In Spanish, there are four ways to say “you” – “tú”, “usted”, “ustedes”, and “vosotros”. If you use the wrong “you” at the wrong time, you might offend someone. Luckily, most people in Latin America will recognize that you are a “gringo” and give you the benefit of the doubt, but it’s still important to know how and when to use each form of “you”. Knowing this will help you seem more educated and possibly avoid causing offense to someone unintentionally. Some of you (newsletter subscribers) might have already learned about this concept in a classroom; hopefully this newsletter will help to clarify things a little more for you. Here are a few basic tips for the usage of “you”: (more…)

Just a few weeks ago, one of our newsletter subscribers asked me to address the differences between Spanish in Latin America and Spanish in Spain. This week, I will discuss a little bit about those differences as well as a few regional word differences from Central America to South America and so on. (more…)

Finally, the last hand gesture in our series. This is probably my favorite gesture of all the Latin American hand gestures. Being an American and not from Latin America, it took me some time to perfect it, but it’s fun and very expressive. As you can tell by the title, I like to call this gesture the “Someone’s in Trouble” gesture, however, it can also be used when you are in a hurry. Click here to learn Spanish. (more…)

Bienvenidos (welcome) to this week’s cultural tidbit. Before we jump into the culture topic for this week, I wanted to remind you to look into this week’s special offer on the Visual Link Spanish™ Level I course if you have not purchased it yet.

This week we will continue on with Latin American hand gestures. The Latin hand gesture we’ll learn today is useful on city buses and at public places in Latin America. I like to call it the “Thief Sign”. (more…)

If are planning to travel to or stay in Latin America, do not drink the water out of the tap! The water usually isn’t potable because they don’t use the same type of water treatment plants as they do in the United States. If you accidentally drink the water out of the tap, you may get what many people, over the ages, have affectionately called “Montezuma’s revenge”. Along with other symptoms, this condition will usually include many unwanted trips to the restroom. (more…)

For your own safety, in the streets of Latin America there is one major piece of information you need to be aware of—pedestrians do not have the right of way. If a pedestrian walks across the street at a cross walk (2 solid parallel white lines) in the United States, all vehicles are required to slow down to let the pedestrian cross. Most cross walks in the United States are at are at street lights or intersections with stop signs, but once in a while there are crosswalks in the middle of city blocks (far from an intersection). When people start to cross the street at the crosswalks, vehicles will slow down to wait for them even without street lights to stop the cars. If pedestrians are in the streets in Latin America, not only do cars not slow down, they seem to speed up. (more…)

Welcome to your new best-friend. The Visual Link Spanish™ blog.

This is where you will find all sorts of great information to help you in your language learning endeavours.  From cultural tips to help you fit in while visiting a foreign country, to learning tips, and even sneak-peeks on the next latest and greatest products from Visual Link Spanish ™. Also, from time to time, there will be opportunities for you to give feedback on new things we are doing here. Anytime though, you can have your say in the comments; tell us what you love, what you hate (but please be nice, we are people too!),  and anything else that might help all of us in our journey to Spanish Mastery.

So bookmark this page, add it to your favorite RSS reader, sit back and enjoy.

Click here to learn Spanish.