ENGLISH
ON THE GO! ESPERO DISFRUTEN EL LIBRO ESTE LO COMPRE HACE TIEMPO EN AMAZON, SOY ESTUDIANTE UNIVERSITARIO, EN ESTOS MOMENTOS PASO POR UNA SITUACION ECONOMICA TERRIBLE, SI GUSTAS APOYARME TE LO AGRADECERE INFITAMENTE, NO INTENTO LUCRAR CON NADA SOLO DESEO TERMINAR MI CARRERA UNIVERITARIA AQUI EN MEXICO, TAMBIEN TENGO LOS AUDIOS, PUEDO SUBIRLOS SI GUSTAN TAMBIEN... MUCHAS GRACIAS POR TOMARTE EL TIEMPO DE LEERME Y POR APOYARME.
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Concepto original Alberto Alonso Autor Alberto Alonso Dirección editorial Rubén Palomero Coordinación del proyecto Julia Nowicki Edición Julia Nowicki Edición del castellano Alberto Imedio Voces Richard Vaughan, Mary Stabb, Natasha Pascua, David Boyes, Matthew Hengler, Kyle Millar, Fitz, Layla Chapoy, Elrike Mostert, Cory McCollough, Lucia Fraile, Angela Sortino, Sean Meehan, Teresa Jones, Rosanna Ryan, Mayte Ziga, Itziar Acosta, Michael Slevin, Johnny Martinez, Julia Nowicki Sonido Juanjo Durán Diseño y maquetación Jacobo Lamas (zeromm.es) y Alejandro González Fotos y elementos Shutterstock, Vecteezy.com, Freepick.com: Starline, Kues1, Kjpargeter, Eightonesix, Mrsiraphol, SXC FreeImages.com/David Lau Imprime Naturprint ISBN 978-84-16667-19-2 Depósito Legal M-14850-2017
© Vaughan Systems S.L.U. Calle Orense 69, 28020 Madrid Tel: 91 748 59 50 / Fax: 91 556 42 21 www.grupovaughan.com / www.vaughantienda.com Propiedad de la presente edición: © 2017 Vaughan Systems
ALBERTO ALONSO
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ON THE GO!
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DEDICATORIA
Dedicated to my Dinks: Diana & Simón with all my love Special thanks to…
My family & friends for believing in me; even when I don’t. Julia Nowicki and Alberto Imedio for putting up with me and doing more than just editing. Juanjo Durán for designing the audio experience experience.. Marta and Carlos for filming and editing the videos. Richard Vaughan, Mary Stabb, Natasha Pascua, David Boyes, Matthew Hengler, Kyle Millar, Fitz, Layla Chapoy, Elrike Mostert, Cory McCollough, Lucia Fraile, Angela Sortino, Sean Meehan, Teresa Jones, Rosanna Ryan, Mayte Ziga, Itziar Acosta, Michael Slevin, Slevin, Johnny Martinez and Julia Nowicki for lending me their voices and time.
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FOREWORD Alberto Alonso is a singular man. Perhaps it’s in his blood: a blend of Andalusia and Italy, with a heavy dose… maybe lethal… of New York. For me, he is the best radio DJ in Spain, a blessing… a godsend... for Vaughan Radio. The hard thing about Alberto, however, is finding adjectives to cover everything everything that he is and does. Describing him is like trying to grasp a moonbeam in your hands. But let’s try: brilliant, candid, determined, focused, effusive, outgoing, expansive, extroverted, extroverted, unconstrained, unconstrained, uninhibited. But this description is only part one. And part two? Let’s see: goofy, wacky, screwball. Oh, and I’m forgetting two more adjectives: quick-witted and very intelligent. And now Alberto wants me to write a foreword to his book! When he approached me with the idea, I was a bit reluctant at first. I still hadn’t seen the book. Was it going to be as witty and entertaining as his last bestseller “This Book is the Milk”? I was doubtful. But when he sent me the chapter on Houston, my hometown, my doubts dissolved like an iceberg on the surface of the sun. I read the entire chapter, from start to finish. He was talking about my Houston, my hometown, hometown, and Alberto, this New Yorker, was describing it better than I could, making it look like the most attractive place on earth. Typical Alberto. His energy and enthusiasm are always contagious and now you have me here writing this foreword. But what is truly fascinating is how Alberto approaches the description of each of the 30 different cities he has included in the book. As you say in Spanish: “se te ponen los dientes largos” . After reading a chapter and absorbing English structures, English expressions and English vocabulary, the thing you most remember is the attractiveness of the place he is describing. In essence, you absorb English without realizing it. Why? Because you become absorbed with the city itself. This is the mark of a superb communicator and storyteller. You forget what language you are reading in, despite the greater difficulty of reading in English. Alberto’s style reminds me a bit of the popular 20 th century literary fashion called “stream of consciousness”, made famous by many important writers, especially James Joyce and Virginia Woolf. As he writes about Houston, New York or Sydney, you hook into his mindset and follow the flow of his own excitement and the fun he has in his explanations and discoveries. discover ies. I would recommend you set aside 30 minutes each day to read about one city and one city only. Then the next day, another city… and then another. After 30 days and 30 cities, you will not only possess a much greate greaterr command of the English language, but you will have a solid travel itinerary for the next 20 years of your life. ENGLISH ON THE GO! A good title for a really good book. I’ve never seen a book which fuses so well English learning with the joy of travel.
Richard Vaughan
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INTRODUCTION Firstly, thanks for joining me on this life-changing trip! I’m sure that by the end of it you’ll Firstly have not only improved your English but you will have discovered so many fascinating things along our 59,092 km journey. It might sound very cliché, but life’s life’s a journey j ourney not a destination. I believe that and I have applied that to everything, especially especially the learning process. process. I wrote this book because I didn’t learn Spanish grammar or have much theory on it. I learned it by spending my summers in Almería, Spain, my father’ father’ss birthplace. I learned Spanish by absorbing the fascinating culture, food, history, anecdotes, jokes, music, movies etc. of my paternal family’s family’s homeland. The language was more of a by-product of learning about the aforementioned diverse subjects. My goal was never to pass an exam, get a certificate or land a dream job. It was to be able to communicate with different people and make new friends. It opened many doors for me and thus my horizons. But that’s easy to say looking back now. When I was a kid I just loved the adventure of speaking “other” languages, and having “other” friends, eating “other” candies. It felt good having this whole second world; a different world that was mine and nobody else’s back home. I guess I knew deep down that it was going to give me an advantage, but I insist that, as a naive kid, I was just having fun discovering things and meeting & chatting with new people, “other” people, different from everyone I knew back in the US. Nevertheless, I did realize that if you’re curious and ask questions, you can learn anywhere and at any time, and I did. I learned from ingredients on cereal boxes, taglines on TV, the pages of Super Pop, and you could go as far as saying that Raphael was one of my Spanish “teachers”. Everywhere, I looked there was something to be learned behind every sight and sound, and I loved it. To this day I still look for lessons, everywhere and at any time or place. There’s no wrong and right time to learn something new. These fun mini lessons will take you around the world, chapter by chapter, city by city and prove to you that you don’t only learn English in a classroom; the world is our classroom, amigos! Buckle up and get ready for the ride of your life! Your amigo,
Alberto Alonso
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