Dialogue

Vocabulary

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Lesson Transcript

INTRODUCTION
Lizzie: Buenos días, me llamo Lizzie.
Allan: Allan here.
Lizzie: Beginner Series, Lesson number 18.
Allan: “Rise and shine - 2”. Hey all, welcome back to SpanishPod101.com, coming to you from Lima, Peru, on the coast of the Pacific Ocean smack right in the middle of South America.
Lizzie: Hi everyone. It’s a lovely, lovely day.
Allan: Lizzie, I was going to ask you how is going today but I can tell by your cheery tone that you are having a great day, aren’t you?
Lizzie: Yes, pretty well. And how is it going for you? ¿Y a ti cómo te va?
Allan: Me va bien.
Lizzie: Do you remember last time when Felix, in Madrid, and Ximena, in Ecuador, were talking on the phone?
Allan: Yeah.
Lizzie: Well, today we are going to pick up where they left off.
Allan: That’s right. We’re talking about time differences. And time differences can really be tough to work around if you’re not used to them.
Lizzie: Claro, pueden ser fastidiosas. They can be annoying, but they’re a fact of life and so we just need to work around them.
Allan: That’s right. So last time we were looking at how to ask the question “What time is it?”
Lizzie: Right. ¿Qué hora es? We heard the beginning of a phone conversation between Felix, in Madrid, and Ximena, in Ecuador.
Allan: Now, today’s conversation is a continuation of the one from last week.
Lizzie: You know, this is such a good example of what it’s really like to speak with someone else in Spanish.
Allan: Yeah, I agree. When you’re talking on the phone it’s a whole different thing than talking in person.
Lizzie: You get to really put your language skills to use and this is just the kind of conversation that people are likely to have.
Allan: Right you are. I mean even if you’re not talking about a time difference, phone conversations in general are a really dynamic form of communication.
Lizzie: Well, Allan, this should be pretty interesting.
Allan: Shall we begin?
Lizzie: Yeah. Let’s jump into today’s conversation.
DIALOGUE
FÉLIX: ¡Claro! Hay una diferencia de siete horas.
JIMENA: Félix, estoy durmiendo.
FÉLIX: No. Estás hablando.
JIMENA: Siempre duermo hasta las siete.
FÉLIX: A las siete allá serán acá las dos. ¡Hablamos entonces!
JIMENA: Hablamos...
FÉLIX: Of course! There's a difference of seven hours.
JIMENA: Félix, I'm sleeping.
FÉLIX: No. You're talking.
JIMENA: I always sleep until seven.
FÉLIX: Seven o'clock there will be two o'clock here. Talk to ya' then!
JIMENA: Talk to ya'...
POST CONVERSATION BANTER
Lizzie: Oh, that’s the worst, when someone wakes you up tan temprano so early.
Allan: Lizzie, are you a late-sleeper?
Lizzie: Yes, definitely, Allan.
Allan: Ok. And now there is a tradition to sleeping late on Sunday or at least really resting on Sunday, right?
Lizzie: Claro! As you’ve probably already noticed, not too many businesses are open on Sundays in Peru.
Allan: I have definitely noticed that.
Lizzie: Para muchos extranjeros les resulta difícil. For many foreigners it’s difficult to get used to.
Allan: Yes. You know, when I first moved down here to Lima I was always kind of little getting frustrated cause I couldn’t find anything productive to do on Sundays.
Lizzie: So what did you do?
Allan: Well, after I got married and had my children I ended up joining a club. And this is something our listeners may be interested in - in Lima, and I think many other cities throughout America, there’s not a whole lot of public space, you know, public swimming pools etc. So, if you want to do sporting activities you really have to buckle down and pay a little bit of money, and join a club.
Lizzie: Me parece una buena decision. It seems like a good, good decision to me. Didn’t you try church?
Allan: I didn’t try church, maybe a couple of times, but no. But let me tell you what I have been doing recently, and I think you will enjoy it cause I know you’re such a huge fan of music.
Lizzie: Yes.
Allan: I’ve discovered that at the National Museum on Javier Prado Street on Sundays at 11.00 AM they have the Peruvian Symphony Orchestra. So I’ve gone there for the last seven or eight Sundays in a row, and it’s just spectacular. Every Sunday they bring in a guest performer, they will change conductors from time to time, and they’ll always play a new piece.
Lizzie: Oh, Allan. You have to invite me.
Allan: I will invite you one day, Lizzie. I think you’ll enjoy it. Ok, let’s see. It’s about that time. Let’s get into some vocabulary.
Lizzie: Vamos!
Allan: Alright. Let’s begin with…
VOCAB LIST
Lizzie: diferencia
Allan: Difference.
Lizzie: diferencia, diferencia
Allan: Now, we’ll hear…
Lizzie: durmiendo
Allan: Sleeping.
Lizzie: durmiendo, durmiendo
Allan: Next, we’ll listen to…
Lizzie: hablando
Allan: Speaking, talking.
Lizzie: hablando, hablando
