I need a man
A friend tried to impress me with their Spanish at a Spanish restaurant. With little appetite, he said No tengo hombre, quiero sólo patatas fritas instead of No tengo hambre, quiero sólo patatas fritas - the difference being 'I haven't got a man, I'd like just chips' rather than the intended 'I am not hungry, I would just like chips'.
Sent by: Phil
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Yep. Been there. I told two immature Spanish-speaking teenagers that I was hungry. They thought I was very funny. It was weeks later before it clicked in that I'd told them I had a man.
Yes, this is common. I am a Spanish teacher, and this is something I work on with my students. The problem stems from Spanish loanwords in North American English, such as nacho and flan that are pronounced as notch-o and flon for dialectal reasons. This faulty "a"-sound is then transferred to Spanish, creating all sorts of confusing and hilarious examples. Mano a mano, hand to hand, becomes "mono a mono", monkey to monkey. Crummy phrasebooks - Lonely Planet is the worst - confound the problem by claiming that Spanish "a"-sounds like English "a" in the word father. Take a look at the IPA transcriptions of these phonemes; they are represented by different symbols. That is because they are different sounds. It is important not to let your own accent colour your pronunciation of Spanish.
I was in a restaurant in Madrid once and told the waitress Tengo un poco hombre ... I have a little man. Oops. She giggled as I corrected myself: ¡Hambre! Es diferente.
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