Telling porkies

There is no rhyming slang in Spanish, although older Spaniards remain fond of rhyming phrases.  So you’ll still hear outdated stuff like ¡te he visto Evaristo! on noticing someone doing something they shouldn’t.

There is nothing resembling porkies (pork pies) for fibs or lies.  This is a new addition to classic cockney terms like titfer (tit for tat) for hat and is looked down on by purists.  But you can’t hold back the tide and cockney has travelled downriver and evolved into Estuary mockney.

A translated porky is una mentirijlla if little and white but una mentira when a whopper.  An exclaimed ¡mentira! is a handy one-word rejection or contradiction of what someone tells you or wants you to believe.

Another’s selfishness, political beliefs, table manners or even occupation can prompt a reaction of pig! in English, pronounced with varying degrees of vehemence and virulence.  The Spanish match and easily overtake English-speakers for vehemence and virulence although they leave pigs out of it and prefer the more generic ¡animal!

But language now travels as far as humans do, so you do now find pigs in English-speaking situations.

In the past, though, exclamations of ¡cerdo! or ¡cochino! (which still means pig) usually occurred in connection with the amount of food shovelled into an ill-mannered mouth.  Cochino could - and still can - express moralising condemnation, particularly where sex is concerned.   Marrano is another option, little used now except by elderly pig-breeders or as an epithet.

So una cerda can label a woman no-one wants to invite to lunch but more often this is the bristle (originally from a pig) found in a tooth- or paint-brush.   

In south-east Spain where I live, rural families used to keep a pig.  It provided sausages and lard (yes, lard – it’s not all olive oil in the Mediterranean) as well manure as fertiliser for the fruit and vegetables that most earned a living from, pre-tourism and pre-building boom.  

Some families still grow their own fruit and vegetables

The pig would be fattened and slaughtered, and most of it used up one way or another over the coming year, including the bristles.

English-speakers throw pearls before the swine but what the Spanish waste on philistines and the unappreciative are daisies: tirar margaritas a cerdos.  This is because a Spanish word margarita - like an English-speaker’s marguerite – has a Greek root, so something has clearly been lost in translation here.  Either way, Spanish pigs get the best of the bargain and are thrown daisies.

Little piggies – cerditos don’t go to market in Spanish nursery rhymes.  Instead infant fingers, not toes, are tweaked in the one below, starting with the little finger and ending with the thumb:

Cinco lobitos tiene la loba

Este fue a por leche
este le ayudó
este se encontró un huevo

este lo frio
y este gordito, gordito se lo comió todito!

Mother wolf has five little cubs

This one went for milk

This one helped her

This one found an egg

This one fried it

And this little fat one ate it all up

This is closer to the English version, but the following version is even more popular:

Cinco lobitos tiene la loba,
Cinco lobitos, detrás de la escoba.
Cinco lobitos,

Cinco parió,
Cinco críó,
Ya los cinco,
A los cinco
Tetita les dió.

Mother wolf has five little cubs,

Five little cubs behind the broom

Five little cubs, five, she had

And she fed and she nursed them all.

Outside nursery rhymes, a wolf-cub is un lobezno but there are no wildlife comparisons for a male wolf or seducer. He is called un ligón in Spanish but be prepared also to meet una ligona, who neither looks nor acts like Mother Wolf.

You say hallo and I say goodbye

If I see someone I know in the street and neither of us feels like stopping to talk, we nod pleasantly, murmur adiós in unison and continue on our way.  There's something eerie about taking your leave of someone you’ve not yet greeted, and it seems more logical if, as often happens, one of us says hola while the other calls out adiós. 

Hasta luego is an alternative to adios for brief exchanges like these and means until later, implying a subsequent meeting.  There is also ¿qué tal? which amounts to how’s things?  Although we might enjoy explaining at considerable length how things are, enumerating woes, cataloguing joys and trotting out a complaint or two, this does not require a detailed reply. The correct response is muy bien, gracias ¿y usted? (or tú, depending on the relationship) - very well, thanks, and you? This gives others the chance to wedge a toe in the conversational door by enumerating woes, cataloguing joys and trotting out the odd complaint.

¿Qué hay? is tricky. It means what is there? and implies what’s new?  You won’t get out of this one with muy bien, gracias ¿y usted?  and all you can do is cover every option by simultaneously smiling, shaking your head and nodding.  Once again, lengthy details are not appreciated.

The Spanish once claimed to be irritated by our abuse and over-use of please and thank you.  I can’t be the only person who has had a tentative por favor shot down in flames with a stern and almost threatening SIN favor. 

This is said with kindness and is polite in its own way, but I was never grateful for being exempted from saying it.  Now, of course, the Spanish use both please and thank you as much as we do, possibly in response to hearing it on all sides from huge numbers of English-speaking tourists and foreign residents and not wishing to appear discourteous by failing to reciprocate. 

What these same English-speakers often overlook, though, is the importance attached by the Spanish to greetings.

On entering any non-self service shop, office or waiting room in Málaga, Murcia, Madrid or Medina del Campo good manners require you to look round the assembled company.  Then you verbally embrace them with a collective buenos días, buenas tardes or buenas noches.

greetings are expected on entering

Some answer, some grunt and others only nod but no-one ignores you.  Greetings are expected, as are farewells when departing. 

This also applies to entering and leaving lifts where reserved English-speakers can earn themselves a reputation for surliness.

 Often the ritual appears to be too much effort even for the Spanish and they limit themselves to a truncated buenas… on entering and another buenas… on exiting.

... and leaving

Before everybody had television, DVDs and computers and males began spending the evening with their families, pavements were less deserted late at night than they are now. People went out on the town, men returned from dominoes, cards or less innocent pastimes at their local bar or el casino, when thiswas still basically a gentlemen’s club and not somewhere to lose money.  They all greeted everyone who crossed their paths and murmured buenas noches or simply adiós. 

Dog-walkers in urban areas still observe the niceties but the most you can expect from a dog-less pedestrian is a sideways glance and a hastening of the step. Notwithstanding a growing lack of faith in the outcome of late-night encounters, the Spanish continue to regard greetings and leave-takings as an important aspect of social intercourse.

Earlier this year their continuing importance surfaced in La Toba, a very small village in the province of Guadalajara.  A mayoral order advised villagers not to spit, slurp their soup or fart in public.  And yes, this exactly the verb he used: tirar pedos.  Had the mayor wished to be more mealy-mouthed, he would have used the polite term of soltar ventosidades – to break wind.   

Another injunction was to “greet those present on entering and leaving closed premises”. 

So be warned: not saying hallo and goodbye in Spain is as heinous a social shortcoming as farting in public.

It's a small world

Instead of exclaiming it’s a small world! to express surprise at unexpected encounters in a huge world, the Spanish call it a handkerchief: el mundo es un pañuelo

There are more occasions than this where pequeño – small isn’t required to get across the idea that something isn’t big because Spanish tacks on suffixes that cut things down to size.

Thes eare –ito and illo as well as the more regional -ico, ín, ino and –iño.  These and their feminine versions can be added to the word of your choice, so although a puppy is un cachorro it can be made into an even more puppyish cachorrito.

A miniscule but adult moggy

A small dog of any age is un perrito, un perillo or un perrico.  Likewise un gato – a cat becomes a kitten or a miniscule but adult moggy when called un gatito, gatillo, gatico, gatino or gatín.

A noun or adjective ending in -o or -a drops this before tacking on the suffix of choice: chair – silla, sillita; table – mesa, mesilla.  

A word ending in -l needs no modification so tree – árbol becomes arbolito but the beady-eyed will notice that it loses its accent because once a suffix is added, that’s where the stress falls.

Words ending in -e or -n acquire -c before -ito and -illo: car (coche)- cochecito; cloud (nube) - nubecilla; heart (corazón) - corazoncito, corazoncillo.

Un pájaro – a bird becomes a fledgling when it is un pajarillo or pajarito while un cuadro – a picture can be reduced to un cuadrito.  

Urban Spaniards, especially those from central Spain, regard -ico as well as –ín and ino as rustic-sounding, to put it kindly.  Nonetheless, you still hear them and in Murcia, for instance, it is possible to turn un poco – a little into an even smaller un poquico. 

City-dwellers are no better, though.  Listen hard enough and you’ll catch un madrileño saying un poquitín, a double diminutive in danger of shrinking into nothingness.

Ín and ino often attach themselves to first names, so Pedro can become Pedrín or Pedrito, and instead of shortening Margarita you can make it longer and sweeter: Margaritina. 

The Spanish do not use caro – dear as an endearment but instead add -iño and turn it into a very loving noun: cariño – darling, appropriate for males and females alike, despite its –o ending.

Chico – boy and chica – girl are often turned into chiquitín and chiquitina as well as chiquitito and chiquitita.  All are suitable for anything undersized but are also endearments between outsize adults, because as well as smallness a suffix frequently indicates affection. 

Thus love converts mi amor into mi amorcito (again, suitable for either sex) and the object of affection understands that despite being addressed as a small love, little things mean a lot in this context.

A suffix can be ironic, so an invitation like ¿comemos una paellita? – how about a spot of paella? heralds a marathon blow-out.  The adjective gracioso – nice, appealing is not always so nice and can be less than appealing when transformed into the sarcastic graciosillo. 

Guapito damns faintly with diminutives because an adult thus described may still be guapo – handsome but there could be less than beauty in the eye of the beholder.

Some people use diminutives more than others but once started, the practice can become addictive and is responsible for phrases like daos prisita instead of daos prisa for hurry up or hasta lueguito instead of hasta luego – so long.   

And take care when making a dimutive out of female servants – criadas because not even the wildest imagination could turn criadillas into tiny maids (they’re calves' testicles).

Facing up to things

A Spanish face is una cara but in popular speech this is also a person who is cheeky or has a lot of nerve – and not of the type that accompanies bravery.  In this context it is interchangeable with cara dura, which translated word-for-word means hard-faced  although an English speaker’s hard or stony face requires a preposition and becomes cara de duro.

Buena cara and mala cara speak volumes, so when told tienes buena cara you know you look good (literally you’ve a good face) but if you hear tienes mala cara then you look bad or as though you’re in a bad mood.

Poner buena cara means to put a good or even brave face on things while you do the opposite with poner mala cara.  Meanwhile there is nothing worse than being down in the dumps and being told alegra esa cara – cheer up.

Echar en la cara is to throw in someone’s face – possibly custard pie but probably an insult.  Partir la cara a alguien is not particularly nice in Spanish and nor is its English translation of to smash someone’s face in (ouch).

Dar la cara means to face in the sense of to take the consequences and is as far as it gets from passing the buck. De cara can mean forthcoming: de cara a las elecciones – the forthcoming elections but in a phrase like tener el viento de cara it means to be going against (or into) the wind. 

Dar de cara is a summer hazard: el sol me está dando de cara – the sun’s in my face but the nearest-to-hand translation to face or face up to a situation or problem is encarar.

The reflexive encararse usually means to face up to or stand up to a person and something similar happens with enfrentar so a reflexive enfrentarse, conveys to confront, to clash with or even to fight: mañana Barça se enfrenta al Real Madrid – Barça faces/clashes with/fights Real Madrid tomorrow (we’re talking about football, after all).

Jasper faces up to things

Afrontar is another way to face or face up to, although this usually entails danger, a problem or something that requires tackling. 

There is also confrontar whose most usual translation is to compare although this, too, can be used when facing up to something abstract or intangible. 

There must be a reason, doubtless psychological, as to why Spanish-speakers have so many ways of facing things, and here’s one more: hacerle frente a algo or if it’s a person hacerle frente a alguien.  And yet another: plantarle cara a algo (or alguien). 

When referring to something to the way that something faces, use estar orientado: la casa está orientada al sur – the house faces south or estar enfrente de: la casa está enfrente del mar – the house is in front of the sea.   You can use dar, too: el apartamento da al jardín  – the apartment faces the garden.

 

Catalina face down



There are alternatives to cara – semblante and rostro for instance but occasionally face disappears in translation and to save face is salvar las apariencias while a cliff or mountain face is una pared (also wall). 

Then there is faz ­ - pretty close to face but a little poetic for everyday use, and it’s easy to detect its closeness to façade, which in Spanish becomes fachada.     





Flora face up

Shorten fachada to facha and you’re talking about the look of something, so ¡vaya facha tienes! is an uncomplimentary what do you look like!  Facha is also an abbreviation and slang for fascista, still an insult and still slung at very far-right politicians.

  

Face down is boca abajo and face up is boca arriba  and in this connection it is not your face that is up or down but your mouth, although this isn’t remotely connected with down in the mouth which is alicaído. 

This really means with lowered wings but there is better description for that feeling when you just can’t face up to things – hacer cara a las cosas.

Namesakes

A namesake is un tocayo, so on meeting someone who shares his or her first name, a Spanish person is likely to remark soy tocayo tuyo or soy tocaya tuya as the case may be. Or, if you tend to look as things from your own point of view, eres tocayo mío / eres tocaya mía – you’re my namesake.

Tocayo is said only of first names and not a surname -  un apellido, possibly because usually there is little novelty value in coming across your own, especially if it happens to be García or Martínez – two of the world’s most common.  

Catalina, Jasper and Flora all have namesakes

 

But even the commonest Spanish surnames are special in their own way, though, because a woman does not relinquish hers on marriage and also bestows her surname on her children.

In earlier times when children tended to be born (if not always conceived - in wedlock, those who were not and whose fathers declined to acknowledge them and register the birth had to bear the burden of going through life with only the mother’s surname.

Society might have been paralytically rigid on the surface and the rules never openly flouted but they were bendable.  Before divorce was legalised, couples did separate and more than one baby from a second relationship was registered in the local records – registro and Libro de Familia (the Family Book or personal register issued on marriage) as though born to the father’s legal wife.

A man who could afford the expense (and many who could not) kept a mistress – una querida, literally a loved one.  Less-loved by the wife, she would unlovingly describe her as la otra – the other.

Even a superficial glance reveals how most Spanish surnames have English counterparts, although their prevalence or scarceness vary as widely as both societies at the time when people acquired them.

There’s probably level pegging between Pastor – Shepherd but Herrero, the Spanish equivalent of Smith, which is one of our commonest last names, is less common here. 

Mayordomo is not as widespread as Butler and nor is Tejero – Tiler (an English Tyler) but you’re more likely to find an Escribano than a Scrivener and will probably have a long wait before being introduced to a Tornero - Turner.

The surname Batanero – Fuller exists, but isn’t particularly popular, possibly because Spain was less bothered about processing cloth than exporting its raw materials. 

It’s easier to come across a Sastre – Tailor (an English Taylor) although you don’t often come across the equivalent to Fletcher which is an obliging Flechero.  Nevertheless you occasionally encounter the surname Flecha which – surprise, surprise – means Arrow. 

Christian names appear as surnames, too, of which María, Marías, Elvira, Elena, Ricardo, Bautista are just a few. Some bear a built-in –ez, the equivalent of an English son: González – son of Gonzálo; Benítez – son of Benito; Estebánez – son of Esteban  and Juanez, which is exactly the same as Johnson.

Towns, cities, provinces, countries or nationalities account for many Spanish surnames: Soler, Ocaña, Castilla, España, Catalán, Toledo, Madrid, Sevilla, Bilbao, Inglés, Francés and Alemán and so on and so on from one end of Spain to the other and half-way across Europe.

The prefixes Ben- and Ab- usually denote Jewish or Moslem origin, but city surnames – for instance Madrid, Toledo – are another indication of Jewish or Moorish ancestry. 

At the end of the fifteenth century the Reyes Católicos – Catholic Monarchs expelled all Jews and Moslems unless they converted to Christianity and many changed their names, adopting the name of the city where they lived.  Others chose a saint’s name: San Juan, Sanjuan, Santamaría, San Pedro or Sampedro  (where the –n becomes an –m in line with spelling rules). 

When a first name is used as a family name, it is often preceded by de: E de Juan or de Andrés for instance.  This also happens when a surname is a noun: Dolores del Río.

Some surnames originating as nicknames occur in in both languages: Rubio – Blond, Blanco – White, Valiente – Valiant but some, like Mago – Magician, Regatero – Bargainer and Izquierdo – Left, do not (although a telephone directory might say otherwise).

Others recall an employer or landmark: Conde – Count, Barón – Baron, Castillo – Castle, Sala – Hall, Ribera - Riverbank.  Spellings can vary, as in English, and for the same illiterate reasons on the part of clerics or registrars, which is why you get Rivera too. 

Spanish surnames are occasionally plural where ours aren’t and vice-versa: Molino – Mills, Tapias – Wall, Prado – Meadows but often they correspond exactly: Campos – Fields, Arenas – Sands.

Before migration and emigration, the prefixes in Macdonald, Fitzgerald, Tremayne were instant geographic markers for British surnames. Similarly, Ll at the beginning and –ll at the end of a name indicate Valencian, Catalonian or Balearic origin, as do surnames ending in –á: Llinares, Ripoll, Durá. 

Likewise -uru, -egui, -echea, -alday are classic Basque endings and González, Fernández and Hernández were originally Asturian; the last two are also a textbook example of how F morphed into H centuries ago.

Márquez, Marín or Carrasco originated in Andalusia.  Other surnames traditionally – but not exclusively – belonged to gypsies: Carmona, Cortés, Montés, Montoya, Correa, Reyes, Heredia, Giménez and Jiménez.

Every language possesses surnames that defy categorisation and their owners must regret that legal name-changing in Spain is such a palaver.  Like the man overheard giving his name to an hotel receptionist and who, with the weary air of one who knows what to expect because it has happened so often before, reluctantly spelt out J-o-d-a-s. 

The startled young woman looked up and exclaimed ¡no jodas! - a favourite but extremely rude phrase approximate to You don’t say!