I remember watching the HBO movie
Live from Baghdad (about the CNN crew that scooped everybody and got caught in the middle of a war
) the other day and noticed a scene where Robert Wiener (played by Michael Keaton) hires an Egyptian woman right at the hotel desk for $100 a day. And she certainly wasn't a professional translator, just a tourist.
In Spanish, we have the 'King's Spanish' (much like British English), spoken with a distinctive 'lisp' and very formal, to the very colloquial and informal Mexican Spanish, spoken with a distinct sing-song accent. And your variations in between European and Latin American Spanish. Argentinian and Chilean Spanish has a somewhat European feel to it (and many Latinos poke fun at the distinctive Argentinian accent -- the (in)famous Commie revolutionary Ernesto Guevara earned the famous nickname 'Che' from his Argentinian-accented Spanish -- they seem to like to inject the word 'che' (almost like 'bud' or 'buddy') everywhere).
Cuban and Caribbean Spanish is spoken very rapidly. Venezuelan Spanish, while it's actually in South America, is grouped as a Caribbean accent. Colombia has a distinctive accent, though Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru and Paraguay tend to speak a neutral accent. The same goes with the countries in Central America, the farther they are from Mexico, the accent is more neutral.
There is a version of Spanish similar to the 'Modern Standard Arabic' that's somewhat jokingly called 'Walter Cronkite Spanish' -- only used in government and news, though many of the anchorpersons give themselves away with their accents.