Grupo Básico Español – lección treinta y uno

Grupo Básico Español – lección treinta y uno

Buenos días señores y señoras. Bienvenidos a la lección treinta y uno de la clase de español.

¿Qué tenemos esta semana?

No tenemos a Lucía ni a Aureliano, estoy muy triste. Están empacando sus maletas. Es muy estresante.

Esta semana, queremos terminar el capítulo diez de Sueños. ¡Hemos estado viajando demasiado tiempo!

¡Empecemos!

Last week, we were looking at a train timetable and booking tickets for train journeys. I think the timetable was giving us more trouble than the Spanish!

Here is a list of appointments in your diary for Monday and Tuesday. Look at the train timetable in the bottom corner of Page 109, the call the ticket office to book your seats. There are three train tariffs to choose from – llano, punta y valle

Monday (lunes)

11.30 reunión en Ciudad Real

15.30 reunión en Cordoba

21.00 cena en Madrid

Tuesday (martes)

15.30 reunión en Bobadilla

22.00 cena en Madrid

How did we do?

Here’s my effort:

Quisiera comprar un billete para ir a Ciudad Real el lunes por favor. Quiero tomar el tren llano que sale a las diez. Además, necesito un billete de Ciudad Real a Córdoba en el tren que sale a las catorce y uno. Es un tren valle. Finalmente, quiero volver a Madrid esta noche. Necesito un billete de Córdoba a Madrid en el tren punta que sale a las dieciocho y veintiséis.

El martes, tengo que ir a Bobadilla. ¿Puedo comprar un billete ida y vuelta para el tren llano que sale a las diez? ¿Puedo volver en el tren punta a las dieciséis cincuenta y cuatro?

Página ciento diez, ejercicio tres

Buenos días

Buenos días. Dígame.

Quisiera comprar un billete para ir a Sevilla el próximo miércoles, y lo quisiera de ida y vuelta.

Muy bien. Dígame a qué hora quiere ir y a qué hora quiere volver.

Quisiera ir por la mañana y volver por la noche.

Por la mañana tiene a las siete, ocho, nueve y once.

A las ocho de la mañana.

Bien, y la vuelta, por la noche el último a las nueve de la noche.

A las nueve de la noche para volver el sábado.

Muy bien. ¿Va a pagar usted con tarjeta de crédito o en efectivo?

Voy a pagar con dinero.

Página ciento diez, ejercicio cuatro

¿Quiere un billete de ida solamente o de ida y vuelta?

¿A qué hora quiere salir?

¿Y a qué hora quiere volver?

¿Va a pagar en efectivo o con tarjeta de crédito?

En la página ciento once, hay un poema se llama El tren de Antonio Machado

Antonio Machado or, to give him his full name, Antonio Cipriano José María y Francisco de Santa Ana Machado Ruiz was one of Spain’s best-known poets. He is famous for his poetry describing the beauty of the Spanish countryside and also his love poems.

He had his first poems published in 1901 and his first book of poetry in 1903. In the same year Machado was offered the job of Professor of French at the school in Soria. Here he met Leonor Izquierdo, the daughter of the owners of the boarding house Machado was staying in, and fell in love.

They were married in 1909: he was 34; she was 14.

In 1911, the couple went to live in Paris where Leonor contracted tuberculosis. They returned to Spain and Leonor died a year later, aged just 18.

Machado was devastated and left Soria and went to live in Baeza. Here he wrote a series of poems dealing with the death of Leonor. He never remarried but had a long affair with Pilar de Valderrama, a married woman. He wrote many poems about her, referring to her by the name Guiomar. The affair was kept secret and people wondered who Guiomar was, whether she was real or imaginary.

When the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936, Machado was in Madrid. The war was to separate him forever from his lover, Pilar, who fled to Portugal. A staunch Republican, he fled Franco’s forces first to Valencia, then to Barcelona, one of the last Republican strongholds.

Machado had written many articles against the Nationalists and would surely have been executed. He and his elderly mother were forced to flee across the Pyrenees to France, but the arduous crossing took its toll on both.

Machado died from pneumonia in 1939, just days after arriving in Collioure on the French-Spanish border. His mother died three days later.

In his pocket was found his last poem, "Estos días azules y este sol de infancia" (those blue days and the sun of childhood). Machado is buried in Collioure where he died; Leonor is buried in Soria.

Pilar lived to be 90 and, in her later years, revealed her affair with Machado. The mystery of Guiomar was solved – she had been real.

Let’s listen to his poem El Tren, a small part of which is on Page 111. We’ll look at the full poem and its translation.

VIDEO

Ahora, id a la página ciento trece, sección B: No se puede

a)    Fotografiar

b)   Comer

c)    pagar con tarjeta de crédito

d)   entrar, acceder

e)   beber el agua

f)    nadar

No pisar el césped (pisar to step or to tread)

Sección C:

Sale

Estación

Vuelta

Ir

Llega

La

Avion

Last week, Don Ramón’s plans to follow el Caminante Solitario were thwarted when his dog needed a wee. What has happened this week?

El Misterio del Caminante Solitario

Capítulo tres, parte uno:

“¡Vamos, Adrián! ¡Date prisa! ¡Está a punto de llegar!” gritó Carlos a su amigo.

