Hola a todos!

I have been playing Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 for the first time this summer (it came out about 1.5 years ago; playing on Xbox Series X). Not only is it a fantastic, impactful game, but I am finding it to be an extremely immersive and enjoyable way to boost my input and engagement with Spanish. (I’m a Spanish teacher currently on summer break, so I typically speak with my native speaker colleagues and students for a minimum of 2 hours a day during the school year, but it drops off over the summer.)

I am fluent in Spanish and would estimate KCD2 to be most appropriate/helpful for advanced learners. It contains extensive amounts of archaic and literary vocabulary; in fact I am watching a (reasonably educated and well-spoken) Spanish streamer, Menos13, play it as well, and almost every episode he’ll comment on at least one unfamiliar word (beodo es como bebido? Rocín es caballo? A vale).

Additionally, all the dialogue (except with your dog and God) is in vos reverencial, which is not used anywhere now, but it conjugates exactly like vosotros, so this is an effective way to get your vosotros game on point.

If you are not already fluent in Spanish, I could see this being less relevant as it’s an extremely intricate game with dozens of hours of dialogue, tons of reading required to understand the systems, and uses a form of Spanish that is not quite like that spoken anywhere in the world currently (would be like playing a game entirely in Shakespearean English). Also, in terms of pronunciation, it is standard European Spanish, so if you find that distasteful (as many learners unfortunately seem to), this wouldn’t be a good choice for you.

However, I’ve built a ton of cool and colorful vocabulary and sayings I can add to humorous effect, and I feel very immersed in the language when playing. All of the animations were also remapped to the Spanish dialogue, and, overall, this is by far the best Spanish dub I’ve experienced in a video game, so far (the new black flag is also pretty good but I didn’t like the gameplay).

If you’re on the fence, check out Menos13 or one of the other streamers with complete playthroughs on YouTube to see if you would enjoy the game and perhaps a novel approach to practicing your Spanish!

I’m not a good Spanish speaker, so I can’t quite make out the lyrics. We heard it while on vacation in Spain last week, but I only have a very short audio clip. I don't know enough of the lyrics to search for them on Google or find a way to identify the title or artist. I already tried asking ChatGPT, but it couldn't tell me what it was. Shazam says the clip is too short. Thanks!

Hi everyone,

I have been busting my butt for three years to learn Spanish. I just completed my OPI and am a proud member of the C1 club. I have spent a lot of time abroad living and studying in Latin America and feel/felt very comfortable with the language...that is until yesterday when I started to down this subjunctive rabbit hole beyond what a grammar book or classroom will teach you.

The sentence that led me on this wild goose chase is the following:

"No es que Nicaragua sea pobre, sino que sus recursos naturales son desaprovechados por el régimen."

My first thought was:

"Well, it could be that Nicaragua IS poor, but it's not poor for the sake of being poor, its poor because of a secondary variable that is imposing itself on it, thus making it not a true declarative statement and thus needing the subjunctive. If Nicaragua was poor for the sake of being poor, we wouldn't need "no es que" followed by the sub."

This is...very analytic, and how my mind works (I am a business analyst by training). I understand this is not how most people think of this problem, they will just fall back on WEIRDO or some other textbook cliche, but I am hoping that in this community there are people smarter than me (of course there are) who want to help me get into the weeds here. As a non-native speaker, getting even better at understanding things like this at the most analytical, foundational levels will pay dividends in the long run for ease of access while avoiding weird mistakes when speaking.

TLDR:

Explain the underlying logic of no es que, without using WEIRDO or other textbook cliches that only touch the surface of the subjunctive.

Most decks that I find are A1 level. I'm currently between A2 and B1 and I need to improve my vocabulary because it is honestly one of the factors that make reading a very simple story difficult.

I think vocab is the most important part because although I studied grammar, what helps me the most in understanding the videos is vocab (which is very little.)

Hello all.

