Spanish Language Blog Honors Stogie

Aw shucks!  (Blush)

For some time now, I have been reading, linking and referring to the Spanish language blog El Opinador Compulsivo.  I learned of their existence from The Other McCain, and since I have been learning Spanish, I was immediately interested.  I visited El Opinador Compulsivo and found the blog to be intriguing, funny, interesting and of a like mind with me politically.  They run very interesting photographs of movie scenes and movie sets, as well as a bit of cheesecake, all of which adds to the visual beauty of the site.

And it's almost all in Spanish.  As I noted before, the Spanish on this blog is deep, written by educated writers, and a challenge for a novice (like me) to interpret.

El Opinador Compulsivo has 18 writers from Buenos Aires (15), Quebec (1), Madrid (1) and Claremont, California (1).

Today the hombres there noticed me noticing them, and we have officially become friends.  They posted this tribute to me here -- see graphic above.  The Spanish reads: "Recommended",  "The blog of our new friend, Stogie." and at the bottom, "Give him a visit, he is already in our sidebar (in the Great Satan links)."

As for their English description of me, wow, these guys know me well already!

"El Opinador Compulsivo": a Conservative Spanish Blog Now Linked

I am studying the Spanish language at a nearby community college, so I like to read Spanish for practice.  I became aware of a Spanish language, conservative blog, El Opinador Compulsivo, which I have now linked in my sidebar.  The writers blog in what I might call "deep" Spanish, using all the proper tenses of verbs and such, which keeps me busy thumbing through my reference texts.  (Actually, I heavily rely on the excellent online resource SpanishDict.com, which is not a gay porn site in spite of its name.)

El Opinador Compulsivo publishes a lot of articles I would otherwise miss, along with very impressive photos of movie scenes -- where they get them, I do not know, but they are enjoyable to see.

Like a lot of conservative blogs, they also like to publish photos of semi-nude, beautiful women.  I don't generally do that myself, but what the heck.  I read the blog for the articles, y'see.

There was an interesting article there today about a 33 year old mom in Santiagao, who, with the help of her two teenage daughters, accosted a young man passing by their door.  They forced him inside, made him lay down on a bed, then the mother got on top him and forced him to kiss her breasts.  She demanded sex, but the young man refused, so the woman choked him until he passed out, saying "Si no me haces el amor, te mato!" which means, "If you don't make love to me, I'll kill you."

Obviously the lady hasn't learned that men don't really like overly aggressive women.  She needs to employ more tact in her approach.

This is what I like about "El Opinador Compulsivo":  there are some great lessons in social skills there.  Among other things!

Spicing Up a Boring Week With Freddy Fender!

I'm bored. The mysterious explosions at Iranian nuclear facilities were fun, but I need something more. Aha! Then I thought of Freddy Fender.

Freddy sang "Tex-Mex" style and one of his songs that I love is "Rancho Grande." I always loved it but didn't understand a single word; now I am taking Spanish and have the highest grade in the class (I got 100% right on my last midterm). Now I understand the words to "Rancho Grande." Here's Freddy singing it live, followed by "Before the Next Teardrop Falls."  (Freddy was born in Texas and was a U.S. Marine, but valued his Mexican heritage mucho.)



"Rancho Grande" is a traditional Ranchero song, very popular in Mexico, and often performed by Mariachi bands. Freddy, however, altered the song with a new verse of his own making:

Cuando se muere mi suegra,
Que la entieren boca abajo,
Que si quiere salirse,
Que se vaya más abajo

It translates: When my mother-in-law dies, let them bury her upside down, so if she wants to get out, she'll just go further down.

Nasty! I liked my mother-in-law, but I guess Freddy didn't like his.

The Three Tenors Sing "Cielito Lindo" (My Favorite Spanish Song)

I'm taking my first semester of Spanish at the local community college here in Hollister, and enjoying it very much.  Learning a foreign language has always been easy to me for some reason, and I am getting a solid A in the class. (That's me in the sombrero - it's a Photoshop.) I know we as conservatives often attach negative feelings to many things Spanish, Mexican or Hispanic, because of the influx of illegal immigrants, the gangs and the drugs.  However, Hispanic culture is often rich and beautiful and we should not be blind to those qualities.

A song I have loved since childhood is the Spanish song from Mexico, "Cielito Lindo."  Per Wikipedia,

"Cielito lindo" is a popular Ranchera song from Mexico, written in 1882 by Quirino Mendoza y Cortés (c. 1859–1957).[1] It is roughly translated as "Lovely Sweet One". Although the word "cielo" means sky or heaven, it is also a term of endearment comparable to sweetheart or honey. "Cielito" can thus be translated as "sweetie"; "lindo" means cute, lovely or pretty. Sometimes the song is known by words from the refrain, "Canta y no llores". ["sing and don't cry"]

Commonly played by mariachi bands, it has been recorded by many artists in the original Spanish or in English and other languages using the melody of the song. In recent decades it has come to be widely known as a theme song for Mexicans, particularly at international events, like the FIFA World Cup.

When I was a kid I didn't know the words so would just sing, "Ay, ay, ay, ay!  Oh my sombrero!"  That's all I knew and it was wrong.  The refrain is quite famous.  It goes:

Ay, ay, ay, ay,
Canta y no llores,  [Sing and don't cry]
Porque cantando se alegran, [Because singing gladdens,]
Cielito lindo, los corazones. [My dear, our hearts.]

The full words and translation of this great song can be found here.

Finally, here singing a shortened version of the song are the "Three Tenors" [the Spanish singers Plácido Domingo and José Carreras and the Italian singer Luciano Pavarotti]:



A longer version, with a lovely children's choir, can be viewed here.

Boring Week, But a Couple of Newsworthy Tidbits

It's been a boring week for news and so blogging has been light.  Okay, non-existent.

I see the powers that be are once again trying to force a Palestinian state on the world.  The Palestinians will never accept the right of Israel to exist, due to their hateful and intolerant religion, and so the whole exercise is doomed to failure.  But we will keep replaying the same tired scenario over and over again, under the false premise that a Palestinian state will somehow lead to peace.  It won't.  As long as Islam exists as a major ideology in the world, there will be no peace.  Unfortunately, we have no long-term strategy for containing and neutralizing the threat.

I also see that Chinese officials have stated that they will not oppose Israel, should it decide to attack Iran.  China has long ago concluded that the purpose of the Iranian nuclear program is to build a nuclear bomb, and that such an occurrence is not in China's interests.  Religious fanatics with nukes are not in anyone's interests.

On a personal note, I am taking Spanish at the local community college.  I am semi-literate in French and love the language, but Spanish is more practical here in California.  I am taking to it like a duck to water, because of its similarities to French and because I have already picked up a lot of it from osmosis, that is, local immersion in the language due to the large numbers of Spanish-speaking people here. There are billboards in Spanish, as well as radio stations, television shows and soap operas.  Plenty of Mexican restaurants and plenty of Mexicans, many of whom are very nice people and many of whom are actually here legally.

In any case, it's a great way to keep the mind active.

I am also learning how to sing so I can contribute vocally to any bands I happen to play with, but we won't go there right now.  Let us just say that I can sing better than Ted Kennedy and I speak better Spanish too.  That would still be true even if he wasn't dead.