How to Say Hello in Spanish and Other Greetings

Hello in Spanish

Learning how to say hello in Spanish is the first step of many you will take when learning Spanish the path will definitely become harder but these early basic greetings are the food and water of any
language and their importance can never be understated.

Do not worry about the formation and the grammar of these early phrases just relax and concentrate on the sound that each of the following phrases makes as you say them, greetings are the first impression you will make when speaking to a Spanish speaker so practice saying them regularly.

When you want to say ‘Hello!’ in Spanish you use the word “¡Hola!

In Spanish the ‘h‘ is silent so you would pronounce ‘Hola‘ as ‘olla‘. This greeting is widely used as in English so you will gain lots of experience using it.

There are of course more formal greetings:

Good Morning which is “Buenas días“.

This is pronounced as ‘bwenas deeas‘ The ‘ue’ is pronounced as a ‘w’ and the accented i in “días” as an emphasized ‘ee‘

Good Afternoon which is “Buenas tardes“.

‘Tardes‘ is pronounced ‘tarrdais‘ with a very slight roll on the ‘r’.

Good Evening or Good Night is “Buenas Noches“.

“Noches” is pronounced ‘notchais‘

If you would like to ask someone how they are you would say:

“¿Cómo estás?” – How are you?

You could also use “está” if you were asking someone you did not know as a sign of respect, however, apart from asking VIP’s, this form is rarely used nowadays.

Another more informal way of asking someone this is to say:

“¿Qué tal?” – How’s it going? or How are you?

When you want to say goodbye to somebody you would say:

“¡Adiós!” – Good bye

Now, not to confuse you too much, it is important should you ever hear it being used in this manner, but “adiós” is also used frequently to say hello in Spanish, but only when passing someone very briefly

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When deciding upon the best learning Spanish software to purchase it is always best to read as many reviews as possible in order to make an informed decision. Unfortunately though, many people don’t go down this route and will often make a spontaneous decision to learn Spanish and will buy the first Spanish course they see sitting on the shelf of their local store due to their enthusiasm and eagerness to get started.

In a perfect world, purchasing any Spanish course in itself would not pose an issue as every Spanish course would teach the exact same material and each course would therefore help the student to achieve their goal of speaking Spanish.

The truth is that each student is different…some are much better at learning languages than others, some are better at learning a language from a grammatical viewpoint as you would learn it at school for example, whereas others have much better results by concentrating on conversational skills.

It is for this reason that many Spanish courses are now available, each one slightly differing in teaching techniques and methods offering the best possible fit for individual students.

The one area of Spanish study that has seen a massive surge in popularity in the last ten years is the use of software for studying instead of the more traditional text books and cassettes.

Because more and more people have become connected online the flexibility that it provided for studying a language became much more apparent and as a result there has been a consistent increase in available courses.

Many of the earlier online courses offered little in the way of improving upon traditional methods other than offering the same material in a new format, but after a while specific techniques were improved upon that improved the speed at which Spanish could be learnt whilst also making learning much more enjoyable as well as improving the practical application.

Whilst some of these software courses are quite expensive, there are a few others available that are as good, if not better, which are much more reasonably priced.

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Spanish Past Tense

The Spanish past tense throws up a problem for many students and that is whether they should use the imperfect or preterite?

In Spanish, the two simple past tenses that are predominantly used, are called the Imperfect and the Preterite and it is perfectly understandable for students, who are learning about past tenses for the first time, to be unsure as to which of these two tenses to use and when.

It goes without saying that both tenses are used to describe past actions or states but each is used differently and the following rules will hopefully clear up any confusion.

When to Use the Preterite

The preterite tense is used to express an action that was completed at some time in the past, listed here are some specific uses and examples:

• When referring to a series of actions in the past:
  • Me desayuné, limpié la casa y me fui a la estación – I had breakfast, cleaned the house, and went to the station.

• When referring to the beginning or the end of a past event:
  • La fiesta empezó a las diez – The party began at 10:00

• When referring to things that are seen as being complete:
  • Dejó el trabajo hace un año – You left the job a year ago

When to Use the Imperfect
The imperfect tense expresses an action or state  that was ongoing during the past and if it is uncertain whether it has been completed. Specific uses and examples are listed below:

• To explain an action that a person did in the past habitually:
  • Cuando estábamos en el colegio, jugábamos al fútbol todos los jueves. – When we were at school, we used to play football every Thursday

• To refer to an action without making reference to an end or a beginning:
  • Mi mujer tenía dolores de cabeza frecuentes – My wife had frequent headaches

• When referring to actions that were taking place simultaneously in the past:
  • Mi hijo miraba televisión y mi hija cantaba – My son was watching television and my daughter was singing

• When describing physical, emotional or mental states or conditions:
  • Estaba tan feliz que quería llorar – I was so happy that I wanted to cry

• When referring to a past time:
  • Eran las ocho y media de la tarde – It was 8:30 p.m.
  • Era la una de la mañana – It was 1:00 a.m.

• When describing an action or state that happened at some point in the past and that lasted for a certain amount of time and that happened prior to another past action.
  • Hacía todo el día que esperando cuando mi mujer llegó – I had been waiting all day when my when arrived

Hopefully, these guidelines will provide the clarity you need.

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Spanish verb conjugation is an extremely important part of learning Spanish, unfortunately it is also one of the most difficult aspects of studying the language and as such is disliked by most students. However, if the objective of the student is to become fluent then Spanish verb conjugation is one aspect of the Spanish language that requires the student to have a complete mastery of. .. continue reading ..

Spanish verb conjugators have been used for as long as languages have been taught. Question is how can traditional verb conjugation tables be improved upon to make the job of learning Spanish verb conjugation easier and quicker? .. continue reading ..