Palo

[DailyWord]

This is a discussion thread for the Daily Spanish Word for May 18, 2008

palo -masculine noun (el), stick, pole, club, staff. Look up palo in the dictionary

En una historia de piratas, no puede faltar el pirata de la pata de palo.
You can't have a pirate story without at least one pirate with a pegleg.

[Alfonso]

Algunos usos figurados de palo en España:

• ¿45 euros? ¡Vaya palo!
• Fue un palo enorme. Iban a casarse y se quedó sin novia.
• No oigo más que críticas. No hago más que recibir palos de un lado y otro.
• Me cayeron palos de todas partes. Tengo la espalda señalada.
• No quiero ir a esa fiesta. No conozco a nadie. Me da palo.
• La baraja española tiene cuatro palos: oros, copas, espadas y bastos.
• Las bulerías es el palo del flamenco que más me gusta.

[Tomisimo]

¡Gracias Alfonso! Those are great examples; some of those uses I had never heard before.

Another important use of palo in the Americas is as a synonym of tree.

[Iris]

¿Qué es un palo de flamenco?

[Tomisimo]

Let me try translating these sentences to see if I fully understand their meaning. These by no means are perfect or even correct translations. Help me out guys

¿45 euros? ¡Vaya palo!
45 Euros? What a ripoff/That's too expensive!

Fue un palo enorme. Iban a casarse y se quedó sin novia.
What a failure! They were going to get married, and she left him.

No oigo más que críticas. No hago más que recibir palos de un lado y otro.
I hear nothing but criticism, everyone's constantly coming at me from all sides.

Me cayeron palos de todas partes. Tengo la espalda señalada.
People are coming at me from all sides. I'm a marked man.

No quiero ir a esa fiesta. No conozco a nadie. Me da palo.
I don't want to go to the party. I don't know anyone there. I couldn't care less.

La baraja española tiene cuatro palos: oros, copas, espadas y bastos.
Spanish cards have four suits: oros, copas, espadas y bastos.

Las bulerías es el palo del flamenco que más me gusta.
The bulerías is the branch/style of flamenco I like the most.

[Iris]

David,
Me da palo means you don't dare to, you are not brave enough to go on your own.
Fue un palo enorme means he was greatly disappointed.
Thanks for explaining palo de flamenco.

[Alfonso]

Originally Posted by Tomisimo

Let me try translating these sentences to see if I fully understand their meaning. These by no means are perfect or even correct translations. Help me out guys

¿45 euros? ¡Vaya palo!
45 Euros? What a ripoff/That's too expensive!

Fue un palo enorme. Iban a casarse y se quedó sin novia.
What a failure! They were going to get married, and she left him. (un palo significa aquí un golpe moral, una decepción, un suceso desagradable. I'm not sure if a failure would be a good translation for this nuance).


No oigo más que críticas. No hago más que recibir palos de un lado y otro.
I hear nothing but criticism, everyone's constantly coming at me from all sides.

Me cayeron palos de todas partes. Tengo la espalda señalada.
People are coming at me from all sides. I'm a marked man. (recibir palos en sentido físico, ser apaleado, golpeado, por eso tengo la espalda marcada).

No quiero ir a esa fiesta. No conozco a nadie. Me da palo.
I don't want to go to the party. I don't know anyone there. I couldn't care less. (me da palo significa que me da pereza, vergüenza o una mezcla de ambas. Es una expresión muy coloquial y juvenil. I think to translate this you need a slang expression).

La baraja española tiene cuatro palos: oros, copas, espadas y bastos.
Spanish cards have four suits: oros, copas, espadas y bastos.

Las bulerías es el palo del flamenco que más me gusta.
The bulerías is the branch/style of flamenco I like the most.

Iris, un palo del flamenco es lo que David dice, uno de sus estilos.

[Tomisimo]

Thanks for the explanations Alfonso! And thanks to you Iris too! Let me try my translations again.


Fue un palo enorme. Iban a casarse y se quedó sin novia.
What a failure! They were going to get married, and she left him. (un palo significa aquí un golpe moral, una decepción, un suceso desagradable. I'm not sure if a failure would be a good translation for this nuance).
It was a huge disappointment/It was a big letdown. They were going to get married and she left him.

Me cayeron palos de todas partes. Tengo la espalda señalada.
People are coming at me from all sides. I'm a marked man. (recibir palos en sentido físico, ser apaleado, golpeado, por eso tengo la espalda marcada).
I can't really think of a good translation for this. Maybe:
People started hitting me from all sides. I'm a marked man.

No quiero ir a esa fiesta. No conozco a nadie. Me da palo.
I don't want to go to the party. I don't know anyone there. I couldn't care less. (me da palo significa que me da pereza, vergüenza o una mezcla de ambas. Es una expresión muy coloquial y juvenil. I think to translate this you need a slang expression).
Hmmm... I can't think of a good translation for this either.
I don't want to go to the party. I won't know anyone there and I'll feel totally out of place.

[poli]

Me da palo seems similar to the way I have heard Latin Americans say
me da pena. I have also heard que pena instead of que lástima.

Quisiera saber si cuando se usa pena así se entiende.

[Alfonso]

Originally Posted by poli

Me da palo seems similar to the way I have heard Latin Americans say me da pena. I have also heard que pena instead of que lástima.
Quisiera saber si cuando se usa pena así se entiende.

Which usage do you mean for qué pena, Poli?

• In Colombia, qué pena means: what a shyness or, even, what a shame.
• In Spain, qué pena means: what a pity.

Me da palo / qué palo me da es que no quieres hacer algo por vergüenza, pereza o por escrúpulos:

• No le conozco de nada, ma da palo besarle, es normal, ¿no?
• Ufff, me toca hacer la cena, qué palo me da, con lo cansado que estoy.
• Me da palo ir a una fiesta organizada por esa gentuza.

I think the one proposed by David would be a good translation for me da palo: I will feel totally out of place. Can you think of a slang for this?

[Alfonso]

Originally Posted by Tomisimo

Fue un palo enorme. Iban a casarse y se quedó sin novia.
It was a huge disappointment/It was a big letdown. They were going to get married and she left him.

Me cayeron palos de todas partes. Tengo la espalda señalada.
I can't really think of a good translation for this. Maybe:
People started hitting me from all sides. I'm a marked man.

No quiero ir a esa fiesta. No conozco a nadie. Me da palo.
I don't want to go to the party. I won't know anyone there and I'll feel totally out of place.

I found out Me cayeron palos... is not so easy as it seems to be. I think the difficulty is in ... tengo la espalda señalada. Do you distinguish in English between marks and signals?


I Spanish you could say:

• Tengo la espalda llena de marcas.
• Tengo la espalda llena de señales.

Meaning both that your back is injured by the hits you have received. So, its nuance is physical. Knowing this, how would you translate Tengo la espalda señalada into English.

Thanks for your help!

[poli]

La espalda llena de señales/marcas doesn't translate to English well.

You can say the following phrase: He's a marked man. This means a man with a bad reputation--a convict perhaps. This probably term probably has biblical origins. (The mark of Kane).

I think you would translate Me cayeron palos de todas partes. Tengo la espalda señalada can be translated in the following way: I've been attacked by all sides. I'm scarred. (This can be a literal or a metaphorical attack)

Poli

[Tomisimo]

In English, marked can be both figurative and literal. You could say he has marks on his back and they would be literal, physical marks. But if you say he's a marked man, it's a figurative usage, and not necessarily saying that he physically has marks on himself.

Maybe a translation could be:

Sometimes I feel like I have a sign that says "kick me" on my back.

[Tomisimo]

This term probably has biblical origins. (The mark of Kane).

It's Cain not Kane

[poli]

Oh, that's right. I was thinking of the movie Citizen Kane. Cain is the name.

[Tomisimo]

Originally Posted by poli

Oh, that's right. I was thinking of the movie Citizen Kane. Cain is the name.

If it were my name, I'd prefer Kane. I think it looks better.

[poli]

Both of them were pretty dark characters.