Help with some preterite tenses please. Very urgent...

Question

Hello world! I don't want to bother with accents; I know where they go. I was wondering if this sentence is correct:

Los medicos se pusieron un inyeccion. I want it to mean: They did an injection, but on my vocab sheet, it says, "Me pusieron..." In this case, it's not me getting the injection, but someone else, so I used "se."

Also, for the above case, does "hacia" work instead of "pusieron?"

2) Is this right: Habia calentamiento global. There was global warming.

And this: El nino se rompi el pie.

           El pajaro se escapo.

           Los medicos se hicieron un examen. 

thank you so much!

Answer 1

Nearly, good try - for the first one ......

Rather than 'se' you need 'le': le pusieron ... this is because 'le' is an indirect object pronoun (in this case meaning 'to him') and is used when there is something between the person doing the action of the verb and the person receiving the action - in this case it's an injection.

It's not easy to work these out sometimes as in English we will say 'they gave him an injection' but it's not possible in Spanish you need to say 'they gave 'to' him an injection'.

Thanks, and what about the other ones? - randomguy123, Mar 9, 2013

Thanks Kiwi-Girl, it helps me to know what the literal spanish translation is. - Maria-Russell, Mar 10, 2013

my pleasure :) - Kiwi-Girl, Mar 10, 2013

Answer 2

From poster of thread: To kiwigirl and others:

I am trying to say that the doctors did an exam (not themselves sat the exam) So it should be "Los medicos le hicieron un examen.

For the global warming, I was trying to say habia, not period finished. So habia calentamiento global is correct, right? Thanks -

Yes 'los médicos le hicieron un examen' means - 'the doctors examined him (ie. did an exam 'on' him'. If you haven't mentioned who it was you might want to put 'a Juan' or whoever it was on the end) - Kiwi-Girl, Mar 10, 2013

How about you give us the whole sentence about global warming, I can't really see how you want to use 'había' here - hubo seems more natural to me but maybe I'm just not getting the context. - Kiwi-Girl, Mar 10, 2013

Answer 3

With 'hacerse un examen' this usually means to 'undergo' an examination so I would have thought that the 'se' wouldn't be used if you wanted to say the the doctors 'did' an exam (ie. a medical exam on someone).

If however, you wanted to say that the doctors themselves 'sat' an exam however then 'se hicieron' would be right.

Thank you so much! I am so indebted to you! I am trying to say that the doctors did an exam (not themselves sat the exam) So it should be "Los medicos le hicieron un examen. - randomguy123, Mar 9, 2013

Answer 4

Re the global warming - if you want to say that in the past there was global warming but that period finished you would use the preterite tense 'hubo'.

Perhaps if you gave us more context that would help us see what exactly it is you want to say.

For the others:

El niño se rompió el pie.

• just missing the ó on rompió

El pájaro se escapó.

• I've seen your comments about accents but really it isn't good enough to just not be bothered to use the accents.

If you say or write escapo it means I escape so the accent on escapó, meaning he or it escaped is essential and I would really encourage you to use them.

For the global warming, I was trying to say habia, not period finished. So habia calentamiento global is correct, right? Thanks :) - randomguy123, Mar 9, 2013

Answer 5

Thank you Kiwi-Girl,

I have two columns for my spanish homework. One is for preterite and the other is imperfect. There are two pictures. One is of global warming and the other is a storm. My sentence is supposed to be (I know, it doesn't make a lot of sense, but that's what I'm supposed to do): Cuando hacia calentamiento global, occurio una tormenta.

can you say this: alugien se fracturo el hueso. Somebody fractured his bone.

Or if it is wrong, please explain how I should put it in Spanish.

ok then, that works but put ocurrió ;) and yep the last one looks good too except for a spelling mistake alguien and the missing accent fracturó. - Kiwi-Girl, Mar 11, 2013