Forming The Present Participle In Spanish

The rules for forming the present participle are just as simple as those for forming the past participle.

• For -ar verbs you drop the -ar and add -ando to the end of the word.  Thus, the present participle of pasar – “to happen,” is pasando – “happening”.
• For -er and -ir verbs you drop the -er or -ir and add -iendo to the end of the word.  Thus, the present participle of comer – “to eat” is comiendo – “eating” and the past participle of vivir – “to live” is viviendo – “living”

Common Verbs With Irregular Present Participles

Just as with the past participle, there are some common Spanish verbs with an irregular present participle.  Some of these are an attempt to avoid an awkward spelling.

• Leer (to read) -> leyendo
• Ir (to go) -> yendo

Most other verbs with an irregular present participle still take the -ando and -iendo endings like regular verbs, but the stem is changed instead.

• Venir (to come) -> viniendo
• Decir (to say) -> diciendo
• Incluir (to include) -> incluyendo
• Dormir (to sleep) -> durmiendo

Forming The Past Participle In Spanish

Spanish has a similarly-simple system for marking past participles:

• For -ar verbs you drop the -ar and add -ado to the end of the word.  Thus, the past participle of pasar – “to happen,” is pasado – “happened”.
• For -er and -ir verbs you drop the -er or -ir and add -ido to the end of the word.  Thus, the past participle of comer – “to eat” is comido – “ate” and the past participle of vivir – “to live” is vivido – “lived”

Common Verbs With Irregular Past Participles

While most verbs adhere to the rules outlined above, some very common ones don’t.  Here are a few you’ll probably run into.

• Abrir (to open) -> abierto
• Decir (to say) -> dicho
• Hacer (to do) -> hecho
• Poner (to put) -> puesto
• Ver (to see) -> visto
• Volver (to return) -> vuelto

Llevar As “To Carry”

The most common definition of llevar is “to carry” as in “carry an object from here to somewhere else.”  For example, say you need to drop a package off at John’s house.  You would say:

Tengo que llevar el paquete a la casa de John -> I have to take the package to John’s house.

Llevar As “To Wear”

Llevar is also commonly used to express the notion of “to wear,” which can be applied to clothes or hair.

Llevo el pelo largo ->  I have (wear) long hair

Llevo gafas negras ->  I’m wearing black sunglasses

LLevar To Express Time

Llevar can also be used to express time.  For example,

Llevo dos años aquí en Barcelona ->  I’ve lived here in Barcelona for 2 years

Similarly, you can use llevar with yourself (me) as the indirect object to express how long it took you to accomplish something.  In this case, llevarme will translate roughly as “it took me”

Me llevó más que cuatro horas preparar para la entrevista -> It took me more than four hours to prepare for the interview

Llevar To express Similarity/Dissimilarity

Llevar can also be used idiomatically to compare two different nouns.

España no lleva mucho a Argentina ->  Spain and Argentina don’t have much in common (not true, but bear with me)

Traer means “to bring, to carry with you”

Examples:
Traje la cerveza => I brought the beer (i.e. I’m already at the party and brought beer with me)
Me trae las llaves => He’s bringing me the keys.

Llevar means “to take out, to carry away”

Examples:
Llevo la cerveza => I’m bringing the beer (i.e. I’m still at home, but will arrive with the beer soon)
Te llevan las llaves => They’re taking his keys to him (i.e. they are here now, but will soon arrive with your keys)

They key distinction can be summed up as follows:

Use llevar if an object is being transported to a destination where you’re not.

Use traer if an object is being transported to a destination you are currently at.

Of course, both verbs have other usages that don’t overlap, particularly llevar. I’ll cover these usages in-depth in a future post.

Traer:  to bring

The most common translation for traer is “to bring” in the sense of something being delivered to you. 

He’s bringing me the keys -> Me trae las llaves

She brought me a cake yesterday -> Me trajo una torta ayer

Another common usage is for when somebody gives you a lift somewhere, i.e. takes you there.  Be careful not to confuse this usage of traer with llevar, which is a common mistake.

