Paula

I would start with any book that is from the collection/editorial EL BARCO DE VAPOR. There are hundreds of books to choose from. You will find a lot of children’s and young adult books but they are in your level of Spanish. I still bet that you will have to look up a lot of words. Two books I love that are very interesting and easy reads are POR TODOS LOS DIOSES – Greek mythology stories written in an easy and fantastic way. LA HIJA DE LA MAÑANA – Young adult novel with challenging vocabulary and interesting plot. Now if you want to be a bit more challenged but still want to be able to read without stopping every two words try EL DIABLO GUARDIAN of the Mexican writer Xavier Velasco. It’s a decent novel with a lot of awards, interesting plot and as plus you’ll also learn Latin American slang and idioms. When you feel you have improved move on to CIEN AÑOS DE SOLEDAD (A Hundred Years of Solitude) by the master and Nobel Prize winner Gabriel Garcia Marquez. I’ve read this masterpiece in English and Spanish and let me tell you there’s a lot lost in translation. You have to read this book in Spanish, you’ll forever be in love with it.

I work as a translator and as someone already said, we all make mistakes. The tricky part of translating is that you have to be able to capture the essence of the text. A literal, word-by-word translation is no good, unless is a technical document. For songs, novels, poems, conversations, movies, etc. you need to have an outstanding command of both languages you are translating to be able to capture the essence, the feeling and not only the words.

Yes, is like slang. It's not a phrase you would say to your mother-in-law for example. It's common among very young people that are not well...educated. It's not nice to say "Qué hubo" but it isn't swearing either. There are hundreds of ways of asking someone How are you, so no need to use "Qué Hubo." However, if you do decide to use it, just make sure you do it around people who are relaxed and don't mind the use of slang.

I’m a native Spanish speaker so I can help you out with this. The thing is that even though all these expressions mean basically the same they’re not the same thing. Some are more casual or informal than others. “Qué tal” is a nice way of asking someone Hey, how are you? This is a nice expression that you can use as, “Qué tal, ¿cómo estás? Now moving to your second example, “Qué Hubo.” I wouldn’t use this one if I were you. It’s not a bad expression, but it’s not nice. How to explain this…like well-educated people don’t use this expression. “Qué Pasa” is not used to ask How are You, it’s more like a question of what’s happening, what’s going on. And “Qué Onda” is like saying, “What’s up’.” Young people used it a lot in the past, but now it’s not that common anymore, but I dare to say that almost anyone who speaks Spanish will understand it.

Tal vez te ayude tener que leer mis palabras en español, ¿no crees? Yo te propongo que escribas todos tus posts en esta parte del foro en español para que asi lo practiques. Si quieres chatear en skype conmigo estoy para servirte. Yo vivo en México y pues lógicamente mi idioma nativo es el español. Tú, ¿de dónde eres? ¿Hace cuánto vives en Estados Unidos? No pierdas tus raíces, habla y practica tu español lo más que puedas. Yo estoy para ayudarte en lo que necesites!!

I wrote something similar in this topic yesterday in another thread, and yes you're totally right. I've been taking French lessons for two years now and even though my vocabulary list is pretty long right now, when I listen to a French person speaking I can barely get anything because of the pronunciation. I do listen and receive my lessons with audios that feature native French speakers but still can't pronounce as they do. When I watch a French movie, for example, I don't understand a thing because they talk so fast and with this smooth and perfect accent that even if I know the words that are being spoken I don't get them. I blame this to the pronunciation issue you're talking about.

Hello, I'm happy I can actually help in this because I'm a native Spanish speaker. One of your translations is almost correct, you got the "NI" right, but the thing is that Oliver and Antonio are two different persons so you cannot use "ES LATINO" in the sentence because "ES LATINO" talks only about one person, not two. Here's how it goes: Ni Antonio ni Oliver son Latinos. As you can see we changed the "ES" with the plural word "SON" and added an "S" at the end of the word "Latino" to make it plural. Hope this helps, and I'll be more than happy to help you out with anything else you have in Spanish!!

I actually learned English in school when I was growing up and the truth is that for not being a native speaker I write and speak English pretty well. I think this is the best way to learn a language, as we grow older it becomes more difficult, at least for me. I’ve been taking French lessons for two years now and I’m still in a beginner level. I have a lot of trouble understanding French people speak, the accent is so smooth and they speak so fast that even if I know the words I don’t get them. This does not happen with English, I can even imitate different accents and understand every single word, no matter who’s speaking.