B1 Spanish
You can follow a normal conversation between Peruvians, most of the time. What holds you back now is not vocabulary — it is the past tenses, the pronouns, and hearing what people actually mean.
Everything at B1
- Pretérito vs imperfecto: the question to ask instead
Spanish has two past tenses and English has one, so the rule has to come from somewhere other than translation. The question that decides it, every time.
Unit: The past The past
- Lo, la, le: Spanish object pronouns without the panic
Direct and indirect object pronouns, which is which, where they go, and the two orders that trip people up. With the Peruvian usage that differs.
Unit: Pronouns Pronouns
- How to roll the Spanish R (and when you do not have to)
The trilled RR is one muscle movement, not a talent. What your tongue is actually doing, three ways in, and the words where a single R is enough.
Unit: Sounds Pronunciation
- The vowel habits your own language smuggles into Spanish
Spanish vowels never reduce, never diphthongise and never nasalise. The three habits English and Portuguese speakers carry over, and how to hear them.
Unit: Sounds PronunciationFor Portuguese speakers
- Ser and estar in the past: era, fue, estaba, estuvo
Four past forms for two verbs. Era describes and fue narrates; estaba is the state you were in and estuvo is a stretch that ended.
Unit: The past Ser and estarThe pastPeruvian Spanish
- The Spanish conditional: would, politeness, and guessing
One set of endings on the whole infinitive, twelve irregular stems shared with the future, and three jobs — hypotheticals, softened requests and speculation.
Unit: The conditional ConditionalsRegister and politeness
- The Spanish past progressive: estaba + gerundio
Estaba haciendo is how you say "was doing" — but Spanish reaches for it far less than English, because the imperfect already carries that meaning.
Unit: The past The pastPeruvian Spanish
- Solía, and why the imperfecto already means “used to”
Iba already means "used to go". Solía ir adds emphasis, and estar acostumbrado a is a different thing entirely — here is which one you need.
Unit: The past The pastPeruvian Spanish
- Alguna vez, nunca, jamás: ever and never in Spanish
Alguna vez asks whether you have ever done something; nunca and jamás answer no. Where each one goes, and when Spanish doubles the negative.
Unit: The perfect The pastPeruvian Spanish
- Ya, ya no, todavía, todavía no: the four combinations
Ya is "already" or "right now", ya no is "not anymore", todavía is "still" and todavía no is "not yet". Four boxes, and what Peru does with ya.
Unit: The perfect The pastPeruvian SpanishJoining ideas
- The Spanish simple future: -ré, and what Peruvians use it for
Peruvians say voy a for real plans. The -ré future does most of its work guessing about the present — estará en casa means "he's probably home".
Unit: The future The presentPeruvian Spanish
- Real conditionals in Spanish: si + present, and what follows
If it rains, we don't go. Si takes the present indicative — never the present subjunctive — and the other half can be a present, a future or a command.
Unit: Conditionals ConditionalsPeruvian Spanish
- Whose in Spanish: ¿de quién es? and cuyo
De quién asks who something belongs to. Cuyo joins two ideas and agrees with the thing owned — but almost nobody says cuyo out loud.
Unit: Questions Asking questionsPeruvian Spanish
- Interesado or interesante? The -ado / -ante split
Estoy interesado is about you; es interesante is about the thing. The same split runs through preocupado, emocionado, agotado and a dozen more.
Unit: Vocabulary traps AdjectivesSer and estar
- Diminutives or augmentatives? Choosing the ending
Same noun, two endings, two different sentences. How -ito and -azo, -ón, -ote split the work in Peru, and why the system is not symmetrical.
Unit: Word formation Peruvian SpanishRegister and politeness
- Spanish for accessible tourism: the words, and the current ones
Ramps, signage, guide dogs and staff training in Spanish — plus which disability terms are current in Peru, which are dated, and why person-first order matters.
- Spanish for art: materials, movements and saying what you think
The vocabulary of the studio and the gallery — pigments, canvas, movements — and the one grammar rule art talk forces: negated opinions take the subjunctive.
- Spanish for architects: the vocabulary of a building
Parts of a building, periods, drawings and the tools on the desk — the Spanish architects actually use, plus ser and estar for describing what you see.
- Spanish for tourism: booking, arriving and staying
The vocabulary of planning a trip, getting through the airport and checking into a hotel in Peru — plus why travel advice is written in the infinitive.
- Spanish for the performing arts: stage, cast and performance
Theatre, dance, circus and opera vocabulary — who does what backstage, plus the impersonal se that almost every sentence about a production uses.
- Spanish for photography: the camera, the light, the shot
Aperture, ISO, focus and the genres — the Spanish photographers use, grouped the way you actually talk, plus the verb-to-noun pattern that builds half of it.
- Spanish for colonial architecture in Peru
Balconies, patios, cloisters and sillar — the vocabulary for reading a Peruvian colonial street, and the verbs for talking about it.
Buildings and architectureArt and craftGetting aroundPeruvian Spanish
- In Peru, "de repente" means maybe — not suddenly
In Peru "de repente" means maybe, not suddenly. One of the highest-value differences between Peruvian and textbook Spanish, and how to hear it correctly.
- What does "ya pe" mean in Peruvian Spanish?
"Pe" is a reduced form of "pues" and it ends a great many Peruvian sentences. What it does, why it barely translates, and why not to use it yet.