Haber Conjugations
Hi,
I'm a little confused on how to use haber in the preterite and imperfect conjugation. How would I say "there were stars in the sky". Would it be a condition or something with a distinct end?
2 Answers
Well, it isn't really the conditional. It happened in the past but has no specific start or end. You are simply describing the sky that night.
So, you would say, "Había muchas estrellas......" in this case.
Here is and example of hubo. This is one of many.
La otra noche hubo una colisión en el cielo. It was something that happened and finished- clearly defined.
This is a good way to start to differentiate between the two.
If you're intention is to set the scene, or rather, to narrate events in such a way as to draw the listener back into that place and time that you are referring to then you might say something like, "Había muchas estrellas en el cielo."
Note that when the verb haber is used to form impersonal expressions, it takes the third person singular form of the verb, the exception being the present indicative which takes the special form, "hay." You might find the following web page of some use as a reference:
