Adios 🇳🇮 Hello & Goodbye on the Street of Nicaragua

I'm Scott Al-Miller, and this is my everyday life living in Nicaragua

As someone who lives in Nicaragua, I got asked when watching my videos, one of my viewers

and a lot of people have had this question, what is that thing that we hear people saying

You walk by people in the street, and often you'll hear someone say, adieu, and they move past

It's just a thing that people are clearly saying in passing to each other. What is that? What does it mean? Where has it come from

We're going to get to that, this little bit of Nicaraguan culture right after the bump

New covers in Nicaragua are often surprised by hearing adio everywhere they go

And you'll hear it in multiple places, but the one that surprises people is in my videos

I do a lot of walking to the streets and you'll hear people say it to me as I'm passing by

And this really catches people by surprise. So the first thing we have to figure out is what exactly are they saying

in Nicaragua, whether it is just a trick of linguistics or it is a French influence, as many

people have told me may actually be the case, it is common for the sounds of things like an

S at the end of a word to be dropped. And this is common in lots of different languages and a lot

of different regions. This is not unique in any way, but it is not something you hear that much in Spanish. And so especially if you're used to Guatemalan or Mexican or Spanish, Spanish

Spain, Spanish, you will likely not be familiar with people dropping the S at the end of the

words, but there's a lot of words like this here in Nicaragua. So it's something you need to be

aware of that you have to listen for that the Ns and sometimes some other letters of words

may be missing. And this can make it very difficult, especially as a non-native speaker

to identify what exactly is being said. Of course, if you are a native Spanish speaker

it still presents a little bit of a challenge, but it's very minor because you can generally fill in what you're hearing. But if you are not a native Spanish speaker, especially if

you're like a learner and you're trying to figure this out, it can be extremely difficult

because careful, important identifiers to words that you're used to hearing may not be there

You also have the problem that what is written is a B and a V that in English are very discreet

B and V do not exist in Spanish. Those two are just two different ways to write the same sound

And here in Nicaragua, we are a spoken Spanish country, not a written Spanish country

So the language is done phonetically, and so something you hear, such as the village that I live in

the barrio is Soutiava. but it could be written with a B or a V, and plus there's an extra B or V that may be in there as well

So there's many different ways to spell the name of the barrio, and they're all correct

There isn't one way is correct, and one way isn't. Whereas in formal Spanish in the rest of the world, there are official ways to spell things

and the history of which letter is used is meant for identification or something else

even though the sounds are actually the same. In many places, you'll actually hear people pronounce them differently

especially North American, American Spanish from the United States. you're going to hear really strong bees and viz

So words like vivir to live is going to be a very strong v sound

And bebibir to drink is going to be a very strong bu sound. But here they're going to sound essentially identical

There's almost no way to tell them apart. And banyarme, I'm going to shower

I'm showering or I'm bathing technically sounds often like vanyarmé. And that vun sound is so confusing when you're expecting a bha sound

So there's a lot of these little linguistic things. That can be very confusing, especially in Nicaragua where they're either stronger or exist where other things don't

So, for dropping an S sound off the end of words. What is adio

It is adios, which you're probably used to. Most English speakers are familiar with the term aidos

It means goodbye. There's one of the few words that everybody learns in Spanish, even people with only the most casual knowledge of the language generally know things like

Ola and C, and Adios. And we're like, oh, adios. Okay, that means goodbye

wait a second, but you pass someone in the street. Sometimes you'll see me talking to someone

and I'll leave and say adios or I'll say adio because we don't say the S here. And the same thing

you're in America we learned to say, Buenos Dias as good day, right? Which we use for good morning

basically. It's a greeting. It's not a farewell. As you often would say in English, if we said

good day, that's often a we're leaving, kind of a formal, I'll see you later sort of thing

Whereas good morning, we often use as a greeting. So we're a little bit quirky in this on the English world side

In the Spanish world Buenos Dias or Good Days is a greeting not a farewell However here and in much of the Spanish world it is Bueno dia this singular But here in Nicaragua it not actually singular It sounds singular because the S is being dropped

