I need a little more clarification on my question about "Voy".
Ok, by one of the answers I got, I can see that "Voy a comer" means "I am going to eat", as the infinitive "comer" is translated in English as "to eat". However....you say "Voy a la esquela" means I go to school? Then what would be "I am going to school? When do you know that "Voy a" means "I go"?...and when would you know that it means "I am going"?
And also, why must you put "la" in front of esquela? Because it is a noun and not a verb? Because it seems as though it translates as: "I go to the school." This reminds me of another situation where they say: "El Senór Martin es mi maestro". Why does the "El" need to be in front of Senór? It makes it seem as though it translates to: "The Mr Martin is my teacher. Why is it not just "Senór Martin es mi maestro"?
Thanks for any help. I am an extremely new beginner and I want to understand these small points.
6 Answers
Voy a ir means I am going to go but you usually follow the sentence up with where you are going to, if you are just saying that you are going away from your present place you would use the verb "Irse" and say "Me voy" I am going (away from here). Escuela which you spelled wrongly is a femenine noun so it is prefixed with la, you prefix the nouns as feminine or masculine not the verbs they don't have gender.
Voy a hacer : I am going to do. You can understand it from the verb which follows "a" if it's a verb that means it's** i am going to do...** But if there is a noun it means you are going somewhere.. Don't think it like in english... It's not the same logic. Use your senses for example "la escuela"... Do you know which school it is? Yes you do. That's why you put *** "the" (la)*** there... You're marking the place... And I'm going to cinema is "me voy al cine" you can think like "estoy yendo al cine" But it's not used in spanish... me voy is better
Well it's just different from the way you speak or write English except when it's the same.
"I'm going to eat at MacDonalds" ain't all that different from "Voy a comer a MacDonalds". In fact, apart from "voy", one word meaning "I'm going" versus "I'm going", 2/3 words meaning "voy" it's 100% word for word. So where's the problem.
As for articles, other answers have said that they just get used differently and you have to read and listen to get an ear for how they're used.
Good luck.
Voy means "I go". So "Voy a comer" means I go to eat. Voy a la esquela means I go to the school. You but la in front of escuela to say "the" school. You don't but la or el infront of a verb because in this case, "Voy a el comer" would say "I go to the to eat" El is refering to the Señor. The sir Marten is my maestro.
But the lesson example is telling me that "Voy a la escuela" means I am going TO school, not I am going TO THE school. Yet the example still uses "la" in front of escuela. Shouldn't "I am going TO school" be "Voy a escuela? instead of "Voy a LA escuela"? - ted-howard
HIited, Delores has already mentioned this, but the article is used in Spanish often differently to English.
for example:
Soy profesora: I am a teacher.
In English you use the article in Spanish you don¡'t.
Here the opposite is the case:
Voy a la escuela. I go to school.
In any case, we are talking about a noun here, in your example above:
Voy a comer----------------comer is a verb! YOu cannot use a verb with an article
Hola, Ted
Spanish uses the articles (el, la, los, las) with much more frequency than English does.
Translating word-for-word can lead to some awkward constructions in English.
"Voy a la escuels" would translate into '" I am going to school."
In this construction, "a" is the preposition "to'."
In "voy a comer," it is a conjugated form of "ir a + infinitive" which is used to say that you are going to do something.
