de qué estás hablando, Willis?

The dialect spoken in Argentina (as well as in Chile and Uruguay) is much different from any other in Latin America and certainly Spain. Many of the words (seemingly all of the more common ones and much of the grammar even) differ greatly from my castellano madrileño. Intonation (replete with effusive hand gestures) is much more akin to Italian (the largest ethnic group in the capital) and there are many borrowings from English, German, French and indigenous languages, specifically Guaraní.

As in much of Latin America, the preterit or simple past (hablé) is used instead of the present perfect (he hablado) and direct object pronouns (lo, la) replace indirect objects (le).

When attempting to speak like the locals, with their ‘ž’ and their ‘š’ for ‘y’ (as in yo = sho) and ‘ll’ (calle = cazhe) and unable to refrain from zezeando – that lispy Spanish ‘th’ for c’s and z’s many of you hate (cerveza = therbetha) – I found myself literally frothing at the mouth and basically sounded like a Brit trying to imitate a Southerner.

Which was quite unnecessary. The locals seem to love my accent and the feeling is mutual, thank you. About 95% of the locals thought I was Spanish, while others guessed French or Brazilian for some reason.

I spent my first weekend there almost exclusively with Spaniards, only partly by accident, in order to firm up my accent. All of the new argentino words, expressions and patterns of speech were, however, surprisingly easy to learn (the second person singular or familiar ‘vos’ form, used instead of ‘tú’ is, for example, almost without exception, entirely regular as well as terribly quaint.

People are incredibly friendly, which extends to the way they speak and what they talk about. No subject is off limits and their curiosity knows no bounds – examples: a particular waiter seemed obsessed with the progress of my laundry and a taxi driver asked me the size of my penis. They do most of the talking – and literally will not shut up - they go on and on and on. It may surprise you to learn that I enjoyed the break.