Learn Spanish one-on-one in a relaxed online learning environment

Elisa Vidal is an independent qualified Spanish teacher based in Mexico.

She offers personalized, one-on-one online lessons in a relaxed and informal setting that puts you at ease to help you improve your language skills and increase your conversational abilities.

Choose the type of Spanish lesson you would like:

• Everyday Spanish conversation — increase your vocabulary, improve your language fluency, and learn about typical nuances and usage of Mexican Spanish in everyday situations.
• Beginner’s Spanish Lessons — start building your Spanish language skills with lessons that will get you started with conversation, understanding grammar, and building essential vocabulary.
• Intermediate Spanish Lessons — build on your existing Spanish language skills with lessons that will help improve your grammar, and build vocabulary and stronger sentence construction for writing and conversations.

Benefits of Elisa’s personalized lessons

Tailored lessons: Elisa offers lessons tailored to help you reach your Spanish language study goals, adapting the lessons to your personal needs.

Goal-oriented learning: Whether you want to improve general conversation, get a better handle on Spanish grammar, prepare for your new lifestyle in Mexico, or simply converse in Spanish with someone who can help you elevate your fluency level, Elisa will tailor the lessons to help you achieve your goals.

Cultural enrichment: Elisa’s language lessons will help you hone your Spanish language skills as you learn about Mexican traditions, expressions, everyday culture and the nuances of local language usage.

Experience you can trust: Elisa is bi-lingual and a qualified Spanish language teacher with over eight years of teaching experience and has worked with learners of all ages and backgrounds.

Spanish lesson plans and prices

Elisa offers 30-minute conversation sessions, pay-per-lesson, and monthly packages. Choose a plan that best suits your language learning intentions.

*Monthly packages are based on 4-week lesson cycles.

Request your language lessons with Elisa

Complete the request form below and Elisa will contact you directly.

What happens next?

• After you complete the request form, Mexperience will send you an email that confirms your request and introduces you to Elisa.
• Elisa will respond to you directly to schedule free initial 30-minute consultation call on Zoom to introduce herself, talk about your language learning goals, and organize the conversation sessions, or lesson plan you choose.

Out of stuff

No Hay, in Spanish, means “there isn’t any,” and in Mexico the term may be applied to almost anything, anytime you need or wish to acquire something.

For example, the term may be used to express:

• a dearth of foodstuffs, “No hay tortillas” (they’ve sold out of tortillas for today);
• stuff in general, “No hay lentes de contacto de esa dioptría” (the contact lenses you wear are not in stock);
• and even services, “No hay luz” (power cut).

Batch availability of foods and other goods

While the overall availability of all kinds of things is Mexico has improved significantly in recent times, in comparison to its northern neighbor, a continuous reliable supply of certain types of goods can still be a hit-and-miss affair here, even in some of the up-scale stores selling imported goods and where items on display this week might not be there again within a month—and might not ever return.

This inconsistent and ‘limited batch’ pattern of supply can sometimes be a source of frustration, in most part, because Murphy’s Law dictates that the infamous ‘No Hay’ will spring up at the precise moment when whatever isn’t available will cause you some inconvenience, and never when it really doesn’t matter.

The impact of No Hay

The ‘no hay’ effect may be mitigated with some forward planning, but it can never be completely avoided, for example:

• It could be that your car just broke down, and ‘no hay’ applies to the very part it happens to need now.
• Perhaps the local store has run out of a key ingredient you need for tonight’s dinner party.
• The delicatessen cheese you eyed up in-passing at CostCo won’t be there next month.
• Perhaps you’ve been looking forward to eating tamales, and the restaurant you sit down at “doesn’t have any today.”

The impact of ‘no hay’ also depends upon where you are situated, how much energy you’re willing to expend in locating whatever it is you want or need, and what price you’re willing to pay to obtain it.

For example, if a store in Mexico City you go to says ‘no hay,’ there’s a high probability that some other place in the capital will have stock, if you’re willing to wear-out some boot leather (but more often, some tread on your car’s tires) to find it.

If you are in the provinces, ‘no hay’ could mean ‘no hay’ for hours, days, or weeks, —or ever— leaving you with little alternative but to try the next nearest ‘bigger’ town or city. Or Amazon.com.mx and its Latin American equivalent, MercadoLibre.com.mx.

Finding peace with No Hay

In the moment when it happens, ‘no hay’ may be frustrating, inconvenient or disappointing to your situation. Nonetheless, when you live in Mexico, the omnipresent ‘no hay’ will pay homage to your situations sooner or later.

A corollary hidden within ‘no hay‘ is that it presents an occasion to break a habitual pattern of buying the same things over and again—or taking things for granted. The situation thus invites you to make a different choice and perhaps try something else.

Part of the art of living in places like Mexico is that one comes to accept that, on some occasions, you just can’t—and that’s as it is. It’s part of the lifestyle tapestry here that encourages you to make peace with the fluid situations that will visit you, and ultimately with yourself.

Language opens your access to the culture

Language is a primary instrument that gives you access to a foreign culture, and being able to converse in Spanish —even at a basic conversational level— will make every experience you encounter in Mexico richer, and more meaningful to you.

Spanish is an important language that is widely spoken around the the world, and Mexican Spanish is polite, clear, and easy to understand.  The speed at which the language is spoken in Mexico is not as accelerated as it is Spain and some South American countries, and the pronunciation is softer, which makes the language easier to ‘pick-up’ and easier for beginners to learn.

PinPoint Spanish series shares valuable insights

PinPoint Spanish is an extensive series of articles which help you to study Mexican Spanish language usage and additionally, provide context and nuance of the language as it’s contemporarily spoken and applied in everyday situations across Mexico.

The series is an ideal study resource for beginners who want to get a wider perspective of the language beyond the basic mechanics and grammar, while intermediate and advanced students of the language will particularly enjoy the insights the articles share about the subtle nuances and everyday practical uses of Mexican Spanish.

Spanish language resources on Mexperience

Mexperience offers you knowledge and connections to help you learn and improve your Spanish language capabilities:

• Enjoy dozens of language insight articles through our PinPoint Spanish series
• Connect to our Learning Spanish section for more advice
• Find online Spanish courses to help you develop your conversation skills
• Discover language schools in Mexico where you can participate in a class in-person, or online

Speaking Spanish gives you access to the local culture and enables you to engage with people in ways that are simply not possible through third party translation and will enhance every experience you encounter in Mexico.

Conversation is the key to language fluency

It’s the everyday interactions with other people that give us the most value and most pleasure from being able to communicate in another language.  Developing your ability to converse in Spanish requires a regular exercise of your vocabulary, and confidence.

The online course offered by our associate is helpful when

• you visit Mexico frequently and want to converse in Spanish for leisure, lifestyle, or for work;
• you’re already living in Mexico and want to improve your Spanish language conversation skills;
• you plan to move to Mexico and you’d like to arrive prepared to converse more confidently.

You can choose from pricing plans depending on how many lessons you want per week.

Each course is tailored based on your current skill level and language learning goals, and your free assessment also includes a lesson test-run over a video call.

True beginner

When you want to get started speaking Spanish for the first time, a coach will help you to build a solid foundation and get you conversing in Spanish.  You will be speaking Spanish from day one of the course.  This is ideal for those who have never studied Spanish before or those who studied it many years ago but don’t remember much, or anything, from those studies.

False beginner

When you’re someone who’s had previous experiences with trying to learn Spanish but still can’t string a sentence together, this course can help you to retrieve the information you’ve stored over the years, unlock what you already know, and develop new vocabulary and skills while building confidence speaking Spanish in everyday situations.   It’s ideal when you understand more Spanish than you can speak or lack confidence when you need to express yourself in Spanish.

Intermediate learner

When you have a good basic grasp of Spanish, but you sense that you’ve reached a plateau you can’t overcome or need to develop confidence to speak Spanish with strangers or in public, this course can help you to make material advances in your current Spanish language capabilities.  Most language students get stuck in a loop and need some help at some point, and a coach will assess your current level with a view to structuring a course to help you reach your goals.  This is ideal when you’ve tried other courses that don’t seem to work, or sense that your vocabulary and sentence structure need to be sharper or more refined.

Intermediate-advanced learner

When you’re seeking to improve your Spanish language capabilities for specific purposes, for example, as part of a career development plan or due to some other specialized interest, your intermediate-advanced skills can benefit by having the course structured to your more advanced needs or professional goals.   For example, you might need to learn Spanish in the context of medical, scientific, business, educational, or technical disciplines.  This course is ideal for those who have a decent command of the Spanish language, but who want to sharpen their abilities and gain others’ trust when speaking in Spanish, especially in formal or business situations.

Someone who wants to learn Spanish for living in Mexico

If you’re living in Mexico, or plan to make a move here in the future, this online course can also help you to improve your Spanish language skills to face everyday lifestyle situations in Mexico.  Language lifestyle conversations are helpful when you are already living here and want to improve your language skills, or you visit Mexico frequently, or plan to move to Mexico in future—so that you can arrive prepared with language and vocabulary skills that will enable you to converse confidently in lifestyle situations you’ll encounter when you’re here.

Every course is tailored to your current skill level

Every course is tailor-made for each student.

Request a free consultation today and our language associate will take the time to assess your current language skill level on a video call and talk about your goals and intentions in regard to improving your Spanish language conversation skills, with no obligation.

Your free assessment also includes a lesson test-run via video-call, and if you enjoy the format you can choose to sign-up for a course that will be tailored to your current Spanish language proficiency and language learning goals.

Month-to-month coaching plans are available from US$140 per month; and you can cancel anytime.

Book your free consultation and lesson test-run, with no obligation

As a rule, feminine words end in an ‘a’ and masculine words in an ‘o’, and so do corresponding adjectives. But there are a number of exceptions, a common one being el problema, which is masculine.  It’s not unusual to hear foreigners use the intuitive, and wrong, “la problema.”

A number of nouns beginning with the letter ‘a’ use the masculine definite article ‘el‘ or indefinite ‘un‘ to avoid the two a’s clashing.  Examples are el agua, el azúcar, un alma.  But unlike “el problema,” these words are feminine so use the corresponding endings: agua fría, azúcar blanca, alma perdida.

There are a number of nouns that can be either masculine or feminine. La radio or el radio, la mar or el mar.  It’s common for people to use la radio when referring to radio in general as a communications medium —an abbreviated form of la radiodifusión— and el radio when referring to the appliance.  Radio is also masculine when it means radius, or radium.

There are also words that mean one thing when masculine, and another when feminine.  La cometa means the kite, and el cometa means the comet.  El orden means order as in law and order, while la orden means order as in command, or an order for goods, or food at a restaurant.  The feminine la frente means forehead, while the masculine el frente means front as in battle front, or the front of a building.

Certain pronouns change their endings to reflect gender.  Nosotros –“we”– becomes nosotras when it refers to only women.

When there is a mixture of masculine and feminine elements in a group, the masculine plural is used.  This of course doesn’t sit well with the politically-correct. Mexico’s former president Vicente Fox made popular the use of the double definite article. His speeches would be dotted with “las y los mexicanos” to indicate both women and men. Grammatically it’s nonsense, but it pandered well to the wave of modernity and is now widely employed in publishing and broadcasting. “Amigas y amigos“ is another popular one, which could have caused Shakespeare’s Mark Antony some technical difficulties fitting in Romans and countrymen.

It isn’t moved to the nearest Sunday like Father’s Day, or Mother’s Day in other countries: when it falls on a week day, so be it. Working mothers are given the day off, some people leave early for family gatherings, and any employer who refuses to allow this without good reason may be said to “not have a mother.”

Which brings this entry to its point: the widespread use of the word madre in expressions whose English equivalents have nothing to do with matriarchal figures.

When it’s said of a person, “no tiene madre,” it means they are shameless or unscrupulous. It can also be applied to things that are disgraceful or simply unfair. A variation is “¡qué poca madre!” which amounts to the same thing.

These two expressions, however, can also mean something quite different, in fact something quite positive:

“Este juego de video no tiene madre” means the video game is very good—extraordinary, in fact; a football team that played “de poca madre“ played extremely well; and a great party can also be said to have been “de poca madre.”

A car that whizzes past at breakneck speed “va hecho la madre,” although “va hecho la raya” means the same thing and is more fitting in polite company.

Hasta la madre is a versatile expression that suggests testing limits in a variety of ways. Its basic meaning is fed-up, or sick-and-tired. “Estoy hasta la madre del tráfico,” or the more personal and unpleasant “me tienes hasta la madre.”

Someone who is very drunk can be described as being “hasta la madre” with alcohol, and a bus that is so crammed-full with passengers that they are hanging out of the doors is also packed “hasta la madre.”

“Hasta el gorro” — literally “up to the cap” — is a valid alternative.

In Spanish “mentar la madre” means to insult — literally “mention or refer to the mother,” even if the recipient’s mother or mother-child relationship isn’t alluded to.

Threats to visit bodily harm on a person can be expressed as “te voy a romper la madre” or “dar en la madre” which make as little sense, literally considered, as some of their English equivalents. And if you run headlong into a brick wall or fall off a bike, a bystander may observe that someone “se dio en la madre.”

A standalone expression of surprise or shock, “¡en la madre!” can be elicited from someone observing an accident or disastrous event.

But the real Mexican classic is “me vale madre” — “I don’t give a damn” — used widely across classes and  immortalized by the illustration of late cartoonist Rogelio Naranjo. This mother of all expressions even has its own noun form: someone in Mexico who habitually couldn’t care less is known as a “valemadrista.”

Some English people, for example, pride themselves on knowing the difference between a rook and a raven.  Urban Mexicans would tell you they’re both crows—cuervos, aquí y en China, as the local saying goes.

An ideal opportunity to extend your vocabulary

One of the most rewarding, and frequently neglected, parts of learning another language is finding out the names of the different animals.

This is pretty straightforward for household pets or farmyard animals, but can get complicated for all but the most avid classification buffs given the variations, from region to region, in creatures of a similar kind and the local names they are given.

Spanish has as least three words for crow—cuervo, corneja and urraca.  Urraca actually means magpie, but some use that word, or cuervo, to refer to the zanate, or great-tailed grackle, which is found all across Mexico and parts of the US.  (Ask the National Audubon Society.)  They all swoop and strut like crows, thieve like crows, and sound a bit like crows, but are smaller and thinner.  They can also be confused with the blackbird—which is mirlo in Spanish.

Burrowing rodents and soccer team nick-names

Another animal common to Mexico is the gopher, tuzo in Spanish, a burrowing rodent that’s more likely to pop its head up than a mole and less likely to than a prairie dog.  The tuzo looks more like a large rat, although it has the long front teeth of a beaver.

In Mexico tuzo also refers to miners, because of the underground habits of the rodents, and is also the Pachuca soccer-team’s nickname—Mexico’s oldest professional team, as the sport was introduced into Mexico by Cornish miners in Hidalgo State in the late 19th century.

Knowing your mustelidae from your opposums

Any dictionary will tell you that tejón means badger.  A friend once showed me a picture of himself holding a tejón, and it definitely wasn’t a badger.  It looked more like a racoon —mapache— than a badger, but he assured me that the animal in question was a tejón.  It turns out that tejón is the name given in Mexico to the ring-tailed coati.

The opossum, most commonly referred to in Spanish as zarigüeya, is known in Mexico as tlacuache, from the Náhuatl tlacuatzin.

If you know of any other distinct or unusual animal names in Spanish for others to learn, or would like to discuss different animal names, share your comments below.

Translated literally, the words say “what happens is that…,” although in Mexico this arrangement of words is frequently used to begin sentences that must inevitably end in the listener’s disappointment.

The concepts of ‘no’ and ‘can’t’ do not rest comfortably in the realms of polite conversation and friendly interaction of Mexican social and business culture and so to avoid being off-hand, Mexicans (and foreign natives who have assimilated Mexican culture) can often be overheard using the now ubiquitous “lo que pasa es que” at or near the start of sentences which require a pretext to soften the blow of the unfavorable response about to be conveyed.

Although it’s possible to perceive the words as nothing more than short shrift intended to assuage the consequences of poor form in the undertaking of some deed or promise, that would be technically inaccurate when taken in the broader context of Mexican culture, and especially when you have been in Mexico long enough to understand some of the primary reasons which can bring about no hay.

The words may be applied to your circumstance in almost any given situation. You might be going to pick-up your dry cleaning on the day it’s due; or visiting a coffee shop to meet someone who doesn’t show up; you might be ordering your favorite dish from a restaurant’s menu, or calling to inquire why your cable TV signal has unexpectedly vanished. It seems most often heard in an assortment of bureaucratic environments, when you attend a place to receive some authorization, certificate, or thing vital to progress your endeavors.

Whatever the situation, when a sentence directed towards you contains the words “lo que pasa es que…,” you need to immediately adjust your expectations and understand that however eloquent, plausible, compelling —or otherwise— the reasons about to be explained to you are, the answer will be a form ‘no,’ or ‘no hay.’

Of the remaining 50% chance, there’s roughly a 33% chance each that you will:

• a) be misunderstood,
• b) say the opposite of what you mean, and
• c) make a complete fool of yourself.

A knowledge of Latin is helpful

The creative adaptation of word endings works better if you have a rough idea of which English words are Latin based, since both languages share those roots. Words with Greek origins will also usually work, since many are used for scientific names or terms.

This causes mistakes with words that have a similar root or origin but have come to change their meaning in one or the other language. These words that look and sound similar but have different meanings are called false cognates —incorrectly, it turns out— or false friends.

Some examples of false cognates

Sensible in Spanish means sensitive, or even touchy. Sensato is the word for sensible.

Sano in Spanish means healthy or whole, or clean (as in jokes), but not sane. Sane in Spanish is cuerdo—which implies “in his or her right mind”—and sanity is translated cordura, which can also mean prudence.

Sanatorio is a hospital or clinic, and sanitario is a (public) toilet or restroom.

Compromiso means commitment, promise, or engagement (to be married or any other kind), and the word for compromise is componenda, although in Mexico arreglo is commonly heard. Hardly anyone uses the word componenda.

Asistir means to attend (e.g. a meeting or event), — less commonly it may mean ‘to witness’ — but it doesn’t mean ‘to assist.’  If you want to provide help or assistance you would use the word ayudar.

Sometimes the meaning of similar-sounding words is the opposite or entirely different, for example, terso means smooth, not terse, and en absoluto or absolutamente means “absolutely not!”  I absolutely agree would be estoy completamente de acuerdo.

There are many of these pairs of words in English-Spanish, and lists of them can be found with an online search.

English-language influence on Spanish words

The transliteration of English to Spanish can also produce words that don’t exist, and native Spanish speakers who know English are also guilty of this, particularly in business world concepts which have their origin in English.

This increasing brush with the English-speaking world has led to more and more frequent use of the hitherto uncommon disrupción and disruptivo, although there is no such verb as “disrumpir,” according to the Academy, which notes the English influence of the former two words.

The fashionable words, ‘accountable’ and ‘accountability’, cause no end of problems for conference speakers, who frequently end up using the English term with apologies: responsable and responsabilidad are perfectly good words, but the compound noun rendición de cuentas leads to speaker’s block when trying to convert that into an adjective.

The online generation has no such qualms about cognates —false or otherwise— and happily takes computer and internet jargon from its original English and tags on the necessary Spanish endings, including conjugations: uploadear, atachar, taguear, tuitear, rebootear, etc. are among verbs in common use.

Applying grammar as you build vocabulary

One argument used for this approach is that if small children can speak and understand language without knowing grammar, why shouldn’t adults?  This is of course nonsense.  Children may not know it, but when they start to speak they are in fact applying grammar as they gradually build up their vocabulary.

As with other skills that contain a practical and a theoretical side, the theory is useless to anyone who hasn’t got a handle on the basics.  The theory of chess openings is meaningless to someone who hasn’t learned how the pieces move.  An academic could define scales, stops, and intervals until the cows come home and be unable to play the simplest tune.  Reading about the grammatical rules of Spanish before you can say buenos días can test the patience of most.

Grammar is the framework for language mastery

Unless the language student is a fan of grammar for grammar’s sake, this is a sure way to make the language boring, and the learning of it intolerable. Hence the kind of outburst mentioned above.

One advantage of learning —perhaps by heart— a basic set of grammar rules is that they can be applied to new vocabulary and situations with a fair amount of success. One rule for conjugating regular verbs, for example, will be applicable to all those verbs.

Most people agree that Spanish grammar is fairly straightforward, so to learn the basic rules as you go along makes more sense than to reject grammar out of hand as some unnecessary obstacle to speaking and understanding.

