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by stavros 1781 days ago
Same in Greek (though we use the Greek word for "rooster", obviously). I've found that Greek and Spanish oddly share many, many idioms.
3 comments

In Mexico high schools we have a class that is called "Greek/Latin Ethimology" (Etimologías Grecolatinas, and most people in high school go through this book: https://www.amazon.com.mx/ETIMOLOGIAS-GRECOLATINAS-DEL-ESPA%...)

There's a huge amount of influence of Greek in Spanish, so I am not surprised idioms are shared as well. (Spanish is kind of amazing in that it has Latin and Greek roots, but also has a lot of Arabic words like Ojalá, Camisa, azúcar, guitarra, blusa, pantalon, fulano, rehen, tarea, etc...

Albahaca is my latest favorite.
Isn't that from Arabic?
Yah. Their last sentence was trailing off a list of Arabic loan words.
Ahh okay, I somehow missed that, thanks.
And as an Spanish speaker, I've found that, oddly, Greek people "sound" exactly like Spaniards. In the sense that you would swear they are Spanish and yet you don't understand a word, it's uncanny! Is it the same for you guys, the other way around?
Yep, nobody in Spain ever believes that I can't really speak good Spanish, because I sound like a native. I had a friend pronounce Greek words transliterated to Spanish, and he sounded like a native as well.

There are a few minute differences, like the "s" sound being a bit farther forward in Spanish, or the "rr" in Spanish being rolled twice (in Greek it's only rolled once), or Greek having a "z" sound (which Castillan accents don't have), but largely it's more or less identical.

Langfocus: Why Does Greek Sound Like Spanish?!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPMqoHPJzac

He also has one about Portuguese vs. Russian/Polish:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pik2R46xobA

And extreme syllable-timed language family (opposite of these) are languages Tagalog, Malay, Indonesian. EVERY syllable is pronounced and it becomes a mouthful but there's a strict cadence that comes from it. Foreign words break it a bit but native words are "ma-ka-ba-la-bu-sa-ng-ah-ga-ta-na..."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6BtThH53PQ

In the same way, Brazilian Portuguese sounds eerily like a made-up language pronounced in Russian, for a Russian ear. Many Indo-European languages are very similar phonetically, despite being completely different in every other way.
It is exactly the same for me (native spanish). I hear greek and it takes me a second to be sure it is not Spanish.

Even talking to greeks in English sometimes a random Spanish word pops out in Spanish (rarely happens in general).

It's nice how similar our pronunciation is. Even if you don't understand the words, you feel like you could write them and make few mistakes.
Greek is one of the bases of most western languages. You'd be surprised by the amount of words that derive from Greek in Portuguese. Here's a thousand of them for starters:

https://www.dicio.com.br/palavras-origem-grega/

But it's not just the words, it's the idioms. There isn't much of a basis for voice cracks to be called "roosters" in both languages.
Worth pointing out that modern Greek has borrowed a lot of words from other languages, including the Romance languages. For instance, the color grey is 'γκρίζος/grizos', from the Romance language words for gray (the more ancient alternatives would be πολῐός/polios and φαιός/fios, with only the latter surviving to modern times). I assume 'γαλάζιο/galazio' is somehow related to Spanish/French azul/azur as well, but can't find any sources.