Perfecto de indicativo tense...
Hola a todos
I in this sentence I am trying to explain to a friend why I am late for our date to see a movie. A series of events have gone wrong and now I am about to relate the major reason for my delay.
I need help with the grammar please. I am using the perfecto de indicativo tense because the event has happened to me before I met up with my friend.
"Espera! Y luego..... me he quedado atrapar en un ascensor y no podría salir"
Gracias.
5 Answers
Actually, if you are narrating something that has happened very recently, the use of present perfect is more than justified. If you were talking about something that happened hours ago, or yesterday, then you should use preterite instead: "me quedé atrapada". The only tense that is wrong in your original sentence is the conditional, "podría", which should be imperfect tense: "podía".
"Y luego..... me he quedado atrapada en un ascensor y no podía salir"
This sounds perfect in Spanish (no pun intended).
I'm a bit confused because two conjugated verbs following each other is not possible.
Me he quedado atrapar/atrapada
Atrapada is not a conjugated verb, it is a past participle being used as an adjective.
haber is an auxiliary verb and the only verb conjugated.
quedado (past participle) [remained/been] is a linking verb in this sentence.
Despite its name, the present perfect tense in Spanish (and English as well) is used to refer to events that happened in the past. Its use in Spanish can be tricky, however, because its usage varies with region and it sometimes is used in slightly different ways than it is in English.
and
You should be aware, however, that the Spanish present perfect tense should not always be thought of as the equivalent of the English present perfect tense. In many regions, it can be used as the equivalent of the English simple past tense. Sometimes the context will make this clear:
- Ha llegado hace un rato. She arrived a little bit ago.
- Cuando lo he visto no he podido creerlo. When I saw it I couldn't believe it.
- Leo la carta que me han escrito esta mañana. I am reading the letter they wrote to me this morning.
and
But even where the context doesn't dictate so, the present perfect can be the equivalent of the English preterite, also known as the simple past. This is especially true for events that occurred very recently. You're also more likely to hear the present perfect used in this way in Spain than in most of Latin America, where the preterite may be preferred (e.g., llegó hace un rato).
In other words, the pretérito perfecto compuesto (compound preterite) is morphologically the same as the English Present Perfect tense, but it is not used in the same manner, so English speakers should not use their knowledge of the Present Perfect tense to explain the use of the pretérito perfecto compuesto. (and it doesn't help that verb tables that translate tense titles list it as Present Perfect making one think that it is identical to the English Present Perfect tense.).
The present perfect (pretérito perfecto) is used for past actions which are more relevant to how they affect us in the present moment, or when they continue in the present moment (the key term is present!) If you say "...me he quedado atrapado en un ascensor", it means you are still stuck while you utter those words.
By the way, it must be "quedado atrapado".
EDIT: I'll leave this up incase others have been looking at the Spanish present perfect like I have - through the eyes of English grammar.
But as pointed out it can be used as the equivalent of the preterite as long as it is relevant to the present moment.
Original post (incorrect) I might be missing something but the perfect tense is equivalent to our "have" etc. Is there some reason why you wanted to use this "I have become trapped" rather than just using the preterite tense "I got stuck ..."?
"y entonces me atrapó el ascensory no podía salir....etc" and then the elevator trapped me and I couldn't get out....
Atorar=get stuck as well but I'm not sure how to make that sound best, as in I got stuck in the elevator. Maybe "Me encontré atorada en el ascensor" Maybe a native can clear this up?
