Spanish language Q&A Forum

In the writing challenge 'Melon with ham' we are asked to translate "You just need to cut some melon slices"

I wrote "Solo necesitas cortar algunas rodajas de melón" and it was corrected with "unas rodajas".

I understood these were interchangeable, and I'm yet to find any definitive to the contrary. Could someone please explain my error here?

Saludos 

I'm confused over the above example:  El banco nos dijo que firmáramos los documentos.

With the English translation provided (The bank told us to sign the documents), why is it not written as follows:

El banco nos dijo firmar los documentos.

What's confusing is the reason for the use of el imperfecto de subjuntivo in this example --- particularly with this English translation.

Pati Ecuamiga

Hola,

Re: Se la había comprado. 

How can one tell when reading or hearing this sentence, - if it was a standalone sentence -  that the “se” means  the plural “les” .

    For example if this sentence is entered in Reverso:  “Se la abía comprado.”  they translate it as “ I had bought it for              "him”.  So there’s no way to know from the sentence that it was bought for “plural someones”.  

Would this conundrum ever happen in real life, i.e. in converstion or writing, or would it always be clear from the preceding sentence?

Thank you for your patience,

Nicole

Hi.  Studying this lesson reminded me that I searched on your site lessons that would help with sentence building, and how that is done in Spanish (above the usual introduction to making sentence.) I could not find any despite several difference search words.  I also looked through the grammar, but saw no heading for that subject.

 So could you point me in the right direction:

1- How to make sentences and their correct /various word order, and how interchangeable /or not the word order is, on a more advanced level than : subject, verb, object.

2-  And also how the same meaning can be conveyed in different ways. 

Thank you. Nicole

¿Porque no se capitaliza español?

Is there a rule for choosing between the preterite + present participle and the imperfect + present participle eg:

Estuvimos hablando con la gente/Estábamos hablando con la gente

The instructions in the link say:

The choice of tense depends on whether the speaker is "still inside" the "unit of time" that's being used or implied:

Use the present perfect ("he ido") form when talking about the past:

- today, this week, this month, or this year

Use the indefinido ("fui") form when talking about the past:

- yesterday, last week, last month, or last year (or further back)

But then an example on the lesson page has this:

Ellos han visto el amanecer.

They saw the sunrise.

In this sentence, as with many of the quizzes, there is no way to know the context and so we have to follow the instructions as to which tense to use. Part of the fun of the quizzes is not reading the directions.

I think this is the root of the frustration here. Perhaps if more context were provided we could have a chance of answering without the addition direction needed.

There is no hint to indicate whether "you" i singular or plural , familiar or formal.   Therefore we can be marked down if our choice of one of four possible correct responses is not the same as your choice.