In the Garlic - Spain from A - Z
by Ben Curtis
3 years ago my youngest sister arrived in Spain for a 12 month Erasmus study abroad program with little or no Spanish. Within months she was teaching Marina who, of course, is as Spanish as you can get, new words and phrases she’d never come across before. Part of her secret ‘learn Spanish sickeningly fast’ recipe involved sitting up in bed at night reading through the dictionary, picking out words that both fascinated her and later just stuck, for good. Sickening.
Anyway, much the same approach that my sister used to get ahead in Spanish could also be applied to Spanish culture, with Valerie Collins and Theresa O’Shea’s book In the Garlic. It’s an amusingly written A-Z of practically every aspect of Spanish culture you could begin to imagine, from Almuerzo (mid morning snacks) to Zara (Spanish version of Gap, sort of), via Chiringuito (beach-side or fiesta bar or restaurant/shack), Gilipuertas (polite version of Gilipollas - idiot) and Payo (gypsy term for non-gypsies). Apply my sister’s bedtime reading technique to this dictionary of Spain and you’ll soon be teaching Marina things she never knew about her own country!
But seriously, do you need this book? Well, here’s a little test. If you know what all of the following mean then you are definitely en el ajo (in the garlic = in the know) enough not to need it at all:
Llave inglesa, pataleo, piñata, selectividad, callista, dominguero, Ikastola.
How did you do? Definitions in the comments below please, and remember, if that little list completely stumped you, the book is available here!
Posted: June 2nd, 2007 under Guidebooks, Non-fiction, Culture, Current Affairs, Spain Books.
Comments: 9
Comments
Comment from Frank
Time: June 2, 2007, 10:06 am
Uuuum? Must confess to only knowing four, so perhaps I should buy it! Only yesterday in a class “dar el callo” came up in a text, but I still didn’t get callista, I’d have put podólogo. However, I see callista is perfectly acceptable.
Ikastola is of Basque origin, so I’ll forgive myself for not knowing that! I’ve always like dominguero, here they normally wear a flat cap as well! Can you keep the examples coming, save me buying the book, I’ve already got far too many!
Comment from Sakkio
Time: June 2, 2007, 12:04 pm
Llave inglesa: adjustable wrench.
Pataleo: temper tantrum.
Piñata: piñata.
Selectividad: sat or act
Callista: never heard this one before but my grandfather was a podologo.
Dominguero: sunday driver.
Ikastola: euskara for school.
Comment from Steve
Time: June 2, 2007, 12:13 pm
I have had personal experience of llave ingles, my neigrbour threatened me with one, but having fights with neighbours is not exactly a good method I would recommend for learning Spanish
Comment from luke
Time: June 3, 2007, 10:06 am
Accepting “Sunday driver” as correct, we’ve got another defn of Dominguero: “someone who likes to party a lot”.
Comment from Edith
Time: June 3, 2007, 10:26 am
Wow, this book should be on any vocab fiend’s wish list! 
I only knew the meaning of ‘llave inglés’ and ‘piñata’ (which is a household word in Mexico).
Comment from Edith
Time: June 3, 2007, 10:44 am
I just read one of the book’s excerpts, ‘Con Franco vivíamos mejor’ by author Valerie Collins. It never ceases to amaze me how much Spain has changed over the past few decades - kudos to this country for re-joining the European family so fast and so well. Telling is story is an excellent antidote to the prejudiced, anti-Spanish attitudes which still exist in some parts of Europe (—> ‘Spanish people are lazy, undemocratic and inefficient’). Astonishingly, the former GDR (DDR - German Democratic Republic) is still lagging behind in many respects, due to its economic recession.
Comment from Theresa
Time: June 4, 2007, 5:03 pm
Llave inglesa: monkey wrench
Pataleo: A temper tantrum
Piñata: papier mache figure filled with candies, hung from a rope. Blindfolded kids hit it with a stick to break it open.
Selectividad: The exam you must take to get into college in Spain.
Callista: A colloquial way of saying podologist.
Dominguero: Spaniard out for a Sunday in the countryside. Usually you find whole families who park their cars and set up their little folding table next to them to have their lunch, and they cause most of the traffic jams when returning home on Sunday evenings.
Ikastola: Special schools in the Basque country where people send their kids to learn Basque and to soak up Basque culture.
Did I pass? Now, can you tell me who Marisol was, who sings “Mi Carro”, and who did the comedy sketch “Empanadillas de Móstoles”?
Comment from Ben
Time: June 4, 2007, 8:13 pm
OK, so I think you got all of them amongst you, but just to clarify the books answers:
Llave inglesa - monkey wrench
pataleo - throwing a tantrum
piñata - cardboard box filled with sweets, hung from the ceiling and bashed by kids with sticks until the sweets fall out
selectividad - university entrance exam
callista - chiropodist
dominguero - sunday drivers/trippers
Ikastola - Basque school
So, do you need the book or not 
?
Comment from Margot
Time: April 26, 2008, 4:10 pm
Just stumbled upon this post (a year later evidently) and ordered the book from Amazon. Armed with both your wonderful new compendium of expressions and this - I’ll have no excuse to not sound like a native (HA!….that’ll be the day tho’ hope springs eternal.as I creep toward that ever receding goal…….
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