NIS Beginners 007 - Las Compras

Hola y bienvenidos, this is Inspired Beginners by Notes in Spanish. Hello Marina, how are you? Very well then, how are you? Fantastic, thank you. I'm Ben Curtis here with Marina DS, as usual, with another inspired beginner's episode for you today. So I hope and I'm sure you're all feeling inspired. Right, we're going to start as usual with a bit of revision before we get on to today's real Spanish audio. Now, based on some feedback we've had from you guys, we're going to fix a system now for how we introduce new vocabulary and revise vocabulary from last week and using our expert here Marina. So basically for today's episode, what will happen is I will ask Marina how to say something in Spanish. And when she gives us the perfect example, she's going to repeat it twice and then we're going to leave a big pause afterwards for you to repeat what Marina said, which sure will really help to get all the vocabulary stuck in your mind. So let's jump straight into it, a bit of revision from last week. Marina, now there was a word for to go to bed at the night, how do you say I go to bed? Great, thank you very much. So there we are, that's the system we'll be using. Two shots from Marina and then a bit of space for you to copy her rather good Spanish accent. So my quest though is I go to bed, how would you say I get up in the morning? Me levanto. Me levanto. Fantastic, now another thing that we talked about was the fact that sometimes things are difficult. Now I wonder if anyone can remember this strange construction to say that I find something difficult. For example Marina, how would you say I find it difficult to get up? Me cuesta levantarme. Exactly, now it is a strange construction, me cuesta, I mean it means it doesn't it Marina kind of, it costs me, it costs me to get up in the morning, which I guess you can see the logic somewhere, can't you, it costs me, it will, it's certainly, it costs me money to get up. No money, no, I suppose it costs you effort, but anyway to find something difficult would be me cuesta. So for example another one Marina, or you guys out there if you can remember, it's difficult to do my homework, how would you say it's difficult to do the homework. What an accent you've got. Gracias. Have you lived here long? Well you're not going to say, are you? A few years now. 30 and a little bit years, okay. Right, another great expression is to say that you're feeling lazy. Now I wonder if you can remember the phrase for lazy. Well how would you say first of all Marina, I'm feeling lazy. And how about saying for example, I really don't feel like doing any sport, I'm feeling really lazy about doing some sport. Okay, great. And finally we talked about when you don't feel like doing something. For example, how would I say Marina, I don't feel like eating very much. No me apetece comer mucho. Well, I'm sure you don't apetece eating very much at the moment because we just had lunch. Okay, that was the revision for today. We hope it helps you to fix some more vocab in your heads. And today we are going to speak about shopping in general, shopping in Spain. And we are going to talk about frequency as well, which is very useful vocabulary for you to learn. Yeah, how often things happen. So for example, when it comes to shopping, you might be guessing that in my case it's something that doesn't happen very often. Why? Why should we guess that? Because I think in the Thailand podcast, a few podcasts ago, I mentioned that buying clothes is something that is not high on my list of life priorities. But anyway, we'll find out who does the most shopping and of what? Because there are things that I do buy more than Marina, but we'll get on to that later on. But well, actually the first question we ask in the first bit of the real Spanish audio that you'll be hearing today is who does the shopping. In this case, food shopping we'll be talking about to begin with. But Marina, here we go. Time to listen twice to you again. And then with the pause for some repetition, how would you say who does the shopping? Who does the shopping? And of course, we'll be finding out the answer shortly. But above only just who does the shopping, we want to know how often. Now in Spanish, there's this phrase to say how often, do you know what it is? It is "cada cuanto". Now get Marina to give us an example phrase in a minute. But "cada cuanto" means each "quanto" means how much. Each how much is a bizarre construction, but it means how often. So, for example, if we were talking about buying fruit and vegetables, fruta y verdura, Marina, how would we say how often do you buy fruit and vegetables? OK, that is. Cada cuanto compras fruta y verdura. Right, but there is another way of saying it as well, isn't there? Which is almost the same. And that's adding in the Spanish word for time in the middle, tiempo. So instead of cada cuanto, we get cada cuanto tiempo. Now, which is again, each how much time, meaning how often, very bizarre, but perhaps it's best not to look too literally at these things. No, I think it's best not to translate directly. Sometimes