Slang will vary from country to country, and from community to community - your best bet is to probably get a Lonely Planet: Spain.
Hell, the word for "car" varies... in some countries, "auto" or "automovil" is standard, while in others, it's antique. I think in Bolivia, "auto" refers to a bus, not a car. Or I might be thinking of "coche," which means car in some countries (possibly Spain). "Carro" is used in South Florida, but I think only because it's (nominally) an English-speaking area, and "carro" sounds like "car." It's a proper word in Cuba, I think, but other words might be more popular.
In the American Southwest, "Dude" is, roughly, "pachuco".
"Kung-fu" is Chinese anyway, so I can't see why it wouldn't work en Espanol.
For "cool," I'd probably use "bueno" or "dulce" - but I'm far from fluent. ("Dulce" is "sweet" - in food, "dulce" can be used as a nickname for "dulce de leche" which is caramel.)
I don't even know the American slang equivalent for "call centre employee."
"Have you any vacancies?" would probably be best translated as "Are there vacancies here?" (since there are occasionally weird bits of slang usage, and you don't necessarily want to ask if someone has an empty room if it idiomatically means something like, "wanna sleep with me?" or "the lights are on but no one's home" or "your wife cheats on you." Not that it does mean that, but it *might*.)
"Hay vacantes aqui?" I think would do it.
I'm also really hoping "Do you want fries with that?" doesn't translate into Castillian Spanish. I'm hoping McDonalds isn't quite *that* pervasive.
Literally, though, it'd be "Quieres fritas con eso?" (or politely, "Quiere papas fritas con eso?") |
