo; pero cómo hacerle cuando yo había aprendido un perfecto «Como você está?» cuando al encontrarme con amistades del nuevo país me salían con un «Comocetá?» o un «Cetábem?». Parece gracioso y después de 11 años, es un cague de risa, pero en aquella época no lo era y hasta llegó a ser un tanto frustrante porque todita la gramática me la había estudiado y, en ese momento, parecía que no me servía de nada. Muchas veces la pronunciación de la lengua portuguesa es muy diferente de la escritura, por ejemplo si en español escribimos papel, en portugués también, sólo que en portugués se lee «papeu». Yo había aprendido el portugués con un método de enseñanza de Portugal y había trabajado mucho con el pronombre «tu» que hasta me resultaba más fácil por su semejanza con el español, pero en São Paulo, casi nunca se usa el «tu» y sí, «você».

Las aventuras fueron de lo más ridículas y graciosas; recuerdo el día que antes de empezar las clases decidí agarrar el periódico —específicamente los clasificados— en busca de un empleo temporal y había un anuncio que decía: «precisa-se de gançons e garçonetes», era cerca de casa y no era una mala idea la experiencia. Decidí llamar por teléfono y candidatearme a la vacante del «garçom»*, pero fue demasiado tarde porque la vacante ya había sido tomada, entonces le dije «senhorinha»**, imagínense ya cara de la tipa al otro lado del teléfono: «restam vagas para garçonete?»***. Fue mortal.

*garçom: mozo, camarero.
** senhorinha: señora de muy avanzada edad o muy humilde.
*** garçonete: femenino de mozo, camarero.

Claro que ya hace mucho tiempo de todo esto y hoy puedo considerar el portugués mi segunda lengua, la que siempre me encantó y sedujo, la que puedo decir que domino, uso, estudio y hace parte de mis lenguas de trabajo.

Por eso, si aprendes una lengua extranjera porque te gusta, porque es importante para tu currículo, porque es necesario para desempeñar tu trabajo… recuerda que además de un exhaustivo estudio de la gramática, de la práctica oral y auditiva, merece mucho la pena la experiencia de un intercambio porque además de ser una experiencia sin igual para aprender una lengua, también es una experiencia cultural enriquecedora.

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