Quick help please please with these text messages
Ok, this guy spells really badly so it is really hard for me to translate what he is trying to say to me. he speaks maybe a handfull of english words. The context is this.... I text message him saying I only wanted to be friends. (No more romantic stuff) ok... then he said this>>( and this is exactly how he wrote it)
O esta bien no mas keria saludarte ok
then after I said I did not understand he said this
yo kero decirte alo jaguartu yu
please help me asap, thanks
13 Answers
lazarus1907 said:
:
I am a grammar guy, but I find it a thousand times easier to explain this tense difference in terms of pictures o clips, than formal explanations.
I'm a grammar guy too but in a classroom setting I'd prefer diagrams/pictures (so long as I didn't have to draw them). That notwithstanding, readers here (unlike classroom students) are not a captive audience so if they're not interested in "heavy" grammatical explanations, they can always skip over that part. I also assume that many of the readers here have looked at whatever their textbooks have to say (and which may have had some kind of diagrams) and found it insufficient. Sometimes coming at the problem from a different angle can be helpful.
I don't think that studying a foreign language should be an exercise in doing slavishly close translations (as was usually the case up to 40-50 years ago) but I do think that one of the joys/benefits of studying a foreign language stems from obtaining a better understanding of ones own language.
Besides, I think grammar can be a lot of fun. The parallels (and differences) between grammatical constructs in different languages say something about how human minds (and cultures) work.
Yay!! So we are soon going to see videos with lazarus explaining with pictures and clips in the spanishdict.com/learn '?
jejeje... 
lazarus1907 said:
Marco said:
Thank you, lazarus for your reply. That helped a lot.I am clear with simple past tense and past imperfect tense. For these two different tenses, the point is which picture you want to give others. Simple past tense is for people just easily and simply to express something that happened in the past (the point is now), but using past imperfect tense is for people to give the pictures to others about what was happening or what they were thinking at one moment in the past (The point is in the past and that is only an imagination because can not go back to the past). Let's go back to the original sentense. The person used "quería" instead "quise" is because he wanted to emphasize "want to say hi" to this woman in order to attract her. If he used only "quise" here, the sentence might not give the reader strong feeling. That's way "quería" was used in the sentence. (I was thinking about this becasue of the contexts and situation).
Mmmm... I'm not quite sure. The difference between the tenses should be fairly obvious to a writer, and (specially) to a film director, as it is all about where to place the 'camera' when telling a story. I've got in mind some images in mind that would be 1000 times more useful than the most concise explanation. My guess is that if you can't visualize as intended, you'll find it very hard to understand why it is used.I am a grammar guy, but I find it a thousand times easier to explain this tense difference in terms of pictures o clips, than formal explanations.
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Marco said:
Thank you, lazarus for your reply. That helped a lot. I am clear with simple past tense and past imperfect tense. For these two different tenses, the point is which picture you want to give others. Simple past tense is for people just easily and simply to express something that happened in the past (the point is now), but using past imperfect tense is for people to give the pictures to others about what was happening or what they were thinking at one moment in the past (The point is in the past and that is only an imagination because can not go back to the past). Let's go back to the original sentense. The person used "quería" instead "quise" is because he wanted to emphasize "want to say hi" to this woman in order to attract her. If he used only "quise" here, the sentence might not give the reader strong feeling. That's way "quería" was used in the sentence. (I was thinking about this becasue of the contexts and situation).
Your explanations look pretty convincing to me, actually. The difference between the tenses should be fairly obvious to a writer, and (specially) to a film director, as it is all about where to place the 'camera' when telling a story. I've got in mind some images in mind that would be 1000 times more useful than the most concise explanation. My guess is that if you can't visualize as intended, you'll find it very hard to understand why it is used.
I am a grammar guy, but I find it a thousand times easier to explain this tense difference in terms of pictures o clips, than formal explanations.
As usual, Lazarus' explanation is both clear, to the point and does a good job of emphasizing the general applicability of the rule (as he prefers to explain it [and his "rule" is better and simpler than what is usually offered]). Without intending to step on his toes in any way, I'll offer a bit that is more oriented to the underlying meaning/intention in similar English constructions. "I only wanted to say hello" is clearly simple past tense but, by way of explanation, one might say that wanting to say hello is "what was going on in my head" (note: imperfect tense) when I wrote this/you [this last phrase is implied but not stated explicitly]). If we wanted to change the sense to more closely match "quise saludarte" in English, we could, for example, say "it occurred to me [simple past but with emphasis on an over-and-done-with action] to say hello". "I only wanted to..." is probably the best English translation but it tends to obscure the "imperfection" of the verb that is more clearly expressed in the Spanish.
By the way, please note that "imperfect" when used to describe a verb tense does NOT mean "flawed" or "defective" it mean "not completed/finished".
lazarus1907 said:
Marco said:
Hi SoKuhl, thank you for your quick reply. Please do not mind what I wrote. Actually any replies are welcome. The reason why I mentioned to lazarus is because I found this question from his post. If I found it from your post, I would mention to you.
Actually I did not get you. You said "querer" here is a desire, wish, not an exact action. That is why past imperfect tense is used here. As you said, we usually say a lot sentences using "want" in English, but that does not mean that we are going to get or do whatever we want to, correct? So does that mean we usually use imperfect tense for "querer" if we are talking about something in the past?
