How can I say in Spanish, "I was reading a book when my father entered" ?
How can I say in Spanish, "I was reading a book when my father entered" ?
3 Answers
Can you fill in the blank here? Yo...... cuando entro mi papa.
Hi bulu, if you have a question like this, which is homework, we expect you to give your own attempt. Then you can post it and we will proofread it.
Feliz has given you a perfect answer, however, you could use both imperfect or past continuous here:
Yo leía un libro cuando....
Yo estaba leyendo un libro cuando----
The subject pronoun should by all means be avoided.
How can I say in Spanish, "I was reading a book when my father entered" ?
= (Yo) Estaba leyendo un libro cuándo entró mi padre
Generally speaking, you would omit the personal pronoun eg Yo except in situations like this where the verb form can be conjugated for more than one person where it is needed for greater clarity. Where the person indicated is obvious from the context of the spanish text (not the case in this short sentance) no pronoun would be required.
Native spreakers rarely use personal pronouns except as explained above
The imperfect (Not preterite/ simple past) tense is used for situations where:
- An action that was going on in the past when another action occurred as shown above
por ejemplo: mi hermano cantaba cuando yo entré = My brother was singing when I came in.
- An action that was going on in the past at the same action: . por ejemplo Mi hermano estaba leyendo y mi padre hablaba = My brother was reading when my father was talking
You need to use preterit tense here .
Yo leí mi libro cuándo mi padre entró.
