The Spanish Work Vocabulary Nobody Teaches You (But Everybody Needs)
Every Spanish textbook has a work section: la oficina, el ordenador, la reunión. Very neutral. Very inoffensive. Very useless for describing 90% of real work experience.
Real work vocabulary includes jefes c*brones, reuniones eternas, and that universal feeling that something is very, very wrong. This week in La Tribu / The Spanish Tribe we use a Narcos lab scene in Medellín to learn Spanish that actually matters at work. Subscribe:
📧 Jefes C*brones — Bad Bosses (Version 1)
This week we’re talking about work. But not the cute LinkedIn version of work. Not “I’m passionate about teamwork and personal growth.” Nope. We’re talking about bad bosses. Jefes c*brones. Yes, because they exist. And there are many.
To do that, we’re using a scene from Narcos, where Pablo Escobar sets up a laboratory in Medellín to produce cocaine. Very normal business meeting. Very healthy workplace. Very “please sign here, we care about your wellbeing.” In the scene, the laboratory is full of smoke, terrible lights, strange smells and probably 700 health and safety violations. And then Pablo and Gustavo talk about it like this is just another day at the office. Basically:
— Esto huele mal. This smells bad.
And Pablo is there like: “Bueno, keep working.”
Gustavo: vos sabes hay una cosa que me tiene preocupado, Pablo? No será que los trabajadores se van a ahogar con tanto humo.
Pablo: Hagamos una chimenea y ya.
That’s a boss who doesn’t care about workplace safety. Of course, he is a narco, so I suppose the normal HR process was: Step 1: complain. Step 2: disappear. So maybe your boss is not that bad. Hopefully.
Because this week we’ll talk about: jefes terribles — terrible bosses / trabajos horribles — horrible jobs / clientes pesados — annoying clients / riesgos laborales — workplace risks / reuniones eternas — endless meetings / and those moments when your job is slowly destroying your soul and you think: Esto huele mal.
Learning a language is not repeating sentences to a machine forever. It’s learning how to communicate with human people. Personas humanas. I’m only opening 20 spots for the first group. You get 7 days to try it for free. No card. No commitment.
Un saludo, Mónica
Work Spanish from “Esto Huele Mal” to “Me Voy”
- Esto huele mal. — This smells bad. / Something’s off.
- jefe/jefa c*brón/c*brona — terrible boss (widely used in Spain, very real)
- clientes pesados — annoying clients (pesado/a = heavy, also: annoying)
- riesgos laborales — workplace health and safety risks
- reuniones eternas — endless meetings
- Hagamos una chimenea y ya. — Let’s make a chimney and that’s it. (Pablo’s solution to everything.)
- Me voy. — I’m leaving. (Sometimes the only correct response.)
- No me pagan suficiente para esto. — They don’t pay me enough for this.
- personas humanas — human people (Mónica’s emphasis that language is for humans, not machines)
Colombians use vos instead of tú — so “vos sabes” = “tú sabes.” Context and region matter enormously in Spanish. In La Tribu (The Spanish Tribe) you hear all varieties.
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Besos, Mónica — your Pale Hispanic from MadriZ
Monica Bernabe Perez | Spanish-English conversation teacher at BlanBla (blanbla.com) | Storytelling copywriter at nosoyisrabravo.es
— Monica Bernabe Perez