First of all, this blog is intended to be shared primarily with people we know. Therefore, if you know us, then you will see the sheer brilliance and cleverness of this name as it applies to my wife. That is, unless you know Spanish. If so, then you too will realize how this name doesn't make any sense at all in Spanish, which would further reinforce the intention of the name.
(sidebar) The way I see it, this is no different then all of these restaurants that have cool sounding Spanish names to us Americans, but when traslated literally into English, sound stupid. I will first pick on "Taco Bueno" since I am a Taco Cabana fan. This may sound cool, since it rhymes (which isn't hard to do in Spanish since the endings of adjectives usually have the same ending of the noun it describes). It just means Good Taco. Now how many people would go to the "Good Taco" if that was the name of the restaurant. In fact, this sounds like a great contest. If you can think of other Mexican restaurant names that sounds stupid when translated into English, please comment to this post.
Case in point, we think this name sounds cool, but as far as I can tell, it doesn't make sense. "Villa" is usually translated as a luxurious estate or village. For those of you who know us, we wanted to use that word as part of the blog name. The other part was up in the air. Gringa was the best we could come up with. Now, usually, an adjective would follow the noun "villa" to describe it. Gringa is not an adjective; it is a noun (definition). I don't know the adjective form of the word. I suppose "La Villa de Gringos" would be more proper Spanish, but it doesn't sound as good to me, plus, my intention is not to use accurate Spanish anyway, it is just to come up with something to call this blog.
So there you have it. It is not meant to be offensive, we are just trying to make fun of ourselves.
Unrelated P.S. : IT IS SNOWING RIGHT NOW IN TEXAS ON APRIL 7TH!!!! That is another first for me. So much for global warming.
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6 comments:
This was a great idea! Here are some examples from Colorado
Del Taco = Of Taco
Buenos Tiempos = Good Weathers
Oh my!
Jen Richardson
In Las Vegas they have a restaurant called Polo Loco = Crazy Chicken (Chicken Crazy)
Never ate there, but I'm sure it was good, or not!
I seem to remember there being an El Pollo Loco in San Antonio when I was a kid. It was bought by Taco Cabana :) I'm not kidding ... It's on West Ave and Blanco Rd if you want to check.
I think you all have way too much time on your manos! My luggage is screaming to be unpacked from the Easter weekend in SA--we missed you. I just love JG and Amy too much to pass this up. When I worked in SA, one of the planners I shared an office with was from Dallas and said his FAV Mex food rest was "El Phoenix." I thought this was as ignorant as naming a rest. "El Las Vegas" or "El Houston." When I moved here, I realized it was "El Fenix" which is even worse because I think they were thinking they were spelling "Phoenix" but didn't know how!!!!!!!!!! What is a Fenix? Anyway, this comes from the wanna-be Mexican who is really Mexican but was raised more Gringa (like a MAP)and who wants to raise her kids Mexican but is completely unable because of her inability to immerse in the Mexican culture because she lives in a community of Gringos (and Asians, Persians, Africans, Slovakians to be fair)!! Love you so much--aunt patti
isn't a phoenix a mythological bird that was raised from its own ashes after dying? so, maybe it would be more like naming a restaurant "el unicorn" as opposed to "el las vegas." which is especially bad spanish as it apparently means, "the the fertile valleys."
These are some fun entries. I think my favorite will have to be Del Taco that Jennifer said. Wow. That would be like a burger joint being "Of the Hamburgers" or something. Thanks for playing.
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