Which is proper tu o ti .....?
I've recently returned from Mexico. I have always used tu for you, but while ordering some food the waiter asked a friend when taking orders.... y ti, I would have said y tu? When I asked my Mexician friend what was the difference he said tu is not a word... but in my lesson books they all use tu.... thanks for your input
3 Answers
Did the waiter say "¿y ti?" ? It's incorrect.
"¿Qué vas a tomar?"... "¿Y tú?"
But he could say:
"¿Qué te pongo?"... "¿Y a ti (, qué te apetece)?".... "¿Y para ti (, qué te pido)?"
Maybe she could have said "Y a ti?....Qué quieres comer..?"
Or something like that. Why your friend said "tú" is not a word confuses me, since it is a subject pronoun, however subject pronouns are rarely ever used at all.
If you said something like:
¡Ya yo quiero la cuenta! (I want the bill now!).......The subject pronoun "yo" is not necesarry at all, and most Spanish speakers don't include it probably because it makes the sentence longer. It is used in some cases for clarification..."I want the bill now!" (and only I.... for example if you were with a group of friends.)
But it's perfectly acceptable to say (and more common) : ¡Ya quiero la cuenta!
The word ti is an object pronoun. ¿Y a ti? ¿Qué te gustaría tomar?"
However, (and you are right about this) I have seen *¿Y tú?"
Let's wait for a native to give you a better explanation.
Tú - personal pronoun / tí - prepositional pronoun / tu - possessive adjective. But a waiter would say ' ¿y a usted? rather than the informal ' ¿y a tí?
