Today’s Vine is by Zaifer4, from Santander, Spain.

(we also saw Zaifer4 in last Monday’s post on “por eso”)

In this Vine, Zaifer is criticizing some woman across the street for not taking good enough care of her dog.  At the end of the Vine, we realize Zaifer is doing a similar thing herself.

The Vine

Transcript

• Señora, ¡tiene un perro en el tejano!
• Qué poca vergüenza.
• ¿Verdad, Timmy?
• ¡A que es horrible!

Explanation

• Ma’am, you have a dog on your roof!
• What little shame. [as in, “you should be ashamed of yourself!”]
• Right, Timmy? [Timmy is Zaifer’s dog]
• Isn’t it horrible!

Notice that she uses the formal “usted” tense: to say “you have a dog,” she says “tiene un perro” instead of “tienes un perro.”  This is because she is talking to a stranger or acquaintance, conceivably older than she is (as evidenced by Zaifer’s use of “señora” when addressing her).

Useful Words and Phrases

• la vergüenza = shame / embarrassment
  • ¡Qué poca vergüenza! = How little shame! / You should be ashamed!
  • Tener verguenza = to have shame / to be embarrassed.
  • Tengo vergüenza = I have shame / I am embarrassed.

• la verdad = the truth
  • ¿Verdad? = Right?
  • see also: previous post, “tu cara es un poema”

•  a que + _____= [this is an expression, used to say “isn’t this ____!”]
  • ¡a que sí! = Right? / Aren’t I right? / I bet it’s “yes”!
  • ¡a que no sabes! = I bet you don’t know! / Aren’t I right that you don’t know?
  • ¡a que es horrible! = Isn’t it horrible! / Aren’t I right that it’s horrible?

• el perro = the dog
  • It’s got a double r, so make sure to roll it.  If you don’t, it might come out sounding like pedo, which means “fart.”

•  el tejano = the roof

The main takeaways from this Vine, for me, are the use of vergüenza for shame and embarrassment, and the phrase a que… which is nifty, useful, and native-sounding, especially in Spain.  

Also, since there is relatively little dialogue, and it moves more slowly, this is a good Vine to try to recreate yourself, by saying each of the lines out loud.  Extra points if you can say them indignantly and dramatically.

¡A que es un buen Vine!