Spanish language Q&A Forum

That sentence "yo huelo siempre bien" translates to I always smell good.

"huelo" in this sense means for the subject to have a scent, not like "I always smell something good"

The sentence "nosotros olemos las rosas del jardín" translates to we smell the roses in the garden.

in this sense, "olemos" means to physically perceive a smell

So it has two meanings kind of like how it does in English, am I understanding this right?

This article talks about using El Presente to express general facts, simple enough... 

... however my qualm is with the use of Ser vs Estar. My understanding was that ser would be used to generally describe things which don’t change over a prolonged period of time, eg. Relationships, jobs, generally accepted facts etc. 

Therefore I was terribly confused when the correct response to one of your questions was: 

“Francia está en Europa”.

Whereas the example on this page states:

“Roma es la capital de Italia.” 

Both of these seem like general facts with a geographical theme... where do I draw the line? 

Apologies for the essay! Haha

I wonder if there is a discussion of the pronunciation of these two words. Depending on the speaker, they sound the same to me. I have noticed in some accents in the north, there's a slight "l" sound in the ll, and even my late great uncle (from the north of Spain) had explained to me that this is a thing, but also he explained this to me a long, long ago and I just want to know if I'm hearing things correctly or if my brain's making it up. ¡Gracias!

I don't understand why naranja is plural in one example and singular in the other. 

This is really nitpicking but I think this can be worded a little more clearly:

"Notice that cada is invariable and is always followed by a singular noun, except when there is a number before the noun, in which case it needs a plural: "   I suggest replace "it" with "the noun" .  I know preposition refers to the last noun before it but in this case I was confused because I thought it meant "cada" that should be plural.  I think because I assumed the noun would obviously be plural.

no entiendo por que, en español , necesita usar "hay" por una oración: "Hay niebla" --pero, no puedo usa la misma estructura para la expresión -- "Esta soleando". Lo se que el ley es usar "hay" siguen por un noun y usa "hay" después un adjetivo  --pero no es "niebla" un adjetivo también? verdad?

What are the equivalents for can't & must not for logical conclusions in Spanish? That is, how can I express the difference in meanings given in the following examples?

(present)

The restaurant can't be open - the door is locked

The restaurant must not be any good - it is always empty

(Past)

He had left the office at 6:00 p.m. He can't /couldn't have been at home at 6:05 p.m

She was not answering the doorbell. She must not have been at home then.

Regards,

Alexander

El director del colegio, el cual trabaja duro, es respetado por todos. 

El director del colegio, quien trabaja duro, es respetado por todos. 

(mas informal) El director del colegio, que trabaja duro, es respetado por todos. 

¿Todos son correctos?