Afternoons have been shortened by telenovelas for many years. We grew up with them and half unwittingly learned Spanish and its (not always) beautiful expressions.
The screenwriters of popular telenovelas have a really vivid imagination, with the help of which we, or rather, were distracted from the television screens. In each episode – there are usually three digits – ours something happens to your favorite characters and that's how real drama is created. The formula for all telenovelas is roughly the same: time flows differently than in reality, but there is always one housewife or servant, which we learn about during the telenovela, that she is the mother of one of the main characters.
What did we learn in the nineties?
There isn't a telenovela where someone isn't hiding something dark secrets from the past. Even the protagonists have their dark side. Usually, such a secret can destroy the lives of many characters, and the perfect moment for its discovery is a funeral, a wedding, in a hospital, or any other occasion where several people are in one place. Dramatic music is indispensable during the discovery, and it is also possible that one of the characters falls unconscious.
Every telenovela also has the main villain. She is the biggest schemer and she implements her ideas in almost every episode. It often happens that she becomes pregnant with her lover, and the child is instigated by her husband. There is also a version where she uses the child as a means of blackmail to achieve her goal, such as getting the main character (usually rich) to stay with her.
A telenovela must not lack a thread memory loss, which is usually the ultimate plot twist. One of the main characters loses his memory, and this was the result of an accident that he survived purely by chance. What can bring him back, or at least refresh his memory, is a meeting with an old love, during which he feels a connection again like the first day they met, even though he doesn't remember anything.
The main character of a telenovela usually comes out from a rich family, lives in a villa and works in the family business. If bad boy he also has his own luxury apartment where he stays with his lover, who is usually a bad person. But if our main character is an honest guy, then the love of his life only cheats when he's drunk or high.
Spanish expressions we learned thanks to telenovelas:
Yo soy tu madre! – I'm your mother!
Estoy embarasada! – I'm pregnant!
I hate you! - I hate you!
Calm down! - Take it easy!
You're touching me! – Don't touch me!
Te voy a matar! – I will kill you!
Leave here! - Go away!
Broke! – Poor thing!
No te quiero eschuchar! – I don't want to listen to you!
No puedo mas! - I can not do it anymore!
Adelante! - Go ahead!
You are stupid! – You are stupid!
Desgraciada infeliz! – The unfortunate vile!
Es un desgraciado! – He's an underdog!
Callate la boca! - Shut up!