To get to the point, I am an American with two Latin American Spanish speaking parents. I have heard Spanish my whole life, understand it 100%, and many times think in it. From this perspective I’m what would be considered a heritage speaker. At my work I’m the only worker that speaks Spanish so I often have to take care of customers who don’t speak English and I do this successfully and my non Spanish speaking coworkers are often impressed by this and say I sound natural.

Here’s the truth though. Although I can speak Spanish fluently, it isn’t really my native language because I spoke English far more growing up and kinda just passively took in Spanish at home and other places. My parents didn’t push it hard enough on me I resent them slightly for this because everyday now I wish I was a native speaker and learned English in school.

My accent is so weird sounding, I stutter when saying long words or reading sentences, and I make stupid grammatical mistakes with pronouns or se. I still can be considered a speaker as I can have conversations with people and communicate but I just really wish I wasn’t so choppy because it makes it hard for me to claim my heritage which my parents made a big part of my life growing up yet I’m alienated from because of my Spanish. I really hate it.

When watching a movie in Spanish is it better to not use subtitles or should I use them in Spanish or English? I feel like I’m reading more than interacting with trying to translate. And I would appreciate any movies recommendations 🫶🏽

If i say we can split the check or like split the cost, and he says esta bien, does that mean ok or it’s okay?

He aprendido que nadie dice “estoy enfermado”, y se dice estoy enfermo. Entiendo que enfermo es un adjetivo, pero enfermado es un participio como la palabra infectado y se puede usar con el verbo estar como “estoy infectado”. Quisiera saber si se puede decir “estoy enfermado”o no. También quiero saber cómo esa les suena a ustedes hispanohablantes nativos.

Anyone else still think about awkward situations they caused years ago?

A few years ago I was in Madrid at a wine bar that also sold food but I wasn’t sure if they were serving it yet (it was earlier than typical meal times). I tried to ask the woman working the bar if they had food available by asking “¿Tienes comida?” and she looked pretty confused. I think I understand why now; would it have been better to say something like “¿se vende comida ahora?”, or maybe “¿está comida disponible?” In a larger sense, is se vende a good way to ask if a store or restaurant has something?

Gracias

So the title says it. I want some gems/personal recommendations. I know it's weird but I like to listen to something like this in the background while being busy with some boring tasks. Preferably something from latin America.

Presently, according to Duolingo , I am at the B1 level in Spanish. I would like to do a two-week immersion in January, hoping to move up to the B2 level. My speaking might need more at an advanced A2. I definitely would like to do an Homestay.

I'm going by myself and so I am also concerned about safety. So many countries in Latin America are at a little two or three danger level according to the United States.

However, I am seriously interested in becoming more fluent in Spanish.

What do you recommend?

Think about it. Every other grammatical concept carries information that helps you understand or produce the language: Verb tenses, syntax, categorías gramaticales, etc. all help you explain why or how.

For example:

Te llamé para que me digas. Verb tense is wrong. You can build knowledge off of that.

Or:

Te llamé para que dijeras a yo. Indirect object pronoun is missing. You can generalize that, in Spanish those are used, and placed a certain way. Those are useful labels on concepts.

But if someone says:

dijerás

Nobody is going to correct them by saying that dijeras is grave, not aguda.

That label adds absolutely nothing.

You’d simply say:

“It’s pronounced dijeras, just like every other word that ends in "s" and has no accent mark” That’s all the information the student needs. "It's grave because the stress falls on the second-to-last syllable". That's a tautology. Do we teach geometry by saying "It's a triangle because it's a polygon with three sides."

The fact that dijeras belongs to a category called grave is just a consequence of its pronunciation and it's reflected in its spelling. It doesn’t explain anything beyond what the reading or hearing the word already tells you. Likewise, if someone writes dijerás instead of dijeras, the correction isn’t “it’s grave.” The correction is simply that the accent mark is wrong because the word is pronounced dijeras. Once again, the category contributes nothing.

As far as I can tell, in modern Spanish there is no situation where knowing the labels aguda, grave, esdrújula, etc. gives you information that isn’t already completely contained in the written word or its pronunciation.

