Spanish Phrases

Spanish phrases found in phrase books can be useful and many people buy them before embarking on vacation to Mexico or Spain. However, in real life most people discover that phrase books lock you into one way of saying something, and life isn't like that at all.

Having the ability to say, "Can you tell me if this is the 10.15 or the 10.30 train leaving for Barcelona?" is all very well. But when you are in Bolivia and it's a bus leaving at midnight you are hoping to catch to some remote village you can't even pronounce, it isn't much help. You need to learn more than just Spanish phrases, or at least you need to be able to adapt the Spanish phrases you know.

Start by learning the obvious Spanish phrases. Learn how to greet people by saying "good day" (buenas días), "good afternoon" (buenas tardes), and "good evening" (buenas noches). You can always just say "hola" (hello) if you're not sure which to use.

You can easily progress from there to a slightly more complicated greeting: "¿Cómo estás?" This means, "how are you?" However, that's a little bit formal and stilted. You are likely to find that most people just say, "que tal?" If someone says that to you, answer them, "bien, ¿y tu?" (I'm well, and you?). They will be impressed with your command of their language, trust me!

In keeping with the infamous phrase books, you need to also learn how to ask for something in a café or restaurant. As in most English speaking countries, Spanish speaking people have several courses to their meals. The first is the, "primero plato," the second is the "segundo plato," and the third is the "tercero plato."

You may wish to have a glass of water (un vaso de agua) with your meal, or a coffee (un café). If you want your coffee with milk, then it should be, "un café con leche." A glass of red wine (un vaso de vino tinto), or white wine (un vaso de vino blanco) may also go down well. Perhaps you want a whole bottle of wine (una botella de vino). And now you can ask for one that's either red or white too.

You may have noticed that in all those Spanish phrases I didn't say "please" once. Because we do it all the time in English we assume that everyone else does it too. In fact, we usually can't understand why anyone would want to be so rude as to not say please when asking for something.

It just simply is not the Spanish way. In fact, they think it rude if you do say, "please" with everything. For example, if you were to say to a Spanish barman, "un vaso de vino tinto, pro favor," he would probably feel a little insulted.

Picture a man who has been standing at the bar in an English speaking country waiting for a long time to get served. Finally he says to the barman in a loud voice, "a glass of red wine, PLEASE." The "please" at the end is said in a rather sarcastic way, and that's pretty much how it comes over when you add "please" in Spanish. Don't do it and your Spanish phrases will be all the better for it.