50 Fun Facts About Hispanic Culture

In Spain and Latin America, which animal collects children's lost teeth instead of the Tooth Fairy?

A mouse called Ratoncito Pérez does the job, swapping the tooth under the pillow for a coin or small gift. The writer Luis Coloma gave him the role in an 1894 tale for the boy king Alfonso XIII.

In Hispanic countries, which day of the week replaces Friday as the unlucky 13th of the month?

Tuesday is the day to fear: martes trece plays the part that Friday the 13th plays elsewhere. Greeks share the superstition and tie the day to Ares, the god of war.

Which fruit do Spaniards eat at midnight on New Year's Eve, one for each chime of the clock?

Grapes are the answer: twelve of them, one swallowed on each bell strike, are said to bring a lucky year. Vine growers in Alicante spread the custom in 1909 to sell a bumper harvest.

The Panama hat, despite the name, is woven from toquilla straw in which South American country?

Ecuador is the hat's true home, and its weaving there is on UNESCO's heritage list. The misleading name stuck because the hats were shipped out to the world through the Isthmus of Panama.

A Spanish tortilla is not a flatbread but a thick omelette of eggs and which vegetable?

Potatoes are the heart of the tortilla de patatas. Whether onion belongs in it splits Spain into two camps, the concebollistas and the sincebollistas.

In the Spanish town of Buñol each August, thousands of people pelt one another with which food?

Tomatoes fly for about an hour at La Tomatina, leaving the town square coated in pulp. The festival is said to have grown out of a 1945 scuffle in which a crowd raided a vegetable stall for ammunition.

Cinco de Mayo, often confused with Mexican Independence Day, marks a win over which country's army?

France was the loser: General Ignacio Zaragoza's troops beat the army of the Second French Empire at Puebla in 1862. The day is now more popular in the United States than in Mexico.

In the Spanish series Money Heist, the robbers wear red jumpsuits and masks of which famous painter?

Salvador Dalí was chosen because his face is instantly recognisable as Spanish. The foundation that guards his legacy complained that nobody had asked its permission.

Which Christmas plant, native to Mexico, is known there as the flor de Nochebuena?

Poinsettia is the English name, after Joel Roberts Poinsett, the first US minister to Mexico, who is credited with sending the plant home in the 1820s. Nochebuena means Christmas Eve.

Which Pixar film follows a boy named Miguel into the Land of the Dead on Mexico's Día de Muertos?

Coco won Oscars for Best Animated Feature and Best Original Song. The title is not the hero's name but that of Miguel's elderly great-grandmother.

Which Spanish city lets bulls run through the old town each July during the festival of San Fermín?

Pamplona stages a run at 8 a.m. on each morning of the festival, and the same bulls fight in the ring that afternoon. Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises made the event famous worldwide.

In Valencia's Fallas festival, what happens to the giant satirical sculptures on the final night?

They are burned as huge bonfires around midnight on 19 March. One figure, chosen by popular vote, is pardoned each year and spared the flames.

In Spain, who parades through towns on January 5 and leaves children gifts overnight?

The Three Wise Men ride in on floats while their pages throw sweets and collect last-minute letters. They are said to climb in over balconies by ladder, and children leave their shoes out for the presents.

Which Mexican Christmas tradition re-enacts Mary and Joseph's search for shelter over nine nights?

Las Posadas takes its name from the Spanish for lodging and runs from December 16 to 24. The nine nights stand for the nine months of Mary's pregnancy.

At a quinceañera, a girl's fifteenth birthday party, her father presents which last childhood toy?

A doll, usually dressed to match her gown, is handed over in the ceremony of the last doll. In another ritual she is given her first pair of high heels.

Which orange flower, known in Mexico as cempasúchil, decorates Day of the Dead altars and graves?

Marigold is known in Mexico as the flower of the dead. Its Spanish name comes from an Aztec word meaning twenty flower, twenty being the base of the Aztec counting system.