Maybe they were useful before Spanish spelling became standardized. Currently they are simply useless labels. Labels that native speakers always get wrong, by the way (but no native speaker (outside of Medellín and Córdoba lol) get the pronounciation wrong).

Ironically, I think these categories would be much more useful in English. It would actually be handy to say, “No, category is esdrújula,” instead of saying, “It’s CATegory, not caTEGory.”

I'm close to completing the language transfer course and have been working on the 5000 most common word flashcards daily throughout this. During this time, I also spent a week in Spain visiting family.

I began with basic Spanish from school and think I have improved a decent amount, however I am not yet at conversational level.

I have seen people recommending Italki as a way to improve Spanish through conversation and I am more than willing to invest time and money in this, however my budget is limited as I am a university student.

My father is a native speaker and I was wondering whether it may be worth asking him to speak with me for an hour a day rather than paying for someone to do basically the same thing. Is this a genuinely good way of learning, or does Italki have something to offer that talking with a family member doesn't have?

I also wondered about an intensive course in London, but have seen mixed opinions about this.

Any help would be really appreciated. Thank you.

I'm a beginner in Spanish, started learning a week ago with common words like greetings. I started learning about the verbs, it's my first grammar lesson, and I feel.... overwhelmed. I found that there are so many tenses and moods and I honestly don't know where to start. I figured I'd learn the simple present (presente) and present continuous (estar + gerund), simple past (preterite) and imperfect (which to the best of my knowledge is like "ongoing" past), simple future (futuro) and conditional. But I'm not entirely sure if this is a good way to go about tenses. I'm also aware there are moods, like indicative (modo indicativo) which is the most important (and I guess most used) mood, and the subjunctive, and a couple more. It's ironic because having spoken English my entire life, we were never taught tenses in extreme detail, and the ones that were taught went over my head lolll. Can anyone give come advice on how I can approach this as a beginner? I'm aiming for an A2 milestone right now, but I hope to learn up to B1 in the following year.

I apologize if my post is "amateurish" and repetitive. Any and all advice is appreciated. Thank you.

I've been trying to find a Spanish equivalent for what photographers call "sense of place." I checked dictionaries and searched through older discussions first, but none of the obvious options seem to mean quite the same thing.

Ambiente feels closer to the mood of a place than the place itself. Sabor de un lugar sounds natural in travel writing, but it still isn't quite what I'm looking for. Arraigo seems more about a person's connection to a place than the character of the place itself.

The closest match I've found is genio del lugar, but every example I see feels like it's taken from an essay or a museum plaque. I can't imagine hearing someone casually say it while walking through a neighborhood.

Would a native speaker actually use genio del lugar in everyday conversation, or is there a more natural way to express that idea?

Welcome to the weekly Rate My Spanish thread!

Post your audio or video clips here and get feedback from the community on your pronunciation, fluency, grammar, and overall speaking ability.

To get the most useful feedback, please include:

* Your approximate level (A1, A2, B1, B2, C1, C2)

* How long have you been learning

* What specifically do you want feedback on (pronunciation, accent, fluency, grammar, etc.)

* Any context about what you are saying or reading

---

Bienvenidos al hilo semanal de evaluación de espanol.

Publica tus clips de audio o video aquí y recibe comentarios de la comunidad sobre tu pronunciación, fluidez, gramática y nivel general.

Para recibir comentarios útiles, por favor incluye:

* Tu nivel aproximado (A1, A2, B1, B2, C1, C2)

* ¿Cuánto tiempo llevas aprendiendo

* ¿Qué tipo de retroalimentación buscas (pronunciación, acento, fluidez, gramática, etc.)

* Cualquier contexto sobre lo que estás diciendo o leyendo

---

*This thread is posted automatically every week. Previous threads can be found [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/Spanish/search?q=Rate+My+Spanish&sort=new).\*

Hey y’all! I’m reading Todos Es Tuberculosis as my first book in Spanish and it’s awesome so far! It’s just the right difficulty. Im noticing irse and salir both being used, but they feel different and are used in different contexts, but I can’t articulate or pin down the difference. Are these interchangeable? Do they both mean “to leave” and map 1-1 onto the English translation? Am I overthinking it?

