Malo

The word of the day is: 'malo'= bad.

The adjective  'malo'/ 'mala' is used describe someone or something as lacking in quality or being damaging, unpleasant (weather), incompetent (profession), ill/ nasty (person), in a bad state (food).

Related adverbs are 'mal' (badly) and 'malamente' (badly/ hardly/ only just)

Related nouns are 'el malo'/ 'la mala' mean the 'baddy'/ 'villain' and 'el mal' the (evil).

Grammar: In Spanish, when placed in front of a noun, the adjective  'malo', looses the ending 'o' and becomes 'mal'. This happens only in front of masculine nouns.
 

We also use 'malo'/ 'mala' in expressions such as:

• Mala leche (nasty/ spiteful intentions or being in foul mood... or bad luck)
• Con mala idea (with nasty intention(s))
• Mala pata (bad luck)
• Mala palabra (rude or dirty word)
• (Hacerse) mala sangre (to get upset)
• Malas artes (devious means/ guile/ cunning)
• (Dicen) las malas lenguas (heard on the grapevine/ )
• Malos tratos (ill treatment)
• A las malas/ Por las malas (unwillingly/ against the will)

Examples of usage are:

• El pescado está malo (the fish has gone off)
• Eres un mal amigo (you are not a good friend)-Note, before the noun 'amigo', we use 'mal'
• El malo de la película (the 'villain' in the film)
• El mal está por todas partes (there is evil everywhere)
• ¡Qué mala pata! (what bad luck!)
• Manolo me hace esto a mala leche (Manolo is doing this to me to be spitful)
• Manolo está de mala leche (Manolo is in a foul mood)
• ¡Qué mala leche!, empieza a llover (what bad luck! it started raining)
• A las malas no conseguirás nada (against the will, you will achieve nothing)

Love-Spanish.com loves the word 'malo' in the song 'El malo' sung by Aventura: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9pDr2_Acs4

More on 'malo', visit: http://www.wordreference.com/es/en/translation.asp?spen=malo

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