Which elegant skeleton lady, painted into a Diego Rivera mural, symbolises Mexico's Day of the Dead?

La Catrina began as a printmaker's jab at upper-class women of the Porfirio Díaz era. Rivera's 1940s fresco gave her a full figure and helped turn her into a national symbol.

By Spanish naming custom, a person's second surname is inherited from which relative?

Their mother supplies the second surname and their father the first. Picasso is the painter's maternal surname, which he used because his paternal one was so common.

In Catalonia, teams called colles gather at festivals to build castells, which are what?

Human towers can rise ten levels, and one is complete only when the topmost climber raises an open hand. UNESCO added the tradition to its heritage lists in 2010.

In Mexican tradition, each point of a classic spiked piñata is said to stand for what?

A deadly sin sits on each of the seven points, and the clay pot stands for evil. The blindfold represents faith, and the spinning the confusion that temptation brings.

Which Spanish Golden Age painter portrayed himself at the easel in his masterpiece Las Meninas?

Diego Velázquez stands brush in hand behind the five-year-old Infanta Margaret Theresa, while a mirror at the back reflects the king and queen. The canvas hangs in the Prado in Madrid.

Which former colony is the only sovereign country in Africa with Spanish as an official language?

Equatorial Guinea won independence from Spain in 1968, which is why a country on the west coast of Central Africa belongs to the Spanish-speaking world.

Tamales in Mexico are most often steamed inside which natural wrapper, sometimes used as a plate?

A corn husk is the classic wrapper, though banana leaves are used too. The filling inside is masa, a dough of specially treated maize, and the dish goes back to ancient Mesoamerica.

Which cold dish of raw fish marinated in citrus juice is considered the national dish of Peru?

Ceviche is typically made with lemon or lime juice. Before the Spanish brought citrus to Peru, coastal cooks are thought to have soured their fish with the juice of a native passionfruit.

Which hot drink, sipped from a gourd through a metal straw, is the national beverage of Uruguay?

Mate is brewed from the dried leaves of the yerba plant, and its metal straw, the bombilla, is traditionally made of silver. Argentina and Paraguay claim it as a national drink too.

Tequila, named after a town in the Mexican state of Jalisco, is distilled from which plant?

Blue agave thrives in the red volcanic soil around the town of Tequila. Mexican law lets the name be used only for spirit made in Jalisco and parts of four other states.

The word tapas, for Spain's small bar snacks, is related to the Spanish verb tapar, meaning what?

To cover is the meaning of tapar, and a tapa is a lid. One popular story has a slice of bread or meat laid over each sherry glass to keep the fruit flies out.

Which Aztec language, still spoken in Mexico, gave English the words avocado, coyote and chipotle?

Nahuatl words reached English by way of Spanish. The language is far from dead: one variety alone, Huasteca, has more than a million speakers.

Which South American nation counts as Latino but not Hispanic under the usual definitions?

Brazil speaks Portuguese, so it falls outside Hispanic, a label tied to Spanish-speaking countries. Spain is the reverse case: Hispanic, but not Latino.

The finest grade of Spain's jamón ibérico comes from free-roaming pigs fattened on which food?

Acorns, bellotas in Spanish, give the top grade its label, jamón ibérico de bellota. The pigs forage for them in oak pastures known as dehesa.

In which novel by Miguel de Cervantes does a would-be knight attack windmills he takes for giants?

Don Quixote is often called the first modern novel and is one of the most translated books in the world. The windmill scene gave English a phrase for fighting imaginary enemies.

Which Mexican painter, married to the muralist Diego Rivera, is famous for her many self-portraits?

Frida Kahlo began to paint while confined to bed for three months after a bus accident at 18, an injury that left her in pain for life. She had been heading for medical school.

Which Picasso painting in grey, black and white depicts the 1937 bombing of a northern Spanish town?

Guernica was painted in Paris in response to the air raid by German and Italian forces. A full-size tapestry copy hangs outside the UN Security Council room in New York.

