Spanish language Q&A Forum

A su vecino le robaron la moto el otro día.

(Le) robaron la moto el otro día a su vecino.

They stole his neighbour's bike the other day.

My brain wants to translate this as: 

The other day they stole the bike for his neighbor.   (su=his, her, your, its, their)

My point being that I think of the indirect object pronoun (le) as to/for him/her your/it

The word "for" being the key point that confuses me in this case, I would guess.  

I would think the sentence would use "de" and be "Robaron el moto el otro día de su vecino." and not have the indirect object pronoun.

Help please!

This seems to me to be too ambiguous (or maybe too subtle) to be used in a lesson.

Gabriel no podía meter las llaves en la cerradura anoche.
Carlos couldn't put the keys in the keyhole last night.

Without additional information, it appears that it could be either way, depending on the reader’s interpretation.

Este se negó a entregárselo. What does Este mean here? I know it means usually means  “this”.  

Thanks a lot, 

Shirley.

I have the worst time remembering which one is what. I get ese/esa and esto/esta mixed up all the time. Any suggestions on how to remember them?

Aquello/aquella isn't so hard to remember since it's so different

Can I use it to say: we were hopinng that he would do ...?