The languages of Spain: there's not only Spanish! :)

¡Hola! :) Today I want to let you know something about Spain that a lot of people from other countries don't know, as I have seen.

Most of the people think that in Spain there is one language: the Spanish language. It looks evident and of course it is. But that is not the only language we have. Actually there are 4 languages in Spain! :)

You need to know that Spanish is the main language, the language which all Spanish people know and speak as a native language. But appart from it, there are big zones in Spain, groups of cities, that also have another official language, spoken by a lot of people of that places.

For instance, myself hehe. I'm Spanish but I come from Menorca, a little island where people also speak Menorcan, a dialect of the Catalan language which is spoken in the Balearic Islands, in Cataluña, and even in some little cities in France and Italy.

Here you have an example of each other first language that Spanish people could have depending on their birth places :)

English: 

Hello! How are you? I'm fine thanks, and you?

Spanish: 

¡Hola! ¿Cómo estás? Estoy bien, gracias. ¿Y tú?

Catalan: 

Hola! Com estàs? Estic bé, gràcies. I tu?

Galician: 

Ola! Como está? Estou ben, grazas. Vostede?

Basque: 

 Kaixo! Nola zaude? Fina naiz, mila esker. Egin duzu?

I guess you are now newly surprised about Spanish culture if you didn't know this, and I hope that you like it! :D

¡Hasta pronto!
Fins aviat!
Vexo vostedes en breve!
Laster arte!
See you soon! 

Carnaval de Canarias, probably the best Spanish carnival celebrations!

¡Hola! :) Today I want to share talk to you about this very famous celebration that takes place in las Islas Canarias every year. Actually I have never been there, but as I have heard it's a huge celebration, maybe near the well-known Brazilian Carnival celebration.

Moreover, there is a well-known kind of competition in which there are girls that wear really big and decorated costumes and show it to the people. As far as I know, there is a team behind each of that costumes, and it tooks months for them to prepare the costumes. It would be really interesting to go there in Carnival to see it! :)

Here you have some images and a little video, as I like to do.
Enjoy it! :)

 

 

¡Hasta pasado mañana! :)
See you the day after tomorrow!

It's something! - Spanish Sayings 1

I would like to post some Spanish sayings that Spanish people often use, so you can study the ones that are more used and leave that others less used.
In this post I will show you some sayings that tell what you have is not totally bad, at least.

¡Algo es algo! - It's something.

Explanation: You could have obtained nothing from an action, but at least you obtained something, so you have to feel good for that.

Example:
- No podemos ir al cine pero por lo menos podemos ver una película en casa.
- Tienes razón, ¡algo es algo!

Translation:
- We can't go to the cinema but at least we can watch a movie at home.
- You're right, it's something!

Es mejor que nada - It's better than nothing

Explanation: It refers to the fact that if you have obtained nothing from an action, it would have been clearly worse, and because of it you have to feel good for the current result.

Example:
- Somos tres personas y ahora sólo tenemos una galleta para comer.
- Bueno, es mejor que nada...

Translation:
- We are three people and now we only have one cookie for eating.
- Well, it's better than nothing...

Más vale pájaro en mano, que ciento volando - One bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. (Literraly =  One bird in the hand is worth a hundred of them flying)

Explanation: It refers to the fact that is better to have something for sure than aim to have more being in risk of loosing everything.

Example:
- ¡Qué mal! Si hubiera jugado un rato más, habría ganado más dinero...
- No pienses así, más vale pájaro en mano que ciento volando.

Translation:
- That's so bad! If I have played for some more time, I would have won more money...
- Don't think so, it's better

Es mejor estar sólo que mal acompañado -  Better alone than poorly accompanied. 

Explanation: It's better to stay alone than going with bad people (friends, boy/girlfriend or other people in general).

Example:
- La novia de Juan dejó a Juan por otro hombre después de seis meses de relación.
- Fuf, pobre Juan... sabes que, es mejor estar sólo que mal acompañado.

Translation:
- Juan's girlfriend left Juan for another man after just six months of relationship.
- Uf, poor Juan... you know, better alone than poorly accompanied.

Más vale poco y bueno que mucho y malo. (Literally = A few and good is worth lots and bad [friends])

Explanation: It means that is always better to have a few trustful and loyal friends than a lot of friends that are not reliable and could hurt you, so they are not really good friends.

Example:
- Roberto tiene muchos amigos y yo sólo tengo dos amigos...
- Pero tus amigos son amigos íntimos, y Roberto en realidad no tiene ningún amigo íntimo. No olvides que más vale poco y bueno que mucho y malo.

Translation:
- Robert has a lot of friends and I only have two friends...
- But your friends are very close friends, and actually Robert doesn't have any close friend. Don't forget that 'a few and good is worth lots and bad'.


And that's all for today! I hope you like it. Don't forget to read the note below ;)
¡Hasta pronto! :)

Español, the fastest language!

¡Hola! :) I just have found a very interesting video! It says that Spanish is the fastest spoken language that exists at present. I'm not sure at all if it's true or not, but I admit that Spanish can be spoken in a way that each word is very near the words beside them, so it could seem fast hehe.
Anyway, it doesn't have too long words and the pronunciation is easier than the most of the language, I think. Moreover, the writting is very intuitive because it follows almost exactly the way Spanish is spoken.

¡Disfrutad del vídeo! :)
Enjoy the video!

Las castañuelas, a Spanish traditional musical instrument

¡Hola! :) Today I want to talk about the Spanish castañuelas. There is a different between the ones made of wood (called castañuelas) and the ones made of metal (cróstalos), but Spanish people in general know them all as castañuelas :).

