use of the verb acontecer ..

Question

Hi friends,

Please look at this sentence (this is an example on SD) ............lo conté los sucesos acontecidos ayer' / 'I told him the events that happened yesterday'.

Now if we look at this sentence carefuly we will notice that the translation is not exact .. because in spanish only the participio "acontecido" has been used as an adjective .... if I were to translate this to Spanish .. I would say "lo conté los sucesos que acontecieron ayer .. I am not sure why there is such a variation in the translated sentences as this can really confuse the students .... kindly analyze both of these sentences and let me know please that which one sounds better ... thanks

SD is still quite good with the translations but in most of the books the translations are so flimsy that I feel like complaining against the authors .. - 00b055e0, May 17, 2014

Have you reported this to feedback? Are you talking about the translators on this site? - rac1, May 17, 2014

no Annie ,. I am not talkimg about the translators ... this is a sentence example .. if u look up the verb acontecer .. u will get this sentence example there ... - 00b055e0, May 17, 2014

Answer 1

That's why you don't use any translator that isn't you head.

le conté los sucesos acontecidos ayer = I told him/her about what had happened yesterday

'I told him the events that happened yesterday'. = le conté los sucesos que acontecieron ayer

I told him 'of' the events, or 'about' the events :-) It's just my opinion but I think translators are good for giving you an idea of how to use a word. I look up words in several as well as dictionaries just to get an idea. - 007c5fc1, May 17, 2014

no my friends .. this is not from the translator... this is the sentemce example mentioned for the verb acontecer ... - 00b055e0, May 17, 2014

thanks chileno - 00b055e0, May 17, 2014

jimmy, just so you know, many of those "examples" are from Spanish students and not Spanish natives. Remember that. - chileno, May 18, 2014

Margherite, all that is good, however we all know that translations done electronically leave much to be desired, so how can a badly translated phrase give you any ideas of how to use any word? Do the same but with your head and you'll see the light. - chileno, May 18, 2014

" that isn't in your head" - ray76, May 18, 2014

I don't know, but they do...without them Chileno, there is no light or the light is on but nobody is home! - 007c5fc1, May 18, 2014

hehe .. I dont use the machine translators too much .. Margh u can ask us ..if u have any doubts .. we are all friends here ... in my opinion the translators worl well only with the very basic sentences .. for complex ones u can reach out your friends . - 00b055e0, May 18, 2014

@ Jimmy....'you', 'u' will make me scream and make faces and turn to a translator to find out what the definition of 'u' is!! - 007c5fc1, May 18, 2014