8 simple sentences for review.
I am going to cook salmon and broccoli tonight.
Voy a cocinar salmón y brócoli esta noche.I love to cook.
Me encanto cocinar.I am going to cook hamburgers at the party tomorrow.
Mañana irè cocinar hamburguesas en la fiesta.I wish I could cook in my office.
Deseo podría cocinar en mi oficina.Would you like me to cook for you?
¿Querías gusta de me cocinar para ti?If I could cook breakfast, I would.
Si podría cocinar el desayuno, yo podrè.I am cooking chicken and rice.
Estoy cocinando pollo y arroz.I cooked fish twice last week.
La semana pasado, cocinaba pesco dos veces.
17 Answers
Thank you-all: OK with some research, study and practice I got it.
2, I love to cook. (it is the to cook -- that I love; and is so it uses either singular or plural --"encanta" in this case.)
Another example with (gustar): I like good books. (it is the books that I like; so -- Me gustan los libros bueno. or A mí me gustan los libros bueno.)
The same is true with verbs like (molestar, parecer, disgustar...) Ex: I hated the movie. (It is the movie that I hated: so: Me disgusta la pelicula.)
Daniel said:
2 encantar is a regular "ar" verb, why is encanto wrong here?
For more on this topic try searching the forum for "mindset molestar gustar" (without the quotes).
I think you can use the following for number three which is along the lines you were thinking.
3. En la fiesta mañana, voy a cocinar hamburguesas (I am going to cook)
Daniel said:
Thank you so much Sally. I have studied my mistakes and have a few questions. #2 encantar is a regular "ar" verb, why is encanto wrong here?
3 In spanish is the ("Where" en la fiesta) or ("When" mañana) always placed before the ("what is going to happen/do" harè hamburguesas.)? I just looked in my REA's Spanish Grammer book and could not find a answer.
4 Same as #3 should "en la oficina" be at the start of the sentence? It was not suggested.
5 "Que quisieras....." What is the purpose of the "Que" before "quisieras"?
6 "....lo harè" = I'd do it. Great... but is podrè used wrongly here?
By the way I think I have just down-graded my spanish level from intermediate to beginner.
Number 2
Me gustA concinar - This means "it pleases me to cook" or "I like to cook"
Me encantA cocinar - I love to cook - This follows the same format as above but makes no sense in English. Hopefully someone more experienced will explain the technicalities.
Daniel said:
I also know (believe) that present tense and sometimes imperfect tense my be used for near future events -- is that correct?
No tense in Spanish (or in English, I believe) has any relationship whatsoever with time distance (i.e. near or far past /future). Almost any tense in Spanish can be used to refer to moments seconds away, minutes away, hours away, centuries away, or millions of millennia away. Distance in time is not the key to grammatical tenses. Example:
Me gradúo dentro de 20 años.
There is a similar misunderstanding in English grammars when they say that "to be + -ing" is used for near future:
I'm visiting my parents in 15 years time, after my sentence is over.
Maybe long time spans is not the original idea, but not because of the length, but because of the lack of reliability of the planned action using such a long schedule. A sentence like "I'm painting my house" does not necessarily suggest a near future, but common sense dictates anyway that you haven't planned painting the house 3 millennia after you're dead, but something which is within your reach, which is why it feels "reasonably" close, from a time perspective.
Thank you Vikingo:
Yes I understand. However the party is more than a day in the future...so I usually use the furture tense -- since I am really studying verb conjugations, and can use all the help I can get. I also know (believe) that present tense and sometimes imperfect tense my be used for near future events -- is that correct?
Vikingo said:
Daniel said:
3 In spanish is the ("Where" en la fiesta) or ("When" mañana) always placed before the ("what is going to happen/do" harè hamburguesas.)? I just looked in my REA's Spanish Grammer book and could not find a answer.
You have a lot of freedom in Spanish regarding where to put what. For example: "Mañana haré hamburguesas en la fiesta", "en la fiesta mañana haré hamburguesas", "haré hamburguesas en la fiesta mañana", "haré hamburguesas mañana en la fiesta", etc.What you're stressing, though, semantically, is slightly different. But in all of these you could use the "ir + a" construction or even the present tense to express the future. Did you understand that point'Take care
>
Apologies! I did miss an accent on "qué" (I was modifying a text, not writing it myself from scratch).
Daniel said:
OK! That explains the "Que quisieras....." The accent mark on Que is missing so I never thought of (What would you like..). It should be "Què"; right.
Yes, it should and I'm surprised that Lazarus should have mis-typed his response (he's usually quite careful about tildes).
Daniel said:
3 In spanish is the ("Where" en la fiesta) or ("When" mañana) always placed before the ("what is going to happen/do" harè hamburguesas.)? I just looked in my REA's Spanish Grammer book and could not find a answer.
You have a lot of freedom in Spanish regarding where to put what. For example: "Mañana haré hamburguesas en la fiesta", "en la fiesta mañana haré hamburguesas", "haré hamburguesas en la fiesta mañana", "haré hamburguesas mañana en la fiesta", etc.
What you're stressing, though, semantically, is slightly different. But in all of these you could use the "ir + a" construction or even the present tense to express the future. Did you understand that point?
Take care 
OK! That explains the "Que quisieras....." The accent mark on Que is missing so I never thought of (What would you like..). It should be "Què"; right.
Oddly enough Sally changed (the meaning of ) your sentence (#5) in correcting it and Lazarus corrected her correction without referring to the English. (In effect, they changed your sentence to correspond to "What would you like me to cook for you'")
¿Quieres que te cocine/prepare algo'
Thank you so much Sally. I have studied my mistakes and have a few questions.
2 encantar is a regular "ar" verb, why is encanto wrong here?
3 In spanish is the ("Where" en la fiesta) or ("When" mañana) always placed before the ("what is going to happen/do" harè hamburguesas.)? I just looked in my REA's Spanish Grammer book and could not find a answer.
4 Same as #3 should "en la oficina" be at the start of the sentence? It was not suggested.
5 "Que quisieras....." What is the purpose of the "Que" before "quisieras"?
6 "....lo harè" = I'd do it. Great... but is podrè used wrongly here?
By the way I think I have just down-graded my spanish level from intermediate to beginner.
Thanks Lazarus, good information there! I've heard about the etymology of the future tense (from the Michel Thomas program on French, actually ). Interestingly, both English and Norwegian have to use auxiliary verbs to express the future.
Vikingo said:
The "haré" uses the "real" future tense.
Real future tense? Well... this is probably not well understood. The so called future tense was originally formed by joining words (periphrasis), exactly like "ir a", so they are not really that different. It was originally an infinitive with the verb "haber", used to express obligation, not future: comer he (eat I must) - comeré, hablar he - hablaré. Later, this idea of obligation allowed to make predictions, both in present and future, and eventually it was given that name, but it is not by no means the main tense to talk about any future. Both "ir a" and the future can be used to talk about the future, but each one is different, and you cannot express the idea of future with these two alone anyway. Funny enough, the present could easily be used more often than the future tense to talk about the future, while the future tense is very often used to make approximations and guesses in the present.
Hiya Daniel,
I guess you wanted to use the "ir + a" construction in sentence #3. What you could say there is something like "Mañana voy a (cocinar/hacer/preparar) hamburguesas..", as an alternative to Sally's suggestion "mañana haré", which is also perfectly fine. The "haré" uses the "real" future tense.
