Another Preterite vs Imperfect question
Hi everyone! I know I ask about this topic constantly, but I have yet another question regarding the pret vs imp. On a worksheet in spanish class one of the problems read:
Un día mi madre ( quiso / quería ) hacer una excursión pero mi padre
( fue / iba ) a un partido de béisbol.
I'm confused which is right (I don't have the answers) I think its quiso and fue because of "Un día" but then again, "to want" doesn't exactly have a beginning and end. And it makes more sense to say "was going" not "went" in the last part, so would it be iba? Please help me and explain why the answer is what it is. Thanks!
Rachel
3 Answers
it makes more sense to say "was going" not "went" in the last part
The hardest part about spanish is to stop thinking in English. A Spanish word doesn't 'mean' an english word, it represents an idea which happens to be mostly represented/translated by something else in English. In the beginning you're going to have to translate spanish to English for it to make sense, but the sooner you can get away from that the better.
As to the actual answer, 'un dia' is a time, but not a specific one. You could remove 'Un dia' and the sentence would mean the exact same thing as no real time is stated. The first will be in the imperfect as its ongoing, the second will be preterit because its at a specific time. The second part could also be "habia ido".
Here's the situation where you would need the opposite for context:
ayer, mi madre quiso hacer una excursión. ( at the specific time )
mi padre iba a un partido de béisbol todos los jueves cuando era joven.
Since going to a baseball game is always at a specific time, you'd use the imperfect if it was over a period of time. :D
You could actually use a combination of them all it just depends what you are trying to say. If you used quiso you would imply that she tried but failed. The imperfect is used to express emotions in the past quería, sentía, etc. If you use fue it means went, while ir in the imperfect means he was going. In this case I would definitely use quería and iba, as they make the most sense.
I'm leaning toward quería and fue.
Querer is a verb that has two different meanings between preterite and imperfect. In imperfect it means "wanted" (just like in present tense." In preterite, it actually means "tried".
If you said "mi padre iba a un partido de béisbol", you would be suggesting that he was there as a long term event. Long term would suggest years. "Ella era joven." She was young for years. "él caminaba el pero cada noche después de trabajar." He walked the dog every night after work. I think that you should use "fue" because he was probably only at the partido for the afternoon.
Imperfect is for habitual, long term events. Preterite is for short-term, finished events. And you need to make sure that you pay attentions for those weird little idiomatic nuances (like quería = I wanted but quise = I tried).
Does this help?
