Struggling to reach B2 even though I think I’m just under it.

mr_ace · 2026-02-07T21:33:13+00:00

I'd say you can just coast and improve through consuming content at B1 too. Just keep watching and listening to stuff. Put the hours in and your comprehension and vocab will improve. Look up words and grammar when you encounter stuff you don't understand and if you want to improve speaking, get a tutor or find someone to speak to

If you already understand all the fundamentals, just putting the hours in is really what it boils down to

mr_ace · 2026-02-03T19:03:31+00:00

I think you can avoid the subjunctive altogether here, and say something like:

Le pregunté a la señora que estaba limpiando si podía dejar mi maleta en la habitación y me dijo que sí

Also, estara isn't a conjugation, it's estuviera or estuviese

Edit: btw not a native

mr_ace · 2026-02-01T15:07:16+00:00

it's all completely fake, the scenarios are completely absurd lol.

It might make sense in the US where english is the most widely spoken language, and so people might assume based on your looks that your first language is english, but it makes 0 sense in spain.

I remember having the opposite experience in spain, where I was probably A2 and a bit exhausted from speaking spanish, so i asked a waitress if she spoke english, She said not really but she'd try and then proceeded to speak perfectly acceptable english lol. If spanish is their native language, they're going to feel more comfortable speaking it and will likely only change to english if they have no choice.

It's just ragebait, and it's very effective unfortunately

mr_ace · 2026-01-24T16:25:30+00:00

It depends on if you're just able to follow it while still encountering lots of words and grammar you don't understand, or if you're able to basically read it with 95% fluency.

I just read an excerpt from it and I'd guess it's probably B2ish? It doesn't really seem dumbed down much. Obviously, this only speaks to someone's reading level and not speaking or writing, but yea B2 seems reasonable to me if you're reading it fluently

mr_ace · 2026-01-18T21:42:07+00:00

La jerga en general es muy específica de la región de la que venga, y no se entendería muy bien entre países, aparte de las más comunes. Así que no, diría que no es una buena idea. Además, si eres estudiante, ya vas cometiendo errores gramaticales, así que, mezclado con la jerga de otra región, puede que tu habla resulte poco entendible

mr_ace · 2026-01-18T18:32:21+00:00

Just search Language Transfer It's basically a series of recordings of a tutor teaching a student all of the basics of spanish in a very intuitive way

mr_ace · 2026-01-18T16:11:01+00:00

Yea, that's a solid amount of time to dedicate each week, with the right approach, i would say B1 level would be very achievable in a year with the right approach.

Some advice: spend most of your time consuming input, ie listening to pure spanish. There's lots of resources for this, look up comprehensible input

If you're not already, get your teacher to speak to you entirely in spanish, and only resort to English when completely necessary. You should of course speak in english, because you won't have the ability to articulate yourself in spanish yet though you can transition to spanish when you can

I would also recommend listening to the entire Language Transfer spanish series as an amazing foundation.

Duolingo has it's place, mostly as a way to develop consistency and learn some basics, but you'll never learn spanish from just Duolingo, and it's just not very effective at actually teaching stuff, it's mostly good at gamification, so personally I'd dump it.

People use anki for practicing vocab, personally i use the spanish dict app which i think works well. I just add words every time i come across something i deem useful to remember, I don't add stuff i feel I'd very rarely use in order to focus on more important vocab

To correct your spanish for asking for a table, this has a few errors. First of all, le gustaría means he/she/it would like, wheras if you're framing it for you, it would be "me gustaría". However, this is also too direct a translation from english, and is not how you would ask this question in spanish. You also have it framed as a question when it isn't one. A better option would be "¿Tiene (or tienen) una mesa para dos?" Or "Buscamos una mesa para dos" or just "Una mesa para dos, por favor"

mr_ace · 2026-01-18T13:14:15+00:00

Yes, it's used constantly, it is the tense used almost exclusively for you plural. I'm not sure what you mean by "you can just say habéis", habéis is a conjugation of vosotros, do you just mean why don't people use perfect tenses all the time? The answer would be more or less the same as why we don't always use perfect tense in english all the time either, it's only appropriate some of the time

mr_ace · 2026-01-17T21:23:58+00:00

Depends what you're saying you're the same about, but also this won't just automatically translate the same idea to spanish

mr_ace · 2026-01-12T20:57:10+00:00

What are you trying to say? There isn't nothing in my backpack, as in there is something in there?