You could argue that it's both singular and plural, because there is no singular and plural in Nicaragua

and that is true in a way. So that's possible. But in the Portuguese world, they don't use the plural that I'm aware of

Every time I see it, it's singular. The Spanish world tends to write it in the plural

but many places say it in the singular. When I took Spanish in school

they taught us that it was always plural, no exceptions. They also taught us that while Buenos Aires

good afternoons, is never used. In the real world, we find that it's always used

possibly more than anything else. Though that was one of the many things

that I learned wrong when taking Spanish in school. Now, as I'm older, I look back and realize

that my Spanish teachers really had extremely little exposure to Spanish, and while they claimed a lot of proficiency in the school

language. The reality was they were very rudimentary speakers. And while they had survival

Spanish, they don't have conversational Spanish anywhere near the level that I do today. And so

that is just something that really shocks me. You know, I really believed at the time that I would

never come close to the proficiency that my teachers had in Spanish. Of course, I also didn't expect

to be living in a Latin American country where I would be speaking it every day. But they really

made it seem like they could go places and, you know, pass as a native speaker, which was

not even remotely the case. They wouldn't pass the most casual of written test because there

were basic Spanish phrases they weren't really familiar with and they weren't familiar with

common usages. Okay, but, so how are we using Adios in this situation then? If we use it

when we're saying goodbye, we've been talking to someone, we're leaving now and you say it, everyone's clear, I think. That does not need explanation. But you're passing someone on the street

If you're doing this in the United States, for example, in English, you might say, hey, or hello

or what's up, you have some kind of basic greeting. That is a greeting. In much of the Spanish

world, this is going to be the same. And so if you see textbooks and such from basically anywhere

telling you what you would say in these circumstances, they'll often show that you say

Ola or Buenos for Buenos Aires, just shortened, or Buenos Aires. Something like that. Very basic

very straightforward. You could guess. You don't really need a textbook to tell you. You don't need someone to teach you. If you already knew that those were greetings, you could use those

greetings in the street, and absolutely you can use them here. People aren't going to be, like, freaked out or anything. They're not going to be confused, but it's not what people

tend to do. You never really hear those. I'm not saying you never do. You definitely hear

Buenos Buenos quite a bit. Ola, you'll hear very little. Adio, you will hear the majority of the time

in my experience. Immediately when we got here, this is one of the first things we asked about

And it was explained and like, yes, everyone does this. Yes, even Spanish speakers from all over

the Latin American world are confused by this. So it's okay that you are confused too

What is happening? And this actually makes a lot of sense when you stop and think about it. When you're passing someone on the street, we are passing them. We're not really greeting

them in the traditional sense. We're not initiating a conversation. We're also not saying

goodbye because we haven't been hanging out with them. So there isn't really a thing that makes a lot

of sense and you don't say everything. It's just a lot going on. Someone's walking by

you're kind of acknowledging that you acknowledge that they're there. You recognize them passing you and you want to be friendly. So that's kind of why we do it. It's awkward, really, in a lot of ways, but it's nice and it kind of gives a moment. What if you wanted to have a conversation? It opens the door that, yes, you could ask me something. So you're passing someone on the street and you're like, hey, what's up? Can I ask you, is this the right way to the Walmart? Right? It kind of gives that invitation. I don't want to make you not say hi to people because you don't want to invite that conversation. But we kind of all accept that that is

the moment where you could kind of ask someone something. So most of the world, but certainly not

all of it, chooses to use a word that is in greeting when this happens. You're passing someone

on the street, so you greet them. Hey, but in reality, it is equally sensible to say goodbye to them

You're not going to be hanging out any longer. They're passing you so that interaction is ending

And so you can say goodbye. Now, in English, if you did this on the street, somewhere in New York

they're going to think you're crazy. Like, we weren't talking. Why are you saying goodbye? Because culturally, we don't use that

