Mexico

[The Johnny]

I personally wish to emigrate to a 1st world country.

But i dont want to leave my father behind and i chose to get a college degree first.

[Jasper]

I spent a few weeks in Ensenada a while ago.  The fish tacos were memorable, and the air was nice.  But avoid the local coffee.  Mine tasted very much the way pee smells. 

[LMNO]

Argentinians may be douchebags, but I loved Buenos Aires.

[The Johnny]

Argentinians may be douchebags, but I loved Buenos Aires.

And the chicks are hot.

[LMNO]

Damn straight.

And, when I was there 3 years ago, there was the beginnings of a Gay Pride movement.  Our hotel was across the street from "The Gay Wine Shop".  Srsly.

[The Johnny]

Damn straight.

Not exactly the most accurate adjective in the context of a gay parade 

[LMNO]

I am a teeming mass of contradictions.  Deal with it.

[East Coast Hustle]

good links. My spanish outside of the kitchen isn't very good and my Mexican is even worse, but I think I can get the gist of it with some patience.

lol dude, "mexican" is spanish.

The only other language south from here is portuguese i think (except french in the guyana i guess).

Portuguese btw is insane - i can read it, but no way can i understand it when its spoken.

yeah, but Mexican spanish and Caribbean spanish are about as similar as American english and Scottish english.

for example, I worked in a restaurant in St .Thomas with a chef who had lived in the DF for 7 years. His Mexican spanish was impeccable. He put "Drunken Duck" on the board as a daily special one monday, monday being the day that all the Puerto Ricans come to STT to do their jewelry shopping.

"Pato" does not mean "duck" in island spanish. It means "faggot". I have never before seen an entire restaurant (staff AND customers) break out in simultaneous hysterical sobbing laughter.

[Cain]

Also, for any European Spanish speakers, there is a small but significant difference between Castillian Spanish and American Spanish.  No lisping is one of the benefits, but I would definitely say there are more basic linguistic differences than there are between, say, British and American English.

[Fredfredly ⊂(◉‿◉)つ]

Also, for any European Spanish speakers, there is a small but significant difference between Castillian Spanish and American Spanish.  No lisping is one of the benefits, but I would definitely say there are more basic linguistic differences than there are between, say, British and American English.

like additional verb forms to learn 

[Kai]

Also, for any European Spanish speakers, there is a small but significant difference between Castillian Spanish and American Spanish.  No lisping is one of the benefits, but I would definitely say there are more basic linguistic differences than there are between, say, British and American English.

like additional verb forms to learn 

vosotros. :/

[Fredfredly ⊂(◉‿◉)つ]

this thread makes me want to work harder on spanish now lol

[East Coast Hustle]

I personally wish to emigrate to a 1st world country.

better hurry. there aren't many of those left.

[Cain]

Also, for any European Spanish speakers, there is a small but significant difference between Castillian Spanish and American Spanish.

back to the torrents go I. cocktoast.

You'd likely be OK on the basics, if you learnt Castillian.  I spent 9 months doing that, and it took me about three weeks to properly adjust in Peru, but even before that I rarely had a problem.  My issue is I'm an language perfectionist, and it annoys me if I'm speaking the wrong dialect or something, even if it is perfectly intelligible (I also have a deep-seated and not entirely unreasonable desire to not be considered British while abroad, since British, American and target are interchangeable in many, many world languages).

[The Johnny]

You'd likely be OK on the basics, if you learnt Castillian. 

The reason behind that is that spanish originally comes from Spain, and all of America below Mexico was basicly a colony of Spain too...

I would draw slight paralels between British English and all its USA variants and its particular manifestation in Australia.

Learning the "mother" dialect from where all the subsequent ones derive makes it all easier.


P.S. For spanish one of the most important references is the work done by the Real Academia Española, just like for english it´s the Oxford's.