how do you say "was"

Question

I need an example of "was" in a sentence, like "He was expelled."

Answer 1

It depends...it could be fui, fue, fuera, estuve, estuvo, estaba....in your example, it would be "fue".

I want to give you a direct, quick answer here, but the truth is, it's a tricky question, because "was" is used in different ways in English, and Spanish doesn't always work the same way. I'm going out on a limb here inferring you are just starting out, so I will try not to get too complicated with grammatical terms...

"Was" comes from the verb "to be", and if all you're looking for is a simple use of "to be" in the past tense, like, "I was the person who did that" you'd use the Spanish verb "ser", and like in English, the word would be different depending on who you're talking about. (I was, you were,etc). In this case, in English it's the same for "I" and "he"...i.e. "I was" and "He was", but in Spanish, the translation of "was" is going to be different. "I was" would be "Fui" but for "He was"it would be "Fue." BUT if you're talking about an emotional state, it would be a different verb in Spanish "Estar", instead of "ser".

In your example "He was expelled", "was" in this case would be "fue"..."Fue expulsado."....If you wanted to say "I was expelled", it would be "Fui expulsado".

The context does matter. If you were thinking of "was" the way it's used in "I was looking at the sky"...was there is a helping verb, while "look" is the real action you were doing. For that kind of helping activity, Spanish uses "estar", so "was" there would be "estaba"...."Yo estaba mirando al cielo."

I could go on, but hopefully you see by now there is no "one for one" exchange between a word like "was" and only one word for it in Spanish.

If you are interested in more nitty/gritty about ser/estar...here's a link to an article by Lazarus here in our reference section

http://www.spanishdict.com/answers/100848/ser-y-estar-by-lazarus

Also, check out the learning videos here...ser/estar is covered in Lesson 1.11

Click on the "Learn Spanish" link at the top of the page for the lessons.

thank you for helping, you're right, it is hard when you are first starting out - whatever54, Sep 27, 2009

"de nada"... it's like saying "it's nothing", as in "you're welcome" ;-) Keep up the good work, it's definitely worth it. You can learn alot here too, with the lessons, etc. And don't be afraid to ask any questions! - arnold3, Sep 27, 2009

Answer 2

Heres a link to conjugated forms of "to be":

http://www.spanishdict.com/conjugate/ser http://www.spanishdict.com/conjugate/estar

You probably want the past form, which is preterite.

either preterite or imperfect are possible unless you are referring to passive voice. - 0074b507, Sep 27, 2009

Answer 3

What do you think it is? Post it to us and we will be more than happy to help you along in it. Give you a hint...there are a great many forms of "was." Post what you beleive is the correct, and we can help you along better.