Which Catalan architect designed Barcelona's Sagrada Família, the basilica begun in the 1880s?

Antoni Gaudí took over the project in 1883, a year after building began. He died after being struck by a tram, and mourners gathered in the church's own crypt to say farewell.

Gabriel García Márquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude is the classic novel of which literary style?

Magical realism runs through the saga of the Buendía family, whose patriarch founds the fictitious town of Macondo. The book became a landmark of the Latin American Boom of the 1960s.

Flamenco, the art of song, guitar and dance, is most closely tied to which region of Spain?

Andalusia shaped flamenco, which grew up in part among the region's gitanos, people of Romani heritage. Extremadura and Murcia have long traditions of it too.

Which partner dance arose in the 1880s along the Río de la Plata, between Argentina and Uruguay?

Tango belongs to both banks of the river: in 2009 UNESCO added it to its heritage lists at the joint request of Argentina and Uruguay.

Which Mexican music is played by bands in charro suits on violins, trumpets and guitars?

Mariachi bands can field as many as eight violins and two trumpets, plus a bass guitar called the guitarrón. UNESCO recognised the tradition as cultural heritage in 2011.

Which Mexican sitcom starred Chespirito as a poor orphan in a low-income housing complex?

El Chavo del Ocho drew some 350 million Latin American viewers an episode at its 1970s peak. The boy's real name is never revealed: El Chavo simply means the kid.

Mexican pro wrestling, famed for colourful masks and high-flying moves, goes by which Spanish name?

Lucha libre treats the mask as almost sacred: in special wager matches the loser must take his off for good. Its wrestlers favour agility and aerial moves over raw power.

Which singer from Barranquilla recorded Waka Waka, the official song of the 2010 World Cup?

Shakira has been tied to the World Cup since 2006, when she performed at the closing ceremony. Often called the Queen of Latin Music, she co-wrote the 2010 anthem for the tournament in South Africa.

Which Puerto Rican rapper made the first Spanish-language album to win the Album of the Year Grammy?

Bad Bunny won it with Debí Tirar Más Fotos, and headlined the Super Bowl LX halftime show in February 2026. An earlier album of his was the first in Spanish to be nominated for the prize.

Which Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee hit, remixed with Justin Bieber, spent 16 weeks at US number one?

Despacito, whose title means slowly, tied the record of its day for the longest stay at number one. Its video was shot in the La Perla neighbourhood of Old San Juan.

Which singer, known as the Queen of Tejano Music, was played by Jennifer Lopez in a 1997 film?

Selena was often refused bookings across Texas in the 1980s for singing in a male-dominated genre. The film about her life turned its then-unknown lead into a star.

Disney's Encanto, about the gifted Madrigal family, is set in which South American country?

Colombia is home to the Madrigals, whose founders flee an armed conflict with their infant triplets. Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote the film's original songs.

Which Mexican director made Pan's Labyrinth and won the Best Director Oscar for The Shape of Water?

Guillermo del Toro, Alfonso Cuarón and Alejandro G. Iñárritu are known as the Three Amigos of Mexican film. Together they founded the production company Cha Cha Cha Films.

How does a telenovela such as Yo soy Betty, la fea differ from a typical American soap opera?

It has a planned ending: one self-contained story, usually wrapped up within a year, where soaps run on indefinitely. Yo soy Betty, la fea was remade in the United States as Ugly Betty.

Which footballer from Rosario captained Argentina to victory at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar?

Lionel Messi became the first player to win the tournament's Golden Ball twice. As captain since 2011 he had lost three major finals in a row before the trophies finally came.

Which Havana-born singer became known around the world as the Queen of Salsa?

Celia Cruz left Cuba in 1960, after the revolution nationalised the music industry, and became a leading voice of the Cuban community in exile.

Which Spanish director of Madrid's Movida era made Volver and won a writing Oscar for Talk to Her?

Pedro Almodóvar made his name in La Movida Madrileña, the cultural renaissance that followed Franco's death in 1975. His breakthrough film was Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown.