In this episode, we once again analyze record audio clips from our brave listeners! We listen to the Shorty, “À Busca de Doces“, and explore how to make your Portuguese sound more native with pronunciation subtleties and word choice. We also clarify some other challenging concepts, such as the differences between “aí, ali, & lá”.
Segredos da Pronúncia Nativa
Secrets of Native Pronunciation
Como Falam os Nossos Membros?
How Do Our Members Speak?
Today, the tables have turned, because YOU, (our listeners) are the main voices of this special episode! European Portuguese learners from around the world bravely submitted recordings of themselves reading our featured Shorty, “Um Encontro“.
We listen to each one, while suggesting subtle improvements for perfecting their pronunciation, including some challenging vowel sounds, and rules of the letter “S”, and more.
A BIG “thank you” to everyone who bravely submitted their recordings. Let us know if you enjoy this and we’ll do more of this in future episodes!
(Learn more about the pronunciation of the letter “S” here: The Letters “S” and “C”)
Carro Alugado, Caos Instalado
Rental Car, Chaos Takes Place
Cláudio and Joana are a Portuguese couple who decide to take a trip to Tomar in a rental car. When it comes to driving, they can’t seem to agree on anything. Will they make it to their destination without driving each other crazy?
Dona Gertrudes e a Conta do Gás
Dona Gertrudes and the Gas Bill
Dona Gertrudes, a retired 65-year-old woman, has just a received a surprisingly large bill from her gas company. Upset and nervous, she attempts to sort the matter out on the phone.
Roupa Na Varanda, Afinal Quem Manda?
Clothes On The Balcony, Who's In Charge Anyway?
Monica has just moved to an apartment in the Historic Center of Porto. She meets her neighbour Eduardo who tries to impose some unexpected rules. Will she be able to deal with these strict requirements?
À Caça de Descontos no Supermercado
The Hunt for Supermarket Discounts
To prepare for an upcoming birthday party that they’ll be hosting, a modern grandma and her jokester husband stock up on groceries at the local supermarket. While taking advantage of every promotion they can, will they actually remember to pick up everything they went there for in the first place?
Perigo na Estrada, Pesadelo na Oficina!
Danger on the Road, Nightmare in the Shop!
Eduarda, the mechanic, deals with a customer who thinks he knows exactly what’s wrong with his car… when in fact, the biggest problem might just be the driver!
(Special guest: Eliana Silva)
Uma Ida Ao Supermercado
A Trip to the Supermarket
While making her way through her lengthy shopping list (containing useful food vocabulary, of course), Sra. Rosa shares her elderly wisdom with a young employee who is eager to help.
Special Guest: Eliana Silva
Um Natal de Crescer Água na Boca
A Mouth-watering Christmas
This holiday season, a Practice Portuguese TV reporter takes to the streets to hear directly from Portuguese natives about their family Christmas traditions… until a particularly talkative woman steals the show!
Lançamento: “Passo a Passo” (o Caminho de Santiago)
Launch: "Step by Step" (the Caminho de Santiago)
With the holiday season approaching, Rui and Joel announce a special early gift for members of Practice Portuguese! Listen and find out exactly what is on “the Way”…
Updated December 1, 2018: It’s launched!
Cabelos, Tesouras e Desilusões
Hair, Scissors, and Disappointments
Salvador and Mariana (– no, Adriana! –) visit a hair salon to freshen up their looks, but quickly find themselves in a hairy situation! In this episode, you’ll learn lots of new vocabulary and expressions that should come in handy the next time you find yourself going under the scissors…
À Caça de Casa
House Hunting
In this episode, we explore the Portuguese apartment rental market with James, a young adult of Portuguese descent looking for a new place. To find some leads, he recruits the help of his friend, Luís. However, Luís happens to be going through a bit of drama with his ex-girlfriend, so let’s see if he’s able to be of any help…
BONUS: Palavras Japonesas Inspiradas na Língua Portuguesa
BONUS: Japanese Words Inspired by the Portuguese Language
After listening to our last podcast on foreign words derived from Portuguese, a Japanese member, Ryoko, came to our rescue with recordings of every Japanese word we mentioned, plus a bunch of new ones for good measure. Join us as we explore surprising similarities between Japanese and Portuguese in this bonus episode!
(“Arigato” once again to Ryoko Kawaoka for her generous time in preparing the list and recordings for this episode!)
Palavras Inspiradas na Língua Portuguesa
Words Inspired by the Portuguese Language
In this unscripted dialogue between Rui and Joel, we discover words in English, Spanish, French and Japanese that apparently derived from Portuguese vocabulary… Come for the comprehension practice, stay for the butchered non-Portuguese pronunciations!
A Tartaruga Ninja
The Ninja Turtle
Our fabulously fictional Portuguese family is back (with peculiarly different voices 😂) and this time, they’re considering adding a new member. We explore new vocabulary surrounding food, animals and more, and also run into some new usage examples of the conjunctive and conditional moods. And just like in the last episode, Rui continues to help Joel identify some more of his “estrangeiro” pronunciation habits!
Update (April 12, 2018): After launching this episode, it was helpfully pointed out to us that keeping a turtle as a pet is irresponsible: They die earlier in captivity and live a miserable, unnatural life. They’re part of our wildlife heritage and need their protected, natural habitat to thrive. Instead, consider adopting a cat or dog from a shelter – surprisingly, they’re less work, and you’ll be doing some good! More details here and here. (Obrigado, Joanna!)
A Rota da Cortiça
The Cork Route
In this episode, we learn about one of Portugal’s most important symbols and main exports: cork! We explore tons of new vocabulary, and later, for your benefit, Rui humbles Joel by tearing apart his pronunciation skills!