Eliot is taking me to the airport.-> Eliot me trae al aeropuerto

Traer is used to translate “to take, to bring” in the sense of taking something somewhere, but only when you have already arrived at your destination.  If are at a party discussing the cake you brought with you, traer would be the correct verb a la “I brought the cake -> Traje la torta.“  However, if you were at home discussing the coming party with the host and she asked what you would be bringing, you would use llevar to say “I’m bringing a cake -> Llevo una torta.“ 

One final common usage of traeris when ordering in a restaurant.  Instead of the more formal quisiera, many Spanish-speakers will use traer instead to ask for something to be brought to the table.  If used in the form of a question and followed by por favor, this is a perfectly polite way to do it, contrary to popular belief.

Could I have a beer, please?  -> ¿Me trae una cerveza, por favor?

Traer is a stem-changing verb, with the first-person present indicative conjugation being “traigo” and several irregularities in the other tenses to boot.  Consult your copy of 501 Spanish Verbs (if you don’t have one, you should!) for more conjugation information.

“Hay un auto.”

and

“Hay does autos.”

are both correct.

The same form is also used when asking questions.  In the case of a question, the question ¿Hay? means both “Is there?” and “Are there?”  Just as above, the sentences

“¿Hay un auto?”

and

“¿Hay dos autos?”

are both correct, translated as “Is there a car?” and “Are there two cars?” respectively.

“John ate the cake.”

is an active sentence. John, the subject of the sentence, is also the one doing the eating. The following sentence, however, is a passive way to say the same thing

“The cake was eaten by John.”

In this example, the subject (the cake) is not the entity committing the action. John is eating the cake and not vice versa. This is the passive voice.

The Passive In Spanish

The passive voice in Spanish works pretty much the same way as in English. For instance,

“John comió la torta.”

and

“La torta fue comido por John.”

are word-for-word translations of their equivalents above. Since it works the same as in English, this particular way of writing the passive is easy to understand; however, there is another way to use the passive in Spanish which has no English equivalent.

The Reflexive Substitute For The Passive

When there is no explicit source of the action, the reflexive substitute for the passive is often used. This can usually be thought of along the lines of the impersonal “they” in English. For example

“They say this restaurant is very expensive.”

Who says that? “They” do, which is to say nobody in particular. It’s just the general consensus. In Spanish, you would use the reflexive pronoun “se” to convey the same meaning.

“Se dice que este restaurante es muy caro.”

What the above sentence literally means is

“It is said that this restaurant is very expensive”

The impersonal “they” is translated using the reflexive substitute for the passive, “se dice” or “it is said.” The “they” doesn’t refer to any one person or group in particular, just a general social consensus.

Uses Of The Preterite

The main thing to keep in mind is that the preterite is used for one-time actions.  For instance, to say you walked to the park on saturday you would use the preterite:

Caminé por la calle el sabado pasado

Since the walking happened at a specific point in time, last saturday, you’d use the preterite.  However, actions that take place against a continuous backdrop of another action also take the preterite.  If you were walking to the park when you saw a dog, the verb “to walk” would take the imperfect tense while the verb “to see” would take the preterite.  That is because the focus of the sentence is on seeing the dog.  The walking is just background information.

Caminaba por la calle cuando ví un perro.

Uses Of The Imperfect

The imperfect tense usually signifies ongoing or background action.  Taking the example above, if you had used the imperfect tense instead of the preterite you would have been implying that you walked through the park regularly.  The sentence

Caminaba por la calle

indicates continuous action.  That is, it was not an isolated event.  Perhaps you walk down the street every morning on your way to work.  By contrast,

Caminé por la calle

implies this was a one-time action.  Perhaps you were forced to walk down the street just this once because your car had a flat tire.  Use of the imperfect implies repetition.

The imperfect tense is also used to describe background actions taking place in contrast to the main event.  In the example above,

Caminaba por la calle cuando ví un perro.

the verb “to walk” takes the imperfect tense, because the act of walking is merely a background action that happened to be going on when a discrete event, seeing the dog, occurred.  It’s what you were doing when you saw the dog.

This short lesson is a gross over-simplification, of course, but these simple rules will get you through 90% of your Spanish conversations.  For more on the preterite vs imperfect, check out my old Spanish verbs tutorial.