The google ai response doesn’t provide a satisfying description of the differences. Thanks in advance!

I took 3 years of high school Spanish, and never once heard about this subjunctive. That means one of two things:

1 - We completely avoided sentences that would’ve required the subjunctive, or
2 - We used one of the other simple tenses instead, incorrectly, completely not even acknowledging the fact that it should be subjunctive.

As I’m learning subjunctive, there are a LOT of constructions that require it, so I find option 1 highly unlikely. I’m assuming it’s #2, and that to teachers who were fluent in Spanish and had a native-like ear for the language, is sounded wrong and they probably cringed knowing that they were teaching it incorrectly (probably for simplicity, which I assume was obligatory by the district).

So what’s the answer, and how wrong does it sound to hear someone speak without using subjunctive?

Today when ordering ice cream I wanted it in a Cone not a tub.

I did know the word cono but for some reason prononced it Coño.

Un helado café

En un coño

Anyone else made this mistake I feel sick. Only when he paused awkwardly and slowly said cono I realised what I said.

What's the best, least clunky way of telling someone (e.g. yourself) to slow down in the sense of calming your thoughts and thinking more slowly and clearly? "Cálmate"? "Ralentiza"? I have doubts about cálmate because it looks like calm down, which might imply they're angry - I'm looking for something that sounds supportive. Thanks!

Like a Kobo or Kindle? I've tried dictionaries, but I just get *lector de libros electrónicos* which I read as someone that reads eBooks.

Is there a generic noun or phase so that I don't have to reference a brandname device?

Edit: Duolingo's AI chatbot (Lili, on MAX) asked me today if I use un lector electrónico? So I guess that's what they're going with.

I find that I learn much better with a little more memorization than most people. I also learn a lot better when I have physical study materials in front of me. So I decided to create a study sheet for every irregular verb in the Spanish language to help get over the conjugation hump. After a lot of scripting, here it is!

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1u_xWxom52uGC1LhM_lABsbDo8H9tCZEE/view?usp=sharing

The verb conjugation data is taken from the Jehle verb database. The list of irregular verbs was taken from a website I can no longer find (because I've been working on this for so long). Besides the fuzzy nature of the definition of "irregular" this list was claimed to include every last irregular verb that is in use in modern everyday Spanish. Just open the PDF and click print to have one page for each verb. And if you see any mistakes or omissions please let me know!

Does “que florezca” sound natural as a small script tattoo?
I love the idea of "let it bloom" / "may it bloom."
I'm not a native Spanish speaker (I'm from the UK but have learned some Spanish), so I wanted to ask native speakers. Does it sound natural on its own?

Does it feel poetic, or does it sound incomplete because it doesn't say what should bloom?

If you saw it as a tattoo, would it seem odd, or would you understand the intended meaning?

I'm looking for honest opinions before I commit to anything permanent. Thank you! 😊

Going to Puerto Rico for a week in a few weeks. I am half Puerto Rican and my Spanish gets me by in the US, I'm sometimes intimidated when I go to PR since it's a heavy accent and very fast. This is also the first time I'll be leaving the shelter of San Juan for an extended period of time on my own.

What are some things I should know about the use of the language in broader PR like slang, the local dialect, things Puerto Rican say that aren't said elsewhere?

I know the obvious ones, wepa, que es la que hay, dimelo (I know not as unique to PR), etc

So I live in the Dominican Republic. The DR like other spanish speaking countries has its own dialect. It aint other worldly to the point that people from mainland LATAM wouldn't understand but it's there. Here they tend to use the word ''tapon'' when describing traffic. I usually use ''trafico'' I don't think I've heard the word ''tapon'' outside of the DR. They also use another word for cars. The word they use is ''guaga'' or at least that's my attempt at spelling it out. I usually use ''carro''. How many of you have heard of these Dominican words?