Here in Nicaragua, they opted for the opposite. Instead of saying hello to someone you're not going to be having an engaging conversation with

someone you're not actually greeting, they simply say goodbye because the transaction of

passing each other is ending. And so if you really stop and think about it it is just equally logical that when you saying something to acknowledge that someone is there or was there they opt for the was instead of the is about to be It funny that such a thing exists

and it's really interesting that here it ended up having this opposite approach in such an isolated area

but that's all that's happening. So it's the combination of no s on the end, so you're not hearing the audios

It's just an audio, and it is simply saying goodbye, instead of hello

as you pass someone in the street because your transition has ended

Now, there is a precedence for this in a couple different places

One, and it's, I'm sure, not linguistically tied in any way, but in Hawaii

famously, Aloha means hello and goodbye. So you can use it that way and think of, adios, as being like Aloha

Not related to it, but it happens to be a five-letter A starting word that does the same thing

Much more likely to somehow be tied to it at least ideologically is the word

chow from Venice. For those who don't know, chow is not an Italian word, even though

Italians often think it is too. It is actually a Venetian word that very quickly made its way

into the Italian language and spread throughout Europe. So most of Europe and much of Latin

America, especially South America, use chow very commonly. They don't all spell it the same

but they use it the same, it means the same thing. And it is this really ancient Venetian word

that basically works the same. You can say hello, you can say goodbye, you can say cheers. It's a very

very general purpose, greeting and well-being kind of word. That heritage has kind of made

its way into Adio here in Nicaragua. Directly, or maybe it was just some far-flung influence

that someone said, hey, wouldn't it be cool if we used a word like this, but I don't want to use chow? We have one. We'll use Adios. Okay, cool. Maybe that's what happened. I don't know

but that is the linguistic history of it. Now, as far as Adios, people often want to know what that

is, since we're talking about it, and this would be a really short video if I didn't talk about anything

else. Adios is actually what, it's two words that have just run together over time. It is literally

Adios, which is to God. Now, what does that mean in the context of saying goodbye to someone? It actually

means a lot. What it is short for, or in meaning it is short for, is you are leaving my care

You are going out from my care and I am commending you unto the care of the Lord. God is now watching

over you because I am no longer watching over you. When you are with someone, when you're having

a conversation or there are a guest in your home or anything like that. There's this mentality

especially in places like Latin America and Europe where this linguistically originated

that you watch over, you have a responsibility for the care and protection and shelter and

housing and food of a person that you're with. But once they leave you, once you're saying goodbye

they are going out into the world and now it's God's job to take care of them or the next person

that they meet. And so we commend people unto the care of the Lord. And so we commend people unto the care of the Lord

as a way of saying that, you know, I've been watching over you and I hope you are safe until

the next person watches over you. This is mimicked throughout the world, especially, you know, European influenced languages

We see the same word identical really in French with adieu. That is exactly the same thing, just pronounced in French

You're going to find this in different languages and it really comes from the Latin originally

and so you're going to see it shared across that region. It's an interesting bit of linguistic

history and connection and it has this really deep-seated meaning that has been completely lost

and there's multiple words and turned into one word and now we've dropped letters at the end so at the end

of the day this really complex historical meaning is being attributed to something that is so

distant from the original words that it is often hard to trace it back and understand where it really

came from in Spanish and I've never heard Spanish speakers use this it is more of an old-fashioned

and often I think northern Mexico or southern stared United States Spanish-speaking thing, but you'll hear people say Viacondios, and that means

you know, go with God, which is very much Adios, but in a more formal way or more lengthy way

more poetic way, perhaps, but very, very similar. So that is the little tiny bit of history of

Adios and explaining how we ended up at Adio and why we use it in a weird way here in Nicaragua

but it is an important one to know that you really do use that everywhere. No matter what you're

doing, walk up to people. And as you pass them on the street, comfortable saying adio, you don't need the S on the end

I'm not soft pronouncing the S. It's really not there. And you really can say it at all these times

Basically, anytime you'd say chow, except when you are clinking glasses, you definitely do not say it Then you say salute good health So that our little bit here in Nicaragua about our culture and our little intricacies of Spanish speaking here I also want to

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