Ok, you may be wondering why I've decided to upload a picture of John Paul II to this post.  After all, this isn't a Catholic blog - it's a Spain blog.  Well, my loyal readers, the reason is simple.  You see, this image illustrates a point.  The image came from a popular pamphlet distributed by the Catholic Church in Spain and the caption of the image proves that the vosotros verb form is used quite often in Spain ("venid" and "veréis" are both verbs conjugated for vosotros). 

Many Americans (including myself) struggle with the vosotros form of verbs in Spanish because in the United States it is typical to teach Latin American Spanish rather than the Spanish of Spain.  Since vosotros does not exist in Latin American Spanish, many students of Spanish from the USA do not learn how to conjugate verbs in the vosotros form.  That's why I've decided to put together this little summary of how to conjugate verbs in the vosotros form.  I figure that other Americans like myself are probably interested in studying in Spain and need to know how to conjugate verbs for vosotros in order to communicate in Spain successfully. 

First, I should mention here that vosotros is the informal version of ustedes (just like tú is the informal version of usted).  In other words, you would want to use vosotros when you're talking to a group of friends.  Also remember that vosotros is only used in Spain (not Latin America).  Now that we have that straight, I'd like to list a summary of the conjugation of vosotros below along with some simple examples of how the verb is used....

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I just wanted to write a quick post for those of you who use iGoogle as your home page.  You see, Abroad in Spain now has an iGoogle Gadget that is TOTALLY FREE and will allow you to check out what is new on the site from the comfort of your iGoogle homepage. 

Getting the new gadget is easy.  Simply click here to install the Abroad in Spain Gadget on your iGoogle page.  You can also use the link in the left menu bar to install the gadget.  It's that simple!

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There is a joke in Spain that says that José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, the current Prime Minister of Spain, looks a lot like Mr. Bean, the ridiculous British comedy character.  I've decided to place a little image above to allow you to compare the two.  Zapatero, of course, is on the left and Mr. Bean is on the right.  What do you think?  Maybe the two were brothers separated at birth....

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In recent years immigrants have been arriving to Spain in swarms looking for better lives.  They have mainly come from places like Africa, Romania, Bulgaria, and some South American countries like Colombia.  Immigration, of course, is something that Spain hasn't really had to deal with much before and the topic of immigration nowadays is quite "hot" in the country.  In fact, Spaniards are now finding themselves faced with the question of what to do with immigrants arriving to Spain.  But those immigrants who are just arriving are not the only worry of Spaniards; according to this recent article in El País, the future of the sons and daughters of new immigrants is also uncertain. 

According to the article, many sons and daughters of immigrants in Spain are experiencing a sort of "identity crisis."  They aren't "Spaniards" because they were born of foreign parents and don't "look like Spaniards;" however, they also don't really associate themselves with the culture from which their parents came because they have been living in Spain practically all their lives and have in essence been removed from their "home land" before they really had time to live there.  The article also goes into issues of teasing and discrimination that many sons and daughters of immigrants can face at school and when looking for jobs.  Still, despite these hardships, the article mentions that most immigrants do not regret their decision to move to Spain.

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I read a lot in Spanish and have decided to add a category to this site entitled "Books" in which I will post information about some of the best "Spanish-related" books that I have read and that I think my readers could be interested in.  To kick-off this new section of the site, I'd like to tell you about a book by Spaniard Ramón Sampedro, a man with a tremendous will... to die....

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Ok, so you may be wondering what people in pirate hats and bears eating madroño tress (does the bear thing really happen anywhere??) have in common.  Well, these are both pictures that I took during previous trips that I made to Spain.  In fact, I have made two previous trips to Spain and the trip that I am currently planning for will be my third one (as you can tell, I really like the country).  Anyway, I thought it would be appropriate for me to write a short post explaining a little about my previous experiences in Spain....

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I just wanted to write a small post to comment on my site's new look.  Now that the college semester is over and I'm no longer student teaching, I have had more time to do some work on the site.  As you can see, I completely re-designed the page and (I think) made it a bit easier to read and navigate....

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It's been a few days since I was notified that I won a scholarship to go to Spain, and now that I've had time to let it "sink in," I thought I'd write a short post to let everyone know my deepest, innermost thoughts (well, not really that deep).  As you can see from the "thumbs-up" picture of me above, the first thing that comes to mind when I think about the scholarship is GOOOOOOOD GOING!!!!

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I want to start off by saying that I'm sorry that I haven't updated this page in a while.  I was student teaching (in Spanish) this semester and got quite busy designing lessons toward the end, so... I haven't had time to get online.  My student teaching is now over (I got an A+) and I should have time to write on a more regular basis now.

The second (and more important) thing that I'd like to mention in this entry is that I was recently notified that I was awarded the scholarship that I applied for to go to Spain and teach English.

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Just the other day I got together the last supporting documents I needed for my scholarship to go to Spain and I just mailed them out yesterday.  Now, all I have to do is sit back, relax, and PRAY that they give me a scholarship. hehe  I'm thinking that my chances are good, but I'll keep you posted on my status. 

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