The Spanish alphabet
Spanish has 27 letters — all the Latin ones plus one extra: Ñ. Spelling is predictable: what you see is what you say. Don't try to memorize the whole alphabet today — pick up the letters by meeting real words.
Vowels — short and clean
A, E, I, O, U each always sound the same: ah, eh, ee, oh, oo. None of the long/short vowel mess English has. Casa = KAH-sah, mesa = MEH-sah, sí = see.
Consonants with surprises
H is silent — always: hola = OH-lah. J is the throaty 'h' from 'loch': jamón = ha-MOHN. LL sounds like English 'y' (or a soft 'ly'): llamar = ya-MAR. Ñ is 'ny' as in canyon: España = es-PA-nya. Z and C before e/i sound like 's' (or English 'th' in Spain): gracias = GRA-syas. Double R and word-initial R are rolled hard: perro = PEH-rrro.
Stress and the accent mark
By default the stress lands on the second-to-last syllable (if the word ends in a vowel, n, or s) or the last syllable (any other consonant). When the stress breaks the rule, an accent mark goes on the stressed vowel: café = ka-FEH, mamá = ma-MAH, sí = see (the accent here also tells you it's 'yes', not si = 'if').
¿ and ¡ — upside-down marks
Spanish opens questions with ¿ and exclamations with ¡, and closes them with the regular ? and !: ¿Cómo estás? ¡Hola!
