Spanish NewsBites Blog

Launguage

"Do you think it is possible to learn a new launguage in just eight weeks?" says the video on this site. The spelling certainly gives you confidence in their method. Like some students of mine who once did a project about a mock "Inglish" school they were going to set up, these guys are shooting themselves in the foot right from the very first pitch.

So how come I'm here, advertising them...?

Two New Posts

We've posted a couple of new entries over the weekend, two parts of a four-part mini feature about the power of Latin American industry.

We're all familiar with those "watch out, the Chinese are coming" dinner-table conversations, and indeed the Chinese have already arrived. But several Latin American companies are emerging as global industrial powers too, and they even have their own name - multilatinas. Another reason - as if you needed one - to get your Spanish into shape.

As yet, we've done very little in terms of getting our name out there onto the Web. We still consider this to be a trial period. So if anyone has any comments about either Spanish NewsBites or this blog - content, design, anything at all - then we'd love to hear from you...

There is a Crisis: It's Official

There's been a lot of talk about that (to me) unlistenable 80s group Supertramp recently, since the Spanish government seems to have unofficially adopted this as their motto. So what a relief it is to learn from the front page of El País today that the government has finally admitted there is a crisis, and that yes, it's actually quite a big one.

Meanwhile, you may remember that a few months ago, at the Iberamerican summit, the King told Venezuela's much adored, much reviled Húgo Chávez to shut up, with a phrase that has since become immortal: ¿Por qué no te callas?. Well, it transpires that the King has now made a gift of a T-shirt to Chávez with that phrase written on it. According to El País, the King handed over the T-shirt with the comment that "you owe me a bit of money" - a humorous reference to the rights that the King has over the phrase.

Unexpected Consequences...

Surely the recent reduction in deaths on the Spanish roads is an unmitigatedly good thing? Well... almost. Find out more from our most recent post to Spanish NewsBites.

Typing in Spanish

For those people using non-Spanish keyboards who need to use Spanish characters, then I just stumbled into the following site:

http://spanish.typeit.org/

Very handy, and it offers a range of other languages too. But the shortcuts only work in MS Explorer.

Fifty-Two

Amazing, Wikipedia. I just looked up "fify-two" on Google to check Johnny Rotten's age for an article (yes, I know, a weird way of going about it) and was greeted by the following valuable information:

"52 (fifty-two) is the natural number following 51 and preceding 53."

As definitions go, you have to admit that's not bad, and I'm sure it gets lots of hits from people who can't remember what "52" means.  So if ever you can't recall exactly where a number comes, Wikipedia has the answer, as it does for so much else. Bless it. How many numbers does Wikipedia deal with like this? Does it go up to a million? And who's typing it all out, and do they ever get bored? (To be fair, the site has plenty more interesting stuff about "fifty-two" which you might not know. I'm off to look up "10,675" now.

A Moving Moment

This image of two elderly men was on the the front page of many of the Spanish papers yesterday as the newspapers found the symbolism hard to resist. It's very moving, since the two men are two of the principal architects of modern Spain. The one on the left is King Juan Carlos. The one on the right is Adolfo Suárez, who was Prime Minister of Spain between 1976 and 1981, thus making him the first president post-Franco. The tragedy is that Suárez has suffered from Alzheimer's since 2003, can no longer recognize anyone or remember anything - such as the fact that he was once Prime Minister. The photo was taken by Suárez's son, also a politician, who explained that his father "did not recognize the King, but was aware of his affection". The King has visited Suárez personally, to  deliver the Toisón de Oro (Golden Fleece), for his role in Spain's transition to democracy, making Suárez one of only seventeen people to hold the award. Suárez is still only 76 years old; the photo was taken in his garden; and it seems to suggest that an era is passing. "The King looks after his friend Adolfo," said Suárez's son who admitted that friends have been asking him to publish a photo of his father for some time. He defined the meeting as a "magic moment"; "not being able to see their faces is an invitation to imagine, to think."

The First Spanish NewsBites Movie Exclusive.

Of which I can't promise many, especially if they star Julia Ormond, like this one does. Which is the case of La conjura de El Escorial (The El Escorial Conspiracy) , which I saw at a press screening today. This big-budgeter, released in September, is going to be the leading Spanish release of the autumn, a high-action item full of skullduggery set in and around the court of Felipe II in 1578, and apparently based on a true story. (Spanish cinema is going though a phase of liking period action thrillers - see Alatriste.) This kind of stuff is hard to do well, and the film adds further support to that theory - believability of character is the first thing to go when you have a cast of billions, especially when they've all been dubbed into Spanish (even, I think, the Spaniards). But at least the story is a truly fascinating one, well summed-up on this YouTube video (in Spanish), and you get to see some strange things, such as a dog with its head cut off (the "no harm" disclaimer at the end is in BIG letters - subtle this film ain't), and Jason Isaacs getting all jiggy with a one-eyed Julia Ormond. For those who like that kind of thing. There's much beautiful scenery, too, and it's educational historically. But there's not too much we haven't seen before. The director, Antonio del Leal, was present at the screening, and there was virtually no applause at the end, which always makes me feel a bit uncomfortable - but then this film hasn't been made to please critics, it's been made to make money, and make money it will.

The First Spanish NewsBites Blog Post.

Welcome to the Spanish Newsbites blog, the sister site of Spanish Newsbites. (That's the new site which helps you to learn Spanish at the same time as you read today's news.) A lot of people still question the value of languages (the link may be a couple of years old, but the attitude hasn't changed), and while Spaniards are as desperate to learn languages as they ever were (with frankly mixed results), the Brits seem to be mightily indifferent about the whole issue. So it seems only right to let one major baggy-suited political figure speak up for languages- whatever you think about him, you have to admit he's right about this. And when he makes his "merci beaucoup" crack, I'm afraid he's talking for the majority of Brits as well.  So please step up,  Mr Barack Obama.