SPANGLISH. What a wonderful invention this is for we struggling expats. For those too grand to have to resort to such tactics, it’s the same as Franglais but with a different accent – identical principles apply. Hands are the most important ingredient of the vocabulary, which is why telephone conversations are so difficult. At least they are for me. It’s a good job that video phones aren’t yet commonplace in Spain or the whole world would realise that my (much praised, for some unfathomable reason) conversational Spanish is no more than a big bluff. I’m sure I’m not alone in desperately wanting to speak better Spanish, but find it difficult to get beyond a certain level. It’s not much use being able to ask the questions (eg directions, instructions, price, time etc) in a cut-glass accent if you then don’t understand the answers. And this is where hand signals come in. What is it with Brits anyway? Whenever there’s a European news story which concerns ordinary people, the camera crews go over and hey presto, there’s a dustman who speaks English – usually with a sexy Sacha Distel or Seve Ballasteros accent. I venture to suggest, though, that there aren’t many Brits-in-the-street who could burst into fluent French or Spanish at the drop of a shovel. And over here, we’ve all seen the medallion brigade trying to put – ie shout -- their point across to a baffled Spaniard….. But I digress, as always. So there you are in the shop. You know what you want, but you can’t see it. So you start to describe it. One of my newly-arrived work colleagues wanted a colander. Not easy, you’ll admit. In the end, she resorted to miming: “Spaghetti in; water in. Water out of bottom; spaghetti still in top..” to her astonishment – and relief, it has to be said – the wise shop owner immediately said: “Si” and went off to fetch one. But imagine what could have happened if she hadn’t been able to mime it as well. England 0, Spain 1. My own favourite experience, soon after arriving here four years ago, was shopping for an egg-timer. Having drawn a total blank with various pantomimes concerning ‘huevos,’ I was becoming desperate. My shopkeeper did not speak a word of English – or rather, wouldn’t admit to any, which was possibly not the same thing at all – and so my limited Spanish was stretched beyond endurance. Finally, after much wringing of hands and shaking of heads, I hit on the key. Kitchen, I said. Cooking (all in Spanish, I hope you’re impressed). Time (minutos)….mime looking at watch….then I said: “tick, tick, tick, PING!” The proverbial dropped with a resounding clang and off he trotted with a beaming smile, coming back with the goods. I felt as though I’d climbed Everest. And then of course there’s lateral thinking. My husband, having been despatched to the euphemistically-named ‘country store’ for a bale of shavings for my horse’s stable, faced a similar linguistic dilemma. Much shaking of heads again and then (with liberal use of hand signals): caballo – pause to mime ‘giddy-up,’ clip-clop (I just wished I’d seen it!) – sleep (mime snoring) – cama. That did the trick. But another colleague had a friend who went further. She bought a lamp which subsequently stopped working. Back she went to the 100 peseta shop where, como siempre, the owner spoke no English. Sadly, she knew even less Spanish than the afore-mentioned personas and so resorted to the time-honoured British solution of putting her point across very slowly, VERY LOUDLY and with plenty of ‘o’s’ on the end of words for good measure and regional accuracy. Lampo broko, she maintained, not once but several times. The shopkeeper was not amused and, as far as she was able to ascertain, told her to vacate his premises (loose translation.) No, she insisted. LAMPO BROKO. This went on for several minutes. Eventually, with an angry queue now lining up behind her, the owner gave in. Despairingly, he opened his till and gave her 20 euros back. It was only when she got home that she realised she hadn’t bought it in that shop in the first place – and that was what the poor guy had obviously been trying to tell her. Viva Spanglish.

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