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Gramática: could and couldn’t

I could swim when I was young. (habilidad en el pasado) – podia nadar
Tomorrow we could swim in the sea. (condicional) – podríamos nadar

Craig can’t play a musical instrument (now)
Craig couldn’t play a musical instrument when he was younger (past)

Craig, could / can I ask you a question? (permission)

We could go for a beer after this podcast.

Estudia más sobre los verbos modales aquí

Pronunciación: consonantes + vocales

“Have a” cuando un vocal va después de un consonante en inglés, los sonidos se juntan. “Have a cup of tea” – “have a cuppa”, “have a coffee”, “have a can of beer”
“Got to get a lot of it”.

Phrasal verb: to set up

to set up a tent, to set up equipment (montar)
to set up a meeting (arrange, organize)
to set up a business, an organization, a foundation, a charity (fundar, montar)
to set up a person (to trick them – hacer trampas, engañar) “The murderer set me up”, “It was a set up”.

Vocabulario: collocations with HAVE

“to have fun”, “to have a ball, (fun v funny) – a funny joke, a funny film, a funny person (gracioso) – a fun person (divertido) to have a good time
To have something in common with someone – What do we have in common? – Craig and Reza have jazz music and houseproud mothers in common!
To have time (to do things) What would you like to have more time to do? Reza doesn’t have time to surf the Internet.
Reza has a new phone. He’s got (he has got) a new phone.

Reza’s Top Tip: Use polite language with strangers

“Where’s the bus staion?” (direct) – “Could you tell me where the bus station is?” (indirect and more polite)
“