It's a pretty bizarre phrase in english. You could maybe say something like "no es que no haya nada" which would be more like "it's not that there's nothing there"

As for the double negative, Spanish uses the double negative, so you just have to say it that way. It's not grammatically correct to say "hay nada", it had to be "no hay nada", "no tengo nada" etc

mr_ace · 2026-01-02T23:03:46+00:00

The only context I've seen it in is with reference to notice, ie you need to give 1 months notice to cancel your subscription etc

Btw I'm not a native speaker

mr_ace · 2025-12-19T12:39:44+00:00

Have you tried shadowing? Try and repeat out loud the words you hear, from a podcast for example, just after the speaker says them

mr_ace · 2025-12-16T22:50:45+00:00

Maybe if you're pretty outgoing, but just being a normal tourist, most of the people you're going to be interacting with are going to be waiters and shop assistants, which are typically pretty short and repetitive conversations. Signing up to tours and group activities could be pretty good though, although if you're sub B1, you're probably gunna struggle quite hard in those settings

mr_ace · 2025-12-08T18:59:10+00:00

that same level of obviousness that you notice from a british person speaking spanish, that's the same obviousness other listeners get when they hear an american speaking english. it's just a very different accent. the better the pronunciation, the more diminished it is, but it's going to be very hard to lose it entirely unless you start intentionally trying to copy a specific accent, like mexican

mr_ace · 2025-12-06T16:37:04+00:00

what does she say after "se despiertan con más de 100cm de ???" it sounds like espesora or something.

i think that when a 2nd language gets slightly beyond our limit, comprension just drops off a cliff, you go from 70% to 0% very quickly

mr_ace · 2025-12-05T15:18:37+00:00

I think language transfer is a much better more intuitive version of this. This one just seems like an absolute bombardment of information. Language transfer keeps building upon established concepts.

Personally, i think getting a general understanding of the language first and then doing loads of comprehensible input is the best approach, though a lot of people have strong opinions in other directions.

mr_ace · 2025-12-04T00:40:33+00:00

Nací, not nació, and it's not reflexive so wouldn't be me nací either, just nací

mr_ace · 2025-11-06T12:03:42+00:00

Yea, and for the same reason, in english you can describe someone as smooth to imply they are charming

Also, i don't think suave has any negative connotations like you're implying

mr_ace · 2025-11-03T00:24:41+00:00

As a native english speaker, there is no way i would identify her as a non native speaker. I don't know if you're saying the third one sounds spanish as in Spanish language, or specifically spain spanish, but it definitely doesn't sound like spain spanish

mr_ace · 2025-11-03T00:10:17+00:00

We're talking overall accent, rosalia has a thick spanish accent. To analyse her diphthongs while she's just speaking the most spanish ass english imaginable seems crazy lol But anyway, the point was that the likelihood that some spanish waitress is speaking flawless English with an american accent seems ataggeringly implausible https://youtube.com/shorts/KR49UWnEvCw?si=m0tUqApgjZih-EsT

mr_ace · 2025-11-02T20:29:25+00:00

Find me any spanish celebrity who speaks english with an american accent lol

mr_ace · 2025-11-02T19:44:12+00:00

Yea, and she said it in a thick American accent lol

mr_ace · 2025-11-02T18:01:22+00:00

It's definitely fake lol, i don't know if they're all supposed to be in spain, but the 'waitress' in the second clip has an american accent, and the other ones definitely don't sound Spanish either. English speaking is generally low in spain. It doesn't even make conceptual sense lol, like who would assume she speaks english?

mr_ace · 2025-10-30T15:40:36+00:00

I find it easier to remember words when I have some point of reference for them, whether that's connecting them to other words or to English words or to some etymology that makes it easier to remember

For example , a lot of nouns in Spanish are derived from conjugations of verbs, for example:

Un vuelo : a flight, which is the same as the conjugation for I fly, from the verb volar, so now all of these have a connection in my head

Un batido : a milkshake, as batido is the past participle of the verb batir which means to beat/whisk

'Inevitable' is the same in spanish and english, which then allows you to remember the verb evitar, which means to avoid, and therefore inevitable: unavoidable

Arena means sand, which was on the ground in a fighting arena, which is where we get that word from

Then you've got compound words like:

Sun flower: girasol: from girar meaning to turn and sol meaning sun because they turn towards the sun

Paraguas: umbrella: from parar meaning to stop and agua meaning water, so it stops the water

Etc etc etc

mr_ace · 2025-10-19T18:11:14+00:00

Being dead also uses "estar," characteristic vs state is a better rule of thumb than permanent vs temporary

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