Both "quise" and "quería" are correct. The usage of these two tenses is a common misconception among students, and many books don't help much by giving weird random rules.With the preterite (quise), regardless of the verb, past actions are contemplated after they have finished and their consequences are over. With imperfect (quería), regardless of the verb, we go back to the past to 'live' again the moment at which the action had yet not finished.Let's see this with "querer":You are in the past, and you want to call someone. You think: "I want to call this person". This action is not finished yet: you still want to call this person after that thought. Now let's go back to the present again. That scenario is described with imperfect.If you don't want to visualize that moment at which you thought "I want to...", but just mentioned that you wanted to do something, and then the action ended, i.e. you no longer wanted to do it (i.e. it's over), and it has no longer relevance, then use preterite.Obviously, the preterite gives a very impersonal and distant perspective of the same action here, so imperfect is the preferred option for this verb.Does this help?
Thank you, lazarus for your reply. That helped a lot.
I am clear with simple past tense and past imperfect tense. For these two different tenses, the point is which picture you want to give others. Simple past tense is for people just easily and simply to express something that happened in the past (the point is now), but using past imperfect tense is for people to give the pictures to others about what was happening or what they were thinking at one moment in the past (The point is in the past and that is only an imagination because can not go back to the past).
Let's go back to the original sentense. The person used "quería" instead "quise" is because he wanted to emphasize "want to say hi" to this woman in order to attract her. If he used only "quise" here, the sentence might not give the reader strong feeling. That's way "quería" was used in the sentence. (I was thinking about this becasue of the contexts and situation).
Please correct me if I made any mistakes or got any misunderstanding.
Thank you, lazarus
Marco
Marco said:
Hi SoKuhl, thank you for your quick reply. Please do not mind what I wrote. Actually any replies are welcome. The reason why I mentioned to lazarus is because I found this question from his post. If I found it from your post, I would mention to you.
Both "quise" and "quería" are correct. The usage of these two tenses is a common misconception among students, and many books don't help much by giving weird random rules.
With the preterite (quise), regardless of the verb, past actions are contemplated after they have finished and their consequences are over. With imperfect (quería), regardless of the verb, we go back to the past to 'live' again the moment at which the action had yet not finished.
Let's see this with "querer":
You are in the past, and you want to call someone. You think: "I want to call this person". This action is not finished yet: you still want to call this person after that thought. Now let's go back to the present again. That scenario is described with imperfect.
If you don't want to visualize that moment at which you thought "I want to...", but just mentioned that you wanted to do something, and then the action ended, i.e. you no longer wanted to do it (i.e. it's over), and it has no longer relevance, then use preterite.
Obviously, the preterite gives a very impersonal and distant perspective of the same action here, so imperfect is the preferred option for this verb.
Does this help'
SoKuhl said:
Marco said:
lazarus1907 said:
True, I forgot the first one, which probably should have been written like:¡Oh, está bien! Nomás quería saludarte, ¿ok'Oh, it's Ok. I just wanted to say hi.
Hi lazarus, have a question here.When you translated "nomás quería saludarte, ok'" to "I just wanted to say hi", the person used the past imperfect tense conjugated form for "querer" here. Can I not use only past tense - "quise" here'What is the difference between past tense and past imperfect tense? Do past tense refer to something that happened in the past, but it is finished and past imperfect tense refer to something that happened in the past, but not finished yet'I know that you are going to give me academic information and knowledge that is what exactly I would like to know and learn.Thank you,Marco
I know you asked Lazurus, but I wanted to take a try at this to see if I'm on track.In this case querer is a desire, a wish, not a specific action that started and ended at a specific moment. So, the past perfect applies here, as you suggested in your comment.I hope I got that right
Hi SoKuhl, thank you for your quick reply. Please do not mind what I wrote. Actually any replies are welcome. The reason why I mentioned to lazarus is because I found this question from his post. If I found it from your post, I would mention to you.
Actually I did not get you. You said "querer" here is a desire, wish, not an exact action. That is why past imperfect tense is used here. As you said, we usually say a lot sentences using "want" in English, but that does not mean that we are going to get or do whatever we want to, correct? So does that mean we usually use imperfect tense for "querer" if we are talking about something in the past?
Please correct me if I made any mistakes or got any misunderstanding from your post.
Thank you,
Marco
lazarus1907 said:
True, I forgot the first one, which probably should have been written like:¡Oh, está bien! Nomás quería saludarte, ¿ok'Oh, it's Ok. I just wanted to say hi.
Hi lazarus, have a question here.
When you translated "nomás quería saludarte, ok'" to "I just wanted to say hi", the person used the past imperfect tense conjugated form for "querer" here. Can I not use only past tense - "quise" here?
What is the difference between past tense and past imperfect tense? Do past tense refer to something that happened in the past, but it is finished and past imperfect tense refer to something that happened in the past, but not finished yet?
I know that you are going to give me academic information and knowledge that is what exactly I would like to know and learn.
Thank you,
Marco
True, I forgot the first one, which probably should have been written like:
¡Oh, está bien! Nomás quería saludarte, ¿ok?
Oh, it's Ok. I just wanted to say hi.
I can´t follow the context of the messages. How does your translation follow from the previous message:
O esta bien no mas keria saludarte ok
which you didn´t translate for her.
Casimiro said:
interesting you know that laz. where are you from? its funny/ sad as i said before that the spanish is being influenced so much by english. i am sure that the person that sent that message to her was a young person.
I am from Spain (Seville). I also believe that the message was written by someone young.
interesting you know that laz. where are you from? its funny/ sad as i said before that the spanish is being influenced so much by english. i am sure that the person that sent that message to her was a young person.
yo kero decirte alo jaguartu yu
Yo quiero decirte "hallo, how are (to) you'"
Just try to read the end using Spanish pronunciation, hehe.
