Sometimes in English and Spanish we have words that sound and look very similar but the meaning can be is quite different. They are called False Friends. Do you want to see some?
Let’s go!
If you are listening to two friends talking and you hear that one of them needs “an avocado tonight”, perhaps, you will think that he is in some legal problem that needs to be solved immediately. But perhaps he is thinking about the dinner that he is going to serve to his friends. In Spanish “abogado” means lawyer, something quite different from the fruit avocado.
Here’s another one. You are having a walk with your sister, suddenly you feel tired and need to stop to rest. In Spanish, you will look for a “banco” and perhaps thinking that this word has in English the same double meaning than in Spanish, you will go to the next person you find and ask for a “bank“, but then he would indicate the nearest place where you can put your money, but not the “bench” that you are probably looking for.
This one is REALLY important!!! Imagine that you awake one morning feeling really bad and you call one of your colleagues at work and say to her, “Sorry, today I can’t make it, I feel really constipated“. Careful! because what you probably wanted to say was that you were feeling ill or that you have a cold. In English, if you say that you are constipated, it means that you can’t go to the toilet normally, so perhaps it is not exactly something that you would share with your colleagues.
And last but not least, what would happen if you really think that what someone said to you was a “grocery“. Sure, you want to express that someone was mean or rude to you, but what you were talking about was a food shop.
So, next time you want to use your imagination to find the correct word, better think twice and do not fall in the arms of these false friends!
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