Allan: Good. Now we’ll hear…
Lizzie: siempre
Allan: Always, ever.
Lizzie: siempre, siempre
Allan: Good. Now, let’s listen to…
Lizzie: dormir
Allan: To sleep.
Lizzie: dormir, dormir
Allan: And finally…
Lizzie: entonces
Allan: Then, so then.
Lizzie: entonces,entonces Allan, we’ve talked about this word entonces before, right?
Allan: Yeah, that’s right. We looked at it briefly back in Newbie Lesson number 7.
VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE
Lizzie: We said that it can mean either “then” or “so then”, right?
Allan: So, we can say ¿entonces que hacemos?, which means “So then, what do we do?”
Lizzie: We can say Hablamos entonces., which means “We’ll talk then”.
Allan: Right, just like we heard in the conversation.
Lizzie: There’s this great expression that my grandfather used to say when he was talking about his childhood or a time long, long ago.
Allan: In a galaxy far, far away?
Lizzie: Allan!
Allan: So, I couldn’t resist. What is it that your grandfather used to say, Lizzie?
Lizzie: Well, he would always start out by saying en aquel entonces, which is something like “way back then” or “back in those days”.
Allan: Wow, I’ve never heard that one before. But it sounds as something a grandfather would say.
Lizzie: Great. So now that we’ve broken these words down, let’s look a little bit at how some of these are used.
Allan: Makes no difference to me.
Lizzie: Good, because our first word is diferencia.
Allan: I think that our audience will recognize this word, but for argument’s sake, what does it mean?
Lizzie: It means “difference”. And I should also add that this is un sustantivo, it’s a noun.
Allan: Now, those words are completely different, un sustantivo and noun.
Lizzie: And how could our audience tell if it is masculine or feminine?
Allan: Easily, audience, watch. With that letter A at the end, I’d have to say that it’s feminine.
Lizzie: When we say hay una diferencia de dos horas, and this means “There’s a difference of two hours” or “There is a two hour difference”.
Allan: Alright. Should we move on?
Lizzie: Sure.
Allan: Ok. Which word should we look at now?
Lizzie: A ver, let’s see. How about the word hablando?
Allan: Ok. So what does this one mean?
Lizzie: Speaking.
Allan: So, audience, we see that it is a verb.
Lizzie: Well, kind of it’s a form of the verb but this form is special.
Allan: I was hoping you’d mention that.
Lizzie: It’s something like a verb and it expresses continuous action.
Allan: There is a name for this kind of verb.
Lizzie: Well, we call it a gerund, but let’s wait until the next section before we get ahead of ourselves.
Allan: Good idea. So, for now, hablando means “speaking”.
Lizzie: Right. As in Ella está hablando con él. which means “She is speaking with him.”
Allan: Alright, seems easy enough.
Lizzie: So, now let’s move on and look at another word that everyone can definitely use. It is siempre.
Allan: Anything and always.
Lizzie: It simply means “always”.
Allan: I’ve got to say this is a very, very useful word to know.
Lizzie: So, consider the example: Siempre almuerzo a la una, which means “I always eat lunch at one o’clock”. See how the word siempre tell us how I eat lunch.
Allan: Yeah, it tells us that you always eat lunch at one o’clock.
Lizzie: And is this act of eating lunch expressed by a verb or a noun?
Allan: It’s expressed by the verb almuerzo.
Lizzie: Right. And if this word siempre is modifying a verb…
Allan: I would imagine it’s an adverb.
Lizzie: Exactly. The word siempre is an adverb.
Allan: There it is, Lizzie.
Lizzie: Alright. Let’s finish up by looking at one more word.
Allan: Ok, let’s have it.
Lizzie: Tranquilo, Allan!
Allan: What?
Lizzie: I’ve got a question for you.
Allan: Well, Ok.
Lizzie: What do you call the room where college students sleep?
Allan: Ok. It’s called a “dormitory” or “a dorm”. Ah, those older days. I see where you’re going with this.
Lizzie: dormir
Allan: dormir means “to sleep”.
Lizzie: Exactly. So we can say duermo cómo una piedra which means “I sleep like a rock”.
Allan: Good and truthful example.
Lizzie: And if we take the English word “dormitory” and remove the Y from the end, then we just have to add and IO and we get dormitorio.
Allan: Yes, this is an easy one to learn. So, if you’re looking for an apartment and you’re talking to a landlord, how would you ask, “How many bedrooms are there?”
Lizzie: I would say ¿Cuántos dormitorios hay?.
Allan: I see. So, to form the plural, you just added an S to the end.
Lizzie: Right, from dormitorio “bedroom” to dormitorios “bedrooms”. And both of these come from the verb dormir, “to sleep”.
Allan: Ok. That was really useful to go over those words.
Lizzie: Oh, you feel good now. Just wait until we’re done going through the grammar for today.
Allan: Well, you sound pretty excited about this, Lizzie.
Lizzie: I am.