it helps you to remember them, you know, for some reason, you think I remember that funny construction. I know when I learnt cada cuanto, it really helped me remember it that it wasn't a normal question word like "que" or "donde", it was slightly different. So we can also have cada cuanto tiempo. So, Marina, let's have an example if you were to say how often do you go to the supermarket? Cada cuanto tiempo vas al supermercado. There we are. Right, let's listen to the first part of today's real Spanish audio and find out the answer to some of these questions. Marina, ¿quién hace la compra en nuestra casa? ¿quién compra todo la comida? Depende, la fruta y la verdura la suelo comprario. Y cada cuanto compras fruta y verdura. Muy a menudo. Unas dos o tres veces a la semana. En casa comemos mucha fruta y mucha verdura. Tú compras fruta y verdura en el mercado. Pero yo voy al supermercado para comprar otras cosas que necesitamos para comer y cenar. Y cada cuanto tiempo vas al supermercado. Una vez a la semana. O menos porque no me gusta. El supermercado es muy droidoso. Hay mucha gente. No me gusta hacer la compra en el supermercado. Sin embargo, te gusta bajar a comprar el pan. ¿Dónde compras el pan? Compro el pan en una tienda justo debajo de nuestro piso y compro el pan todos los días. Pero no solo compramos comida. Marina, ¿tú compras mucha ropa? No? No. De vez en cuando me compró alguna cosa. Pero tampoco voy de compras. Todas las semanas ni siquiera que la quince días. ¿Y dónde compras tu ropa? Me gusta mucho ir de compras cuando estamos en Inglaterra. Sí. Y ¿cara cuánto estamos en Inglaterra? Pues cada 2 or 3 months. And you? I don't know. compro Europa. Nunca. Bueno, intento. No me gusta. A la mejor dos veces el año y eso es suficiente. Great, so we've just seen a lot of ways of saying how things happen and now we are going to go through them. We're going to use our wonderful, on-hand Spanish expert here, the one that only Marina Diaz, to give us some examples of how to say these things perfectly once again and with a pause after each double repetition for you to repeat as usual. So Marina, how would we say "Every day"? Todos los días. Todos los días. Great, and now here's one I like from time to time. Yeah, it sounds hard when you listen to it so perfectly spoken like that, but it is "de" "beth", which is spelled "v-e-z-n" "quando", okay? Right, how about every two or three months? Okay, and never. Nunca. Nunca. Which is about how often I want to go shoe shopping, for example. Absolutely. Nunca. Love it. Yeah, really love it. Right, then luckily my brother-in-law and his partner quite often give me shoes for my birthday, so I tend to get a new pair of shoes once a year, which then last me all year round. Just, Marina, is it unlucky in Spain to put new shoes on the table? New and old shoes, put in shoes on the table, it's very dirty thing to do. The point is that we're never mind. In the UK, if you buy a pair of new shoes, brand new straight out of the box and you put them on a table, it's bad luck. Ah, okay, I've never heard that before. Nothing like that here? No. Okay, how would you say "often"? A menudo. A menudo. Okay, how would you say very often? Muy a menudo. Muy a menudo. Okay, right, I think that's enough of the frequency words for now, because in fact, we're going to put the entire list, the biggest list we can come up with on our worksheet for today's episode, which you'll find over at notesandspanish.com. But of course, these words are very useful, because it's not just talking about how often you go shopping, but you can combine these, for example, with the verb "solar" to tend to do something for you. Soler. Soler, I'm sorry, the heat again, go to my head. Soler to tend to do something. So, for example, "suelo ir" a la "pistina" los fedes ames. I tend to go to the swimming pool twice a month, something like that. You know, all sorts of reasons for learning these really useful bits of Spanish grammar. Right, let's have a sentence from memory. Let's say, for example, I go to the bookshop once a month. Voy a la librería una vez al mes. Right, and we'll be hearing that phrase in the second part of today's audio. Another couple of words you'll be hearing, which I'm sure you might know already. First of all, computer. How do we say "computer" in Spanish? Ordenador. Ordenador. I think in some parts of Central America, they also say "computadora". Is that right? Yeah, that's right. That would be correct. For in Spain, we often use "ordenador" instead of "computadora". Yeah. Okay, but that's kind of a computer that you put on your desk. How about a laptop? Portátil. Portátil. And is that masculine or feminine? Másculine. El portátil. Okay, great. An el ordenador. El ordenador, okay. Are you a desktop or a laptop person? I'm changing. Ah, yes, right. So, okay, we'll be finding out about trips to the bookshop, the librería and Marina's portátil in the second part of today's real Spanish audio. Okay, here comes. Ativen, ¿qué es lo que más te gusta comprar? A mí me gusta comprar libros. Voy a la librería una vez al mes y compró tres o cuatro