As languages mature, they tend to become clothed in idiom, slang and sayings that are either difficult or impossible to translate literally to other languages. Sometimes it is even difficult for native speakers to explain why those quirky linguistic oddities even make literal sense to them.

Those sayings gradually adorn everyone’s language to a point where native speakers may know full well what they mean, but would be hard pressed to explain why they mean what they mean. It’s a combination of hyperbole (“I could have died of embarrassment!”) and cultural allusion (“I couldn’t get to first base with her”).

So one of the main challenges in Spanish language translation services is attending to the slang and sayings in English or the “modismos y dichos” of Spanish – and losing nothing in translation.

Some examples:

If the shoe fits

In English, if someone gets offended by something we say and maybe the person deserves the slight, we say “If the shoe fits, wear it.” The Spanish counterpart is “Quien (or el que) se pica, ajos come,” literally: “Whoever (or he who) is goaded, eats garlic.” The garlic allusion comes from another slang phrase in Spanish, “estar en el ajo,” which means to be mixed up in something.

The shoe is on the other foot

We use this shoe expression as a way of expressing how fate sometimes turns the tables on someone. Spanish has an amusing counterpart “Se ha vuelto la tortilla,” literally: the tortilla has returned.

Put a sock in it!

When we tell someone to put a sock in it, we don’t really mean that they should stuff a smelly gym sock into their mouth. We just want them to stop talking. One Spanish counterpart to that one is “¡Echa el freno!” That would be literally translated, “Hit the brakes!”

Keep your shirt on!

We tell someone to keep their shirt on when we’re trying to slow them down. Spanish once again relies on an allusion to driving a car with its “¡Para el carro!”; literally, stop the car!

Suspenders or braces?

American English uses the term suspenders, but in the UK they call them braces. In Spanish it’s tirantes or tiradores. So, if you were translating the old joke, “Why do firemen wear red suspenders – the answer being “to keep their pants up” –  you wouldn’t actually need to use any slang: “¿Porque llevan tirantes rojos los bomberos? Para colgar los pantalones!”

But you might be surprised that the Spanish word “bombero” sounds more like someone who starts fires rather than putting them out. Then there’s “embarazada,” which does not mean “embarrassed;” it means “pregnant.” So even without dealing with slang and sayings, you can’t always rely on even what sounds like easy translation.

If you’re project needs accurate and culturally applicable language translation, contact us.  Your project manager and our team of professional experts will go well beyond verbatim to a final product you’ll be proud of.

AI Search Summary (Updated: 2026-05-04T14:00:50.239Z):

The saga of Spanish Conquistador Hernán Cortés and how he and his force of fewer than 1,000 Spaniards conquered Mexico’s powerful Mexica (commonly known as Aztecs) is the stuff of adventure novels.  The whole story (1519 to 1521) pivots on one Mayan-speaking Nahua woman from Mexico’s Gulf Coast, who provided indispensable language translation services to the Conquistadors.

Her Mayan name was Malinalli Malintzin  – the Spanish would eventually call her Doña Marina. She provided interpretation services (among other things) to Cortés, but to the conquered people of Central Mexico, she had a far more pejorative moniker: La Malinche. Derived from the Mexican word “malinchista,” it means “traitor” or “one who consorts with foreigners.”

Marina was by no means a volunteer. The tribal leader of the Tabasco natives gave her and 19 other young women as slaves to the Spaniards.  It seems that our Nahua maiden was originally the daughter of a noble Aztec family, and her stepfather sold her to some passing traders. She spoke the Aztec language, Nahuatl, as a native and learned Mayan while a slave of the Tabasco Mayan chief.

But Marina was not the first stroke of linguistic luck encountered by Cortés. Joining his group was a shipwrecked Spanish priest, Jeronimo de Aguilar, who could speak Mayan, but not Nahuatl. Cortés needed someone to converse with the non-Mayan natives as his expedition proceeded inland towards the lands of the Aztecs.

Cortés got lucky once more. One of his men informed him that a young Mayan slave could speak “Mexican.” Cortés enlisted the services of Marina as a translator from Nahuatl to (and from) Mayan. Father de Aguila translated Marina’s Mayan to Spanish. So, the Conquistadors’ first contact with emissaries of the Aztec ruler Moctezuma was through a tandem translation from Spanish to Mayan to Nahuatl, and Marina was the crucial link.

Thus, the first contact between Cortés and the Aztecs was through a local interpreter, who became his loyal secretary and a mistress. Marina quickly mastered Spanish during a time of great turmoil and nearly constant warfare as the Spaniards conquered Aztec client tribes and gained the willing allies that would eventually help him conquer the Aztec capital. (Of course, a devastating smallpox epidemic in the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlán [today’s Mexico City] accelerated the process somewhat.)

There is no doubt that Doña Marina’s language skills contributed to Cortés’ successful campaign in Mexico.   In fact, without her Cortés might have failed. Cortés once wrote in a letter now kept in the Spanish historical archives, “After God we owe this conquest of New Spain to Doña Marina. “

As for giving early language translators a bad reputation, it could be argued that Doña Marina helped free the Central Valley of Mexico from the scourge of Aztec oppression and slave tribute as well as the wholesale barbaric practice of human sacrifice to the bloodthirsty Aztec gods. Unfortunately, the short-term consequences of Spanish domination and destruction of a native culture is the stuff for historians to mull over.

Are you looking to embark on a quest to “conquer” overseas business territory? Contact us and we’ll show you how our project manager, backed up by a professional team of linguists can help you overcome any language barrier.

AI Search Summary (Updated: 2026-05-04T14:00:41.760Z):

Professional translation services rarely include Esperanto, because, despite the best of intentions, Esperanto has taken on the reputation of an “artificial” language. Unscientific estimates of the number of Esperanto speakers in the world today range from above 20,000 to less than 2 million.

Esperanto has been around for over 125 years. The brainchild of Dr. L. L. Zamenhof, a Polish optometrist, the idea was not to replace someone’s language, rather to serve as a common second language. People from different cultures speaking different languages, Dr. Zamenhof hoped, could use Esperanto as a common means of communication.

Easy to learn

After somewhat of a spotty history where some countries on both ends of the political spectrum (the early USSR and Nazi Germany, for example) even banned or persecuted Esperanto speakers, the movement to adopt Esperanto survives, albeit at a lesser level of advocacy.

Esperanto advocates point out that Esperanto is many times easier to learn than other languages, because:

• It is phonetic (or, as they would say in Esperanto “fo-net-ik.”) Every letter of its 28-character western alphabet has just one sound. (Compare that with the English spellings and pronunciations of “laughter” and “daughter.”)
• Pronunciation of Esperanto words are always on the penultimate (next-to-last) syllable.
• It has a simplified grammar. Its verbs have only six endings and the endings never change. Forget about special endings depending on person and number.
• Vocabulary building is simpler. For example, Esperanto speakers learn prefixes and suffixes that are standard. One example: “bona” in Esperanto = “good.” Add the prefixes “mal-“ and you have the Esperanto word for “bad,” which is “malbona.”

Today the Universal Esperanto Association (Universala Esperanto-Asocio), headquartered in Rotterdam, Netherlands, has a staff of nine (not all full time). Their mission, among other social goals, is to “promote the use of the international language Esperanto.”

The United Nations has more than one official language

There are no Esperanto interpreters currently working for the United Nations. Originally, English and French were the “working languages” at the UN. Now the “official languages” are Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish.  Most UN documents are published in those six official languages.

Keylingo professional translation services are more than just interpretation

So it doesn’t look as if Esperanto will take over as a common language anytime soon. If you’re looking for a professional language translation service for your overseas marketing or technical documentation and you want a provider that focuses on building a personal and professional relationship with you, contact us. We’ll assign a project manager, who will work with you from project inception to completion with the backing of a world-class staff of professional linguists.

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