Lesson focus

Lizzie: Today we’re going to learn a really useful way to use verbs.
Allan: What is this that we are going to study?
Lizzie: Well, if I say to you Estoy trabajando “I’m working”, do you know when this action of “working” started?
Allan: Definitely not.
Lizzie: And do we know when this action stops?
Allan: That we don’t.
Lizzie: Right. But what we do know is that this section is happening. Estoy trabajando ”I’m working”.
Allan: Exactly. The action here is continuous. But we don’t see any of its borders, to put it that way. Now, in English when we say something like “I’m working” we often call this the present progressive tense.
Lizzie: Right. But that could get confusing because in Spanish it’s a little different.
Allan: So, what should we call this?
Lizzie: When we use one of these words which are more or less equivalent to an English word that ends in ING, we call it gerund.
Allan: A gerund. Listen up, audience. A gerund is a form of a verb but it doesn’t really act much like a verb.
Lizzie: The gerund tends to modify the action of a verb.
Allan: But not the same as an adverb.
Lizzie: It can have the role of an adverb but it’s an impersonal form of the verb.
Allan: So, for example, if I say Martin camina hablando por telefono, our verb here is camina, which means “you walk”. And then we have the phrase hablando por telefono, and this means “talking on the phone”.
Lizzie: The phrase “talking on the phone” describes how Martin walks. hablando comes from the verb hablar, “to speak” or “to talk”.
Allan: So, can we say that to form gerunds in Spanish all we need to add is the ending ando to the stem of the verb?
Lizzie: Well, in some cases, this is exactly what we do for verbs of the first conjugation. Verbs that end in AR like hablar, caminar, cantar.
Allan: So, the gerund of these would be hablando, caminando, cantando.
Lizzie: Hablando - “speaking”, caminando - “walking”, and cantando - “singing”.
Allan: Now, you said that this only works for verbs of the first conjugation, right?
Lizzie: Right.
Allan: Well, then,what about the verbs of the second and third conjugation, Lizzie?
Lizzie: The good thing is that the gerunds of regular ER and IR verbs are formed the same way.
Allan: Oh, that’s good news for our listeners. There’s less forms to remember.
Lizzie: Right, so with a verb like correr, which means “to run”, we’ll drop the infinitive ending ER and then add INDO. So, from correr – “to run”, now we have corriendo – “running”.
Allan: So, we can say: estoy corriendo, “I am running”, or Susana viene corriendo, “Susanna comes running”.
Lizzie: And you’re saying that the gerund of regular IR verbs is formed the same way?
Allan: You got it. So, how about an example?
Lizzie: Let’s see. It’s got to be a good one. Marcos sigue imprimiendo las revistas, “Marcos keeps on printing the magazines”.
Allan: Hey, that’s a good one. So, it seems like those vowels I and E let us know that the verb is either in the second or third conjugation. And we know that these conjugations are very similar.
Lizzie: Right.
Allan: Oh, that’s very, very interesting.
Lizzie: So, now that it makes a little more sense, when we say estoy durmiendo or estás hablando.
Allan: That would be “I’m sleeping” or “You’re speaking.
Lizzie: Or No vayas comiendo a restaurantes sospechosos si no estás bien del estomago.
Allan: That’s good. So can you translate that one for audience?
Lizzie: Don’t go eating in suspicious restaurants if your stomach is off.
Allan: Very good, very good.
Lizzie: No hay de que. Ha sido un gusto para mi. It’s been my pleasure.
Allan: And mine as well. I’m sure that our audience feels the same way as we do.

Outro

Lizzie: Y no se pierdan, ya nos vemos.
Allan: Don’t be a stranger. Hasta luego amigos!
Lizzie: Chao!

Grammar

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