verb gustar
am a beginner learning spanish. like to know 2 things. firstly when i say "me gusta la playa" i s it necessary to say "a mi me gusta.......". or "a mi" is implied? secondly is this treatment special for this y verb only, as a verb like "llamar" does not get the same treatment viz i cannot say "me llama, te llama." i guess it is possible only for a few verbs due to common usage. can somebody help clarify. thanks subros2
9 Answers
No, you don't always have to say "a mi".
Gustar is a funny verb. It means "to be pleasing (to)". Although "Me gusta el café" is usually translated as "I like coffee," what it really means is "Coffee is pleasing to me." So normally you only use the third person singular or plural forms of gustar. (In the present tense that would be gusta and gustan.) So "I like milk" is "Me gusta la leche" (i.e. Milk is pleasing to me.) And "I like candies," is "Me gustan los dulces" (i.e. Candies are pleasing to me.)
Me gusta la playa (= A mí me gusta la playa) A mi no me gusta mucho, a mi me gusta más la montaña. Me gusta la playa,pero también me gusta el mar-dijo Elsa ¿A tí te gusta el mar? A mí no-dijo Luis. Pero quien realmente me gusta es tu novia. Oh, pues a mí me gustas tú.
El se llama Luis Yo Tomás. ¿ Y tú?( =¿y tú como te llamas?) Yo Eduardo. Perdona , creo que Francisco me está llamando(= me llama).
Sí, quería decirte que ayer te llamó tu tía Elisa por teléfono. Perdonadme, me tengo que ir a llamar por teléfono a mi tía. ¿Llamas por teléfono a tu tía o es ella la que te llama a tí? El cartero siempre llama dos veces a la puerta. Mi perro se llama Boris,pero le llamamos Bor. Mi novia me llama “cariño” cada vez que me llama por teléfono.
La Playa is not yours, me gusta la playa is correct. People in mexico always use me llama and te llama.
"Me llamo" can be translated in two different ways:
Me llamo ''''', pero en los foros me llamo lazarus = My name is ''''', but in the fora I call myself lazarus.
Hola Mirle
I think the best way to explain this is by saying that "me gusta" literally means in english "it pleases me", whereas when you say "me llamo" it means "I call myself", If you were to say "me llama" it would mean he/she(or you-formal) calls me, so you could say for example: "Mi madre me llama Mirle", my mother calls me Mirle.
you're right that "llamar" doesn't get the same treatment (is used differently than "gustar"). However, you definitely _can_ say "me llama" (he calls me) & "te llama" (he calls you). "llamar" is less "interesting" because it behaves the way English speakers _expect_ a verb to behave (and the subject/object also match up to their expectations). "gustar", on the other hand, does not behave the way most English speakers think a verb "should" behave. As Heidita suggested, read the thread for which she provided a link.
thanks. i got a good idea about using gustar. mirle
When you want say "I like" or "you like", there is no much point in saying "a mí" and "a ti", since there is only one "yo" and one "tú", but you can use it when you want to greatly emphasize what you or the other person likes. When you say "he likes" or "she likes" it often makes sense to add "a él" or "a ella" just to avoid ambiguities, since "le" doesn't differenciate, and you can talk about anyone using the third person, but this extra "a él/ella/..." can also be used to stress what he or she likes.
Mirle, in this very interesting thread the verb gustar came up. Look at the valualbe posts by James and Lazarus.
[url=http://my.spanishdict.com/forum/topic/show'id=1710195%3ATopic%3A291320]http://my.spanishdict.com/forum/topic/show'id=1710195%3ATopic%3A291320[/url]
