Spanish language Q&A Forum

Hello Lawless Spanish,

I JUST found your excellent web site. I've been using various means to learn Spanish over the last 1.5 years, but your site seems to be the best resource so far. I'm still at A1 however.

Here's a thought that I'd be interested to know your opinion on. Often while reading an English interpretation of a Spanish phrase or sentence, I think I would like to have the more literal translation rather than the Spanish being re-worded in order to be a grammatical English sentence. Because I don't care about English grammar or want my English reinforced when I'm trying to understand how a Spanish speaker constructs their thoughts linguistically. Do you know what I mean?

Take the example from the first exercise I happened to land on,  Corro para estar en forma. It would be helpful to see a more literal translation, then I get a better idea of the words and structure a Spanish speaker uses. In the example, "estar en forma" is re-interpreted as "to keep fit." That is quite a departure from the literal. I think an English speaker is quite capable of recognizing a more literal translation "to be in form" because it is identical to the common English phrase "to be in shape." So while I know authors are trying to be helpful with English re-interpretations, I often feel cheated out of knowing a more literal construction and wording, and in the process authors may even be making less-accurate interpretations (such as "to keep fit" instead of the better "to be in shape."). What do you think?  

Hi Kwiziq experts,

In the phrase "Lo que más me gustó de la gastronomía local fue deleitarme con..."  I wrote "Lo que más me gustó de la gastronomía local ERA deleitarme con..."   I was marked wrong and corrected "era DELEITARSE con"  and I'm not sure why that is. Is it down to whether one uses fue or era in the sentence?

Many thanks

Dee

"Sobre" was given as a hint for "on" one page prior to where it was used (on the last line of text).

Habría valido la pena mostrar imágenes de los cuadros para reforzar las emociones que supuestamente suscitan.

I understand that no articles are used in negatives 

e.g no hay tienda

Therefore, I am asking whether you would also drop the article in this sense?

e.g hay el de rojo--> no hay de rojo?

How exactly do we use this as it means "Curiosities" as well!!

I heard some intresting facts about you.

He oído algunos curiosidades de ti.

Is it okay to say this?

This might be way off base, but while "I" (or "yo") is the most common personal pronoun in most all languages, when one combines "it", "he", "she" and "este" etc followed by nouns, the third person singular is the most commonly used conjugation. In Kwiziq quizzes and exercises, it seems that "yo" and "tu" are the ones that show up most often. The exercises would be better if they had a proportional focus on the pronouns/conjugations in line with how frequently they are used in real life.  

Yesterday I was visiting my friend Jimena.

The best answer is:

Ayer estuve visitando a mi amiga Jimena.

Is it incorrect to say    estaba visitando  OR   visitaba   ?

I can't find any lessons on the differences.

Gracias

I understand it grammatically or literately. What I am trying to figure out is what the semantics is. The sentence seems breaking the semantic chain of the text. What is the author trying to tell us?