In the end, it doesn’t matter whether you learn “book Spanish” first and then add conversation and listening comprehension, or take a conversation course first and then begin to synthesize the rules.

To master the language, you will have to do both in the end.

Expressions of natural wisdom

By analogy or through rhyme, the dichos are supposed to convey time-honored truths that admit no argument. But they can be, and often are, pronounced in such a smug manner as to fit the definition of perogrullada—a word almost onomatopoeic in its ugliness which means, briefly, an obvious truth of such little moment that to utter it is foolishness.

One frequently used phrase, tanto va el cántaro al agua, hasta que se rompe, —or the jug is dipped so often into the water that eventually it breaks— is self-explanatory and can be particularly annoying with its “told you so” tone and presumption of virtue in the inevitable.

Literal translations from English can work, sometimes

Native English speakers will occasionally translate an English saying into Spanish literally, with varied results.  Some are close enough in their equivalent not to matter.  Más vale pájaro en la mano que cientos volando literally means a bird in the hand is worth more than hundreds in flight, quite similar to “a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.”

But a literal rendering of say, “you can’t have your cake and eat it” —no puedes tener tu pastel y comerlo— might cause some amusement even if the hearer realizes you’re saying something like no puedes chiflar y comer pinole, which literally means “you can’t whistle and eat pinole,“¯—a powdery substance made with baked ground corn and sugar.  Figuratively they are about the same.

I haven’t noticed, on the other hand, that English-speaking Mexicans make the same assumption about their own sayings being turned into English.  Rather, they will tell you there is a saying in Spanish, say it, translate it and then explain what it means.  This all makes for longer conversations, but then “time is money” isn’t a phrase that gets much mileage in these latitudes.

English equivalents with alternative imagery

There are plenty of sayings that have English equivalents but use different imagery. Es mejor ser cabeza de ratón, que cola de león, literally means it’s better to be the head of a mouse than the tail of a lion, but its equivalent may well be —in the absence of any rules— better a king among beggars than a beggar among kings.  Cuando el río suena, agua lleva —when the river sounds, it’s carrying water— means about the same as the English “there’s no smoke without fire.”

One puzzling local saying is tirar (echar) la casa por la ventana, which is literally to throw the house out the window, but means simply to spare no expense, usually applied when celebrating something.  A very Mexican expression is cada chango a su mecate—each monkey to his own rope.  This one is self-explanatory, an antidote to busybodies, and has a number of variations in different Spanish speaking countries.

A saying for difficult situations

Finally, for this entry anyway, there is one dicho that may well be true, but which never seems to be applied except at the worst possible time.  No hay mal que por bien no venga.  Literally, there is no bad thing that doesn’t happen for good, similar in meaning to every cloud has a silver lining.  The problem is that people always seem to say it when someone is in great anguish about something awful that has happened.  And a bit like Job, rather than take comfort, one is perhaps inclined to mutter something like the universal con amigos así, ¿quién necesita enemigos?

An ample selection of Mexican sayings can be found online.

Here are some examples:

• The bus won’t arrive until 3 pm, in Mexico would be: el camión llega hasta las 3 pm.
• He didn’t hand in his homework until the next day. Entregó su tarea hasta el otro día.
• I didn’t see your message until I got home. Vi tu mensaje hasta que llegué a la casa.

To the native English speaker this all sounds unnatural, and it’s almost impossible not to want to say “no vi tu mensaje hasta que llegué a la casa.”

For the native Spanish speaker, a negative would suggest that the bus won’t be arriving, the homework wasn’t handed in, and the message wasn’t seen.

The case is quite arguable, and the negative sounds normal in Spanish when the stress is on what didn’t happen until whatever, rather than what did or will happen.

• No lavó los trastes hasta que fue obligado.
  He didn’t wash the dishes until he was forced to.
• No escribió un nuevo blog hasta que desapareció de las listas de Google.
  He didn’t write a new blog until he fell off the Google lists.

On the other side of the same coin, there are expressions in Spanish where the negative is applied when in English it wouldn’t be.

Hace años que no voy a Acapulco, translates into English as “it’s been years since I went to Acapulco.”

English could express this in the negative, with “I haven’t been to Acapulco for years,” —no he ido a Acapulco en años— but Spanish doesn’t have a good non-negative way of saying it.