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Music and Poetry: Leonard Cohen and Federico García Lorca Posted by Paula on Nov 28, 2016
This year has seen the departure of yet another great poet, writer and musician: Mr Leonard Cohen (Québec, 1934 – San Francisco, 2016) was probably the most well known Canadian author still in active in his 80s. He had always declared himself a devout fan of Spanish poet Federico García Lorca, and many of Cohen’s…
How to rent an apartment in Latin America and Spain (2) Posted by Paula on Nov 21, 2016
This Monday we discussed how to rent an apartment in Spanish. We learnt Spanish vocabulary related to the process of renting an apartment in America. Now we will see the differences with European Spanish. To begin with, we talk about ” un piso” and not “un apartamento”, very much like the UK-US difference between “flat”…
How to rent an apartment in Latin America and Spain (1) Posted by Paula on Nov 14, 2016
A huge part of growing up is related to being able to move out of your parents’ house. One of the options is renting out an apartment (or flat). You surely know how to do this in English, but what happens if you plan on moving to a Spanish-speaking country? Is alquilar the same as rentar?…
(Tricky) Prepositions in Spanish: Por y Para Posted by Paula on Nov 4, 2016
Prepositions are easy to understand although not that easy to use. Their use is rather similar both in English and in Spanish, but some prepositions are not that easy to learn. At least two Spanish prepositions are frequently confused by English-speaking learners since they both translate to “for” in English: por and para. Let’s have a look at…
Spanish elections: There will be no third round Posted by Paula on Oct 26, 2016
If you have been following the news on politics, you’ll know that in addition to the US Elections scheduled for November 8th, and to the referendum in Colombia, in Spain we have had to repeat elections in July 2016 due to the impossibility to agree on a coalition government [gobierno de coalición] by all the minority forces…
Premio Nobel de Literatura 2016: Bob Dylan Posted by Paula on Oct 19, 2016
Last week Bob Dylan gave us all a big surprise. Or rather, the members of the Swedish Academy did. Bob Dylan was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature 2016 “for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition”. Hurricane is a protest song by Bob Dylan co-written with Jacques Levy, about the imprisonment of…
Spanish Set Expressions: Estamos a mano (III) Posted by Paula on Oct 10, 2016
This week’s post presents the last set expressions in Spanish using hands. Today’s picture shows us the Cave of Hands in Santa Cruz, Argentina, a pre-historical painting of hands dating from 13,000 to 9,000 years ago. It’s a great precursor of stencil painting widely used nowadays! Estar a mano (to be at hand): When something…