Spanish castañuelas comes from an ancient kind of castañuelas called iberian "crusmata".

As you probably know, the castañuelas are a very famous instrument used in the flamenco dances as the Spanish sevillanas (a topic for another post ;) ) and also in some well-known orquestas like Carmen de Bizet, The Rapsody España of Chabier, and the ballet El Cid of Massenet, to give them a 'Spanish feeling'. Even Wagner used castañuelas for his song 'Venusberg'.

Actually, the origin of the castañuelas dates back to the Phoenicians, in the year 1000 b.C. Also Egypt, Chinese and Greek people used castañuelas even before Spanish people. There are evidences about their existence even in the Paleolithic! So probably it's one of the first musical instruments that human being have created. 

But Spanish people have conserved, used them, and castañuelas have evolved since the first ones. In the other countries they didn't evolved as Spanish castañuelas did. And they are still being used! :)

Now I leave you with a beautiful video of flamenco dance with castañuelas. Enjoy it! :)

I hope you like my post about Spanish castañuelas.
¡Hasta pronto! :)

Golden Waves, another song of Armik

¡Hola! :)
I hope you enjoyed the guitar music of Armik that I posted in another post, because today I want to let you listen and enjoy this other song of Armik :) I really like it, I hope you like it too hehe. Enjoy it!

At least I guess you will play the video, isn't it? ;)
¡Que tengáis un buen día! :D
I wish you have a nice day today!

La paella española

What is the Paella?

Paella is a typical Spanish food. The main ingredient is rice coloured with species. Moreover, it use to contain chicken meat, prawns, seafood, green peas, etc. We have different kinds of paella, so there are paellas that has meat more than fish, and there are other paellas that has fish more than meat, etc. Anyway, the biggest paellas are made in Valencia. 

Those paellas are so huge that they need several people to prepare them!

Origins of Paella

Linguists believe that the word paella comes from the name of the pan it is made in - the Latin term patella, a flat plate on which offerings were made to the Gods.

It was in the mid-nineteenth century that modern paella was created in an area around Albufera (a fresh water lagoon near the city of Valencia). At lunch time, workers in the fields would make the rice dish in a flat pan over a fire,, mixing in whatever they could find.

Source: about.com

Curious origin, without any doubt! And now it's so delicious :D

 

¡Que tengas un buen día!

Have a good day!

El Mío Cid

¡Hola! :) Taking advantage from the last post, I would like to share with you this video of the beginning of the Cantar del Mío Cid.
El Mío Cid was a legendary man that conquers a lot of territories to the arabic people that were in Spain centuries ago, when the Spanish Kingdom was still being developed and was trying to conquer all the Iberian Peninsula.
The amazing thing in this video is the fact that the boy who recorded it tried to speak in old castilian spanish, and it's amazing to hear it because it has changed a lot :D
Enjoy it! :)

¡Que vaya bien!
Everything goes well with you!

Don Quijote de la Mancha

Don Quijote (Don Quixote) is a novel by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra. It's full title is 'El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha' (The ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha).

When the Spanish teenagers go to the high-school, they have to read part or all this book in their Spanish classes. It's an important book of the Spanish culture and literature. Anyway, its way of writting is actually old, only used centuries ago, but in spite of that I was impressed by that book.

It's also a beautiful Spanish, and I thing that is good to feel respect and admiration for all that changes that languages make during their lifes.
I have also read some thing about the Old English and its way of being written in the past, and I was impressed by that too :) Really curious!

¡Hasta más ver, osado caballero! :)
Till the next time, brave knight!

Canción del Pirata - José de Espronceda

¡Hola piratas! :D Today I want to show you a poem written in the 19th century by one of my favourite Spanish poets, José de Espronceda.

The poem talks about the freedom of the pirates from the authorities and the governors, and all the responsabilities that this freedom implies for them.

José de Espronceda - La canción del pirata
 

Con diez cañones por banda,

viento en popa a toda vela,

no corta el mar, sino vuela,

un velero bergantín;

bajel pirata que llaman

por su bravura el Temido

en todo el mar conocido

del uno al otro confín. 

...

You can find the whole lyric here :)

You can find its translation here :)

A beautiful recitation of the poem :)

And here you can watch a video of this poem put in a song by the rock group Tierra Santa, a really good song (yeah! haha :) ). Enjoy it! :)

¡Nos vemos! 

See you!

Fiestas de San Fermín in Pamplona, Spain

Hola! As I'm from Menorca, a little island of Spain located in the Balearic Islands, I have never seen any bull running like in the Fiestas de San Fermín. But I have to admit that this fiestas are really incredible and amazing. The people runs in front of the bulls to avoid them, and everybody is there seeing and enjoying that traditional and important Spanish celebration.

The Fiestas de San Fermín begin in July, as the traditional song says :)

" ¡1 de Enero, 2 de Febrero, 3 de Marzo, 4 de Abril... 5 de Mayo, 6 de Junio, 7 de Julio... San Fermín! "

Today is the 4th day of this fiesta, and as I read in elpais.com, a well-known national newspaper in its online version, during the 4th day the bulls runs faster than any other day in the celebration, and in a shorter period of time.

I leave two images for you, a little video and the source of the news here. Enjoy it! :)

Source of the news: http://ouo.io/9kBcb

¡Hasta la próxima!
See you in the next post!

Armik, the Armenian flamenco guitarist

¡Hola! I would like to share with you this Spanish guitar music (played by an Armenian man, but really flamenco and nice guitarist without any doubt). Here you have the video, enjoy it! :)

Youtube link: http://ouo.io/pCrL77

¡Hasta pronto!
See you soon!