"She tripped me." in Spanish?

Question

Unsure on how I should conjugate and whether or not it should be in the imperfect or preterit. I'm writing about a childhood memory. The sentence starts out like "Cuando era caminaba a mi hermana para el pastel con una sonrisa en mi cara, mi amiga presunta..." and then I need the "tripped me" part.

Could you maybe tell us the entire sentence you are trying to say? Thanks! - PumpkinCalabaza, Sep 15, 2013

In English, it would be "When I was walking to my sister for the cake with a smile on my face, my alleged friend tripped me." - karmasnapz, Sep 15, 2013

Answer 1

You may need help with the rest of the paragraph. If you are trying to work out of a dictionary to make your translation that can be difficult at beginning level. Here is help with the expression "she tripped me" (mi amiga presunta):

First the English verb "to trip" in this case is transitive, meaning there is a direct object (me).

Second it is in the past tense and in this case would definitely be "preterito"

Third, this is said with a phrase construction in Spanish - not just one verb and direct object: So the phrase is "hacerle una zacandilla" and in preterite, substituting the pronoun me for le, you would say me hizo una zacandilla

I would suggest you post this again with the English and Spanish and ask for proofreading.