“¡Ya voy, ya voy!” Venir is to come, ir is to go. What’s going on? The idiomatic use is ir, not venir. I don’t know why. That’s just how it is. Date prisa means hurry up. Dar is to give, da is the imperative form of the verb in the tu form and te is yourself. Date = you give. Prisa = hurry. Give yourself haste would be the literal translation. In English we can say “hurry up” to friends, family, strangers, one person or lots of people. In Spanish, there’s a separate command for each one.

Date prisa for family or a friend.

Dese prisa for one person (formal)

Daos prisa for more than one friend or family.

Démonos prisa for we need to hurry

Dense prisa for more than one person (formal)

"Come on, Adrián! Hurry up! He's about to arrive! "Carlos shouted to his friend.

"I'm coming, I'm coming!"                                     

Adrián salió rápidamente de su escondite, detrás del tobogán del parque, sin dejar de mirar el cronómetro de su nuevo reloj de pulsera. Sus padres le habían regalado el reloj por su cumpleaños.

Adrián quickly left his hiding place, behind the slide in the park, without stopping to look at the chronometer of his new wristwatch. His parents had given him the watch for his birthday.

Era un reloj digital muy guay. Podía sumergirse en el agua, tenía luz para poder ver la pantalla en la oscuridad y además poseía una función de brújula y de despertador.

It was a very cool digital clock. He could dive into the water, had light to see the screen in the dark and also had a compass and alarm function.

“Sincronicemos nuestros relojes,” ordenó Carlos. Él no tenía un reloj, pero sí (tenía) un cronómetro digital de colgar al cuello, que también marcaba la hora, tenía función de luz y de despertador, igual que el de su amigo Adrián.

"Let's synchronize our watches," ordered Carlos. He did not have a watch, but he did have a digital chronometer hanging around his neck, which also marked the time, it had a light and alarm function, just like that of his friend Adrián.

“Bien, pongamos el cronómetro a cero cuando él salga del portal … ¡ahora!”

"Well, let's put the timer to zero when he leaves the portal ... now!"

El hombrecillo de la boina y el perrito con la correa salieron del portal, como cada día, a las 17.00 en punto. No fallaba nunca, ni con sol, no con lluvia, ni con granizo. Siempre, a la misma hora, el señor de la boina salía de su portal, se dirigía a la Avenida Principal y luego caminaba por el Paseo de Colón.

The little man in the beret and the little dog on the leash came out of the doorway, as they do every day, at 5:00 p.m. It never failed, neither with sun, nor with rain, nor with hail. Always, at the same time, the man in the beret left his portal, went to Avenida Principal and then walked down the Paseo de Colón.

A las 17 y 25 en punto llegaba al parque, se sentaba en un banco y esperaba hasta las 17.37, hora en que se levantaba para cruzar el semáforo. Una vez allí, se perdía entre la multitud, caminando por la acera derecha de la Avenida de Castilla.

At 17 and 25 exactly he arrived at the park, sat on a bench and waited until 17:37, when he got up to cross the traffic light. Once there, he lost himself in the crowd, walking along the right sidewalk of the Avenida de Castilla.

¿Y quién era el hombrecillo? ¡Por supuesto! Era don Ramón, aunque los niños no conocían su nombre.

And who was the little man? Of course! It was Don Ramón, although the children did not know his name.

“Atención, atención,” susurró Adrián, hablando por un walkie-talkie imaginario. “El sospechoso se dirige hacia la Avenida Principal.”

"Attention, attention," Adrian whispered, speaking on an imaginary walkie-talkie. "The suspect is heading towards Main Avenue."

“No es el sospechoso,” replicó Carlos. “No sospechamos que haya matado a nadie o algo así.”

"He is not the suspect," Carlos replied. "We do not suspect that he killed anyone or something like that."

“Eso no lo sabemos,” contestó su amigo con cara de misterio. “Mi padre dice siempre que los que parece que nunca han roto un plato son los peores.”

"We do not know that," replied his friend with a face of mystery. "My father always says that those who seem to have never broken a plate are the worst."

“Anda, venga,” apremió Adrián. “Deja de hablar, que le vamos a perder. Tú síguele por la acera de la derecha y yo por la de la izquierda. ¿Has sincronizado el reloj? Nos vemos en el parque a las 17.25 en punto.”

"Come on, come on," Adrián urged. "Stop talking, we're going to lose him. You follow him on the sidewalk on the right and I on the left. Have you synchronized the clock? See you in the park at 5:25 pm sharp. "

Los niños caminaron detrás de don Ramón, poniendo cuidado de esconderse tras un árbol o en un portal cada vez que el señor se paraba junto a un árbol o una farola para que su perrito hiciese sus necesidades.

The children walked behind don Ramón, taking care to hide behind a tree or in a porch every time the man stopped by a tree or a lamppost for his dog to do his business.

©This story is from Spanish Short Stories for Beginners published by the Language Academy

Next week is our last episode. We won’t have enough weeks to get through a full story from our book, but I’ll try to find a shorter piece to use.

OK, we’ll finish Chapter 10 with a couple of quick exercises:

Let’s look at the checklist on Page 114. Can we do all of those?

1.     Viajo al trabajo en tren o voy al trabajo en tren

2.    Prefiero viajar en coche

3.    ¿Cómo se puede viajar a Madrid? o ¿Cómo puedo viajar a Madrid?

4.    ¿A qué hora sale el tren para Madrid?

5.    ¿Se puede hacer una reserva? ¿Se puede reservar un asiento?

6.    Quisiera un billete de ida y vuelta.