Hi All, I listen to the audio course and it sounds as if voy and vas are pronounced with a v sound as in victory, then Mauricio sent out a newsletter on tricks to remember voy and said it was like saying "boy I want to go". Then I asked a friend of mine that was taught his Spanish in Spain and he said it is voy like victory. So I asked a hispanic summer farm worker and he said it was voy like in boy. I read my Spanish alphabet and the v sound is the same as the b sound (beh). So would vamos also sound like bamos? Can someone who knows for sure let me know.

Hola. Lots of us have had the same question, and in fact there's an old thread on the Rocket Spanish forum dealing with this: __http://www.rocketlanguages.com/spanish/bb/viewtopic.php?t=138__ You'll see in the above discussion that the pronunciation varies from place to place, and even Mauricio and Amy don't use the same pronunciation!

This discussion of b and v reminds me of an amusing pseudo soap opera that they're running on *SpanishPod*. In episode 4 of the soap opera, called _Amor Sin Destino_, one character is crying out for vengeance. She is in the hospital and yells "¡venganza ...venganza...venganza!" whereupon the door of her hospital room opens and a gringo walks in and says: "Hola. Soy Ganza, Ben Ganza, ¿alguien dio mi nombre?" :D By the way, if you haven't taken a look at the SpanishPod site, you may want to do so. They offer a new podcast every day, and unlike some similar sites, these are imaginative and entertaining as well as instructional. There are podcasts at five different levels, from Newbie to Advanced. I think Rocket Spanish is a better way to get a good foundation in Spanish, but SpanishPod is a great additional resource. The URL: *__http://spanishpod.com/__*