Resolver Um Problema Ao Telefone: Alô?!
Solving a Problem on the Phone: Hello?!
Update: April 10, 2018 – As a gift to us and all Practice Portuguese fans, our friend Wayne has turned this episode into a fully-animated cartoon. The video is free for everyone to watch, plus our supporting Members get access to a special version with subtitles for improving comprehension.
Telephone and Internet service companies are notoriously painful to deal with, and Portugal is no exception! In this dialogue, a pushy representative from “VOZ” calls in an attempt to recapture a former client. Have you had the pleasure of dealing with one of these services in Portuguese yet?
Um Café em Lisboa
A Coffee in Lisbon
This episode is a collaboration featuring Tatiana Ribeiro, a Portuguese teacher (and fan of the project) from Brazil, currently living Italy! She recorded with us and also wrote the dialogue, which takes place in a café in Portugal.
Since we all know jokes are funnier after they’re explained in exhaustive detail, Rui and Joel discuss the key vocabulary and expressions used throughout. But rather than making it easy on you by switching to English, we decided to keep the entire conversation in Portuguese!
But don’t worry – For the first time ever, members using the podcast player on our website can now enable English translations at any point in this episode, to make sure you don’t miss a single “palavra”.
We’re excited to hear what you think!
Update, August 11, 2017: Shortly after launching this episode, we were invited on Tatiana’s radio show for an interview. We’ve released an edited version of this interview with transcript if you’d like to have a listen!
A Lenda Da Serra Da Nó
The Legend of Serra da Nó
We’re back with another classic Portuguese tale, this time with the story of a Moorish king after the heart of a humble, female shepherd. Will he win her heart, despite their different religious backgrounds? How will they survive when the Christians come to take over the castle and land? Listen and find out!
Aprender Português? Vejo-me Grego! (Video)
Learning Portuguese? I'm seeing myself Greek (I'm struggling)!
In this video, Joel (o Canadiano) interviews Pedro, a personal trainer in Lisboa. When he saw which videos and website his Greek girlfriend was using to learn Portuguese, he immediately recognized Rui and Joel as members of the gym!
Instead of just taking a photo together, we decided it would be a bigger surprise for her to see her boyfriend pop up in her YouTube activity feed! So we recorded this interview to make it happen…
During the conversation, we discuss:
• Common challenges that make Portuguese difficult for non-natives to master
• Learning your partner’s language while in a relationship
• Specific grammar and pronunciation peculiarities in European Portuguese
Disclaimer: Since this interview is spontaneous and Joel is not a native speaker, he makes a few mistakes (eg. “Isto é” instead of “Este é” when introducing Pedro!) Members who see the subtitles / transcription will see the corrections, and hopefully learn from these common errors. But for those who just hear the audio or view the video without subtitles, just make sure to take Joel’s grammar with a grain of salt and focus more on Pedro! 🙂
Natal e o Ano Novo
Christmas and the New Year
What could be better than a holiday episode in January? (Just about anything!)
Listen to find out what happened to Rui that delayed this episode… and be extra prepared for when the holidays come around again in about 355 days!
We also discuss some quirky traditions and superstitions that Portuguese natives take part in during the New Year. Feliz janeiro!
A Lenda da Rapariga com Pés de Cabra
The Legend of the Girl with Goat's Feet
In this Lenda (tale), we explore a famous Portuguese tale of a woman… with goat feet! She manages to keep the secret hidden her entire life, until a nobleman falls in love with her and learns the truth.
(special thanks to Luís Relógio for writing this episode!)
3 Video Lessons (Special Announcement)
Attention Practice Portuguese podcast subscribers!
This is not a regular podcast episode, but a special announcement to tell you about a 3-part video series we’re launching starting today.
Check out the first lesson now: practiceportuguese.com/words.
In these 3 lessons, we aim to solve a few of the biggest challenges our members run into when learning European Portuguese.
In the first video, we start with a list of simple rules you can use to quickly add 5000 words to your European Portuguese vocabulary, just by using words you already know.
In the second video, we’ll tackle the challenge of oral comprehension. We’ll explain what it is that spoken European Portuguese more difficult to understand than Brazilian. We’ll give you the necessary tools for you to not only better understand what they’re saying, but also make your own accent sound a lot more authentic when you speak Portuguese.
This second lesson will also have an interactive tool that you can use to practice what you learn in the video to make sure it sticks.
In the 3rd and final video, we’ll walk you through valuable tips and resources to help you throughout your Portuguese learning journey. We’ll also show you how to confirm that the words and grammar you’re learning are specific to Portugal (instead of the Brazilian vocabulary that you’ll find in most dictionaries and apps).
At the end of that third video we’ll also be announcing the biggest addition to Practice Portuguese since the launch of our podcast in 2013… but that’ll come later.
In these 3 videos, we worked hard to deliver very high-quality content to make the best use of your time. We could have easily sold these videos as a course, but we decided to offer them completely free so they could reach as many European Portuguese learners as possible.
If you want to get started with the first lesson and learn 5000 new words, head on over to practiceportuguese.com/words.
You’ll be able to download the free PDF e-book that goes along with the video lesson, as well as sign up to be notified when we launch videos 2 and 3. There won’t be another announcement for each video, so make sure you don’t miss out.
Once again, that’s practiceportuguese.com/words. Thanks for listening and we hope that this video series helps you learn a lot more about European Portuguese!
Uma Viagem a Marraquexe
A Trip to Marrakech
Today’s destination is Morocco, as we cover tons of new vocabulary to prepare you for wherever your future travels take you! Follow our journey through the airport, airplane, and all through the ancient city of Marrakesh.
(Featuring a very special guest, Ana Coimbra, Rui’s mãe!)