libros. ¿Y dónde compras los libros? Compró los libros en una librería internacional en Madrid, que se llama "pasajes", que es una librería muy buena. ¿Y compras libros en Inglaterra también? Cuando vamos a Inglaterra, suelo volver con varios libros. La maleta de Ben siempre tiene libros. Sí, es que los libros son más interesantes que la tele española. Y tu Marina, ¿cara cuánto compras libros? Pues yo compro más o menos dos libros al mes. Yo no leo tanto como Ben. ¿Y hay otras cosas que compras a menudo? Pues por ejemplo, compramos vuelos para ir a Inglaterra. Sí, para ir a visitar a mi familia. Los compramos por Internet. Sí, también las entradas para el cine, compramos por Internet. De vez en cuando, a Ben le gusta comprar algo grande. Sí, a lo mejor, una vez cada dos años, compro algo importante como un ordenador, una cámara de fotos, nueva, pero eso muy de vez en cuando. Porque estas cosas son muy caras. ¿Y tu Marina pasa compra un portátil nuevo? Sí. Entonces, a ti también te gusta comprar cosas grandes. ¿De vez en cuando? Remember that if you feel that you need a tiny bit of assistance with the Spanish sections of the podcast, where Marina and I are talking Spanish, then you can get a full transcript and a translation of the Spanish parts on our worksheets. Right now, there was a couple of Spanish gems hidden in that last bit of audio. The one that I really like is "alomejor". No, Marina, what does "alomejor" mean? "Alomejor" means "probably". And it can be used either on its own. For example, if I ask Ben, do you think it's going to rain tomorrow? ¿Crees que va a llover mañana? ¿Cuáles va a ser bien? Bueno, creo que está en Madrid, yo dije, "No, you must be joking". Pero si es el 8th of April en England, yo creo que "alomejor" "probably". ¿Y si puedes ver en la sentencia? Por ejemplo, yo puedo decir que Ben. Bueno, o si me voy a preguntar la pregunta, ¿qué está haciendo hoy, Marina? "Alomejor, voy al cine". Bueno, vamos a hacer una repetición super repetida, que, de course, me voy a ir a la cinema, pero vamos a ver un poco de tiempo, me voy a ir por el super repetido. Bueno, de hecho, podemos usar eso para algo que queremos. maybe I'll come over and see you, "Alomejor, voy a verte, baby, I'll go to see you". "Alomejor, probable", es asimpleo de eso, sounds very Spanish. Ok, now, of course, we were talking about shopping in today's episode, and I'm sure you all know how to ask what "something costs", which is, of course, "cuanto cuesta", or if you're talking about plural things, "cuanto cuesta". Por ejemplo, "cuanto cuesta el pan". Right, how much is the bread? Let's have another super example from you, Marina. How would you say "how much to the apple's cost"? Ok, now, if you want to sound super Spanish, then there's another great phrase that I picked up, quite early on in Spain, because I just heard it everywhere in the shops, and to begin with, it sounded bizarre, but the other phrase is "accomo son", right? So, let's have another example, I don't know, back on the fruit and vegetables, which Marina spent her life buying. She's so healthy. Sometimes. Come on, pick a vegetable you like. Ok, then. potatoes. Potatoes, for example. Okay. So let's have, well, how much of the potatoes? "A como son las patatas?" "A como son las patatas?" Right. So you walk into a little grocery store on a street in the middle of the grid like me looking like a complete tourist and you come out with "A como son las patatas." And she says, "The old lady behind the counter at my goodness. This guy is bilingual." Right. Well, that's it for today. Marina, you are the homework Maestra. Okay. What have you got lined up today? Okay. The homework today is you can write a few sentences telling us about your shopping habits and you can tell us, what do you usually shop and how often? What you buy, where you buy it, online, but internet, for example. If you do the other one that does all the food shopping in your house, whatever. And of course, if you don't feel like writing it which is perfectly understand because as we know homework, gear, oil, you can of course just think it in your head. Or you can send us an audio comment. Ah, and that would be very good. You can always send us email us an MP3 or even better a video blog. If you look on our forums, you'll find loads of people who put video blogs together from all over the world. Why not do a video blog telling us about your shopping habits and how often you do it and so on. It's an amazing way to practice your Spanish and you'll find more of those, the worksheets and so on, all via notes in Spanish.com. Right, Marina, I'm off to the supermarket. Not. We'll see you all next week. Bye. Adios. Hi, it's Ben here. Just a quick message. We've got a very special free PDF report for you. Our real Spanish fluency road map. These are the exact steps that I used to go from clunky textbook Spanish to real confidence Spanish fluency. It'll make a huge difference whatever level you're at. So you can get this wonderful free real Spanish fluency road map if you go to notes in Spanish.com/real. That's notes in Spanish.com/real spelled R-E-A-L.