Numbers Booboos



There are people, on the other hand, who unknowingly desecrate this powerful language. It is a common sight to witness men displaying wrong interpretation of Spanish numbers. Spanish as a language warrants better treatment!

A popular case of this is Chad Johnson from the National Football League. The words “ocho cinco” are spelled out above the numeral 85 of his jersey. If he displays more respect for Spanish, he will know that the proper interpretation of 85 is “ochenta y cinco.”

Writing dates in Spanish words is also a victim of number blunder. For starters, US dates are expressed in month-date-year while Spanish dates are spelled out in date/month/year – this is particularly true for dates are written only in numbers. On the other hand, if the dates are expressed as a combination of words and numbers, the proper manner of writing them in Spanish is 14 de augusto 2008; take note that the said language does not require the capitalization of the first letter of the month.

Avoiding Number Blunders

There's no better way in avoiding these booboos than in practicing your knowledge on the Spanish number system. If you do manage to memorize these numbers, you would have no problem calling them out in the correct order.

Benefits of Knowing

If you work in large corporations, you'll encounter shipping documents that have both English and Spanish information. You might also be faced with communication lapses when you have to make or take orders using the phone or email. Therefore, it is to your advantage if you know the right numbers as Spanish has an almost completely dissimilar number system from English.

If you are into Mexican food, there's more reason for you to learn Spanish numbers. Many restaurants catering to Mexican food speak very little or no English at all. Thus, to avoid unnecessary stress as a result of miscommunication, might as well find time to learn those Spanish numbers.

If you happen to be in Miami or Los Angeles, surely you must have bumped into Spanish-speaking individuals whose English needs a little work. Or, if they happen to speak English, they would still prefer to utilize their native language. At least, if you know Spanish, you can get around town easily sans the fear of communication breakdowns as a result of misunderstandings about the fare and distance, si?

Overall, knowing your Spanish language lets you learn the language altogether more swiftly. Do you know that Spanish numbers can function as pronouns, too? This is applicable to both cardinal numbers and ordinal numbers, but only when these stand for the number and a noun that's either omitted or understood. At the outset, this concept seems confusing but as you go further with your Spanish lessons, you will find out that this makes perfect sense.

Así pues, ahora comience sus lecciones españolas y aumente su número de amigos y de negocio.