A Lesson in Fluency and Flamenco

A lesson on Castilian Spanish-

Unbeknownst to me, there are many.many different dialects of the Spanish language.  There is the spanish that is spoken in Central and South American countries, the spanish spoken by people from Mexico, and the spanish spoken by people from Spain.  There are 4 different dialects spoken in Spain- Basque, Catalan, Galician and Castilian (or castellano).  Castilian is the most widespread so we will learn a few words in that. 

They have a lot of the same familiar phrases:
Hasta Luego - See you later   Hola - hello    Por Favor - please
Gracias - thank you    Como esta usted? - how are you?

And some different words :
Castilian                Latin American Spanish              English
vale                           de acuerdo                                  ok
patata                           papa                                       potato
coche                          carro                                         car
conducir                     manejar                                    to drive

Interesting the differences in the "same" language but not at all surprising if you go back and read the post about the English language from England week.  

One word that is the same in both languages?  Baile (or dance)!!!

A lesson on Flamenco -
Flamenco dancing is a genre of dance, music and song from the southern Spain area of Andalusia.  It includes "cante" or singing, "toque" or guitar, "baile" or dancing, and "palmas" or handclaps all done in a fast rhythm and in beautiful costumes.   It can be found in Spain in many forms from the informal juerga, where dancers are accompanied with table banging, to the theatrical show, where a large band is playing and the dances are very choreographed.  It has also become popular around the world - Japan has almost as many flamenco schools as Spain! 

My husband's mother's family has some roots in Spain.  Her aunts used to travel the U.S. putting on Flamenco shows and became quite well known.  Unfortunately, they are no longer with us to give us a lesson so we resorted to watching a youtube video for lessons. There were many to choose from or you just stomp your feet and clap you hands to the music!  My Aunt went on a trip to Spain a few years ago and brought back a cute Flamenco dress and shoes so we had the costume.  With the internet (and the right shoes) anything is possible!! 

Aunt Ariel and Rita Chavez doing the real dance!

My little dancer strutting her stuff

Ole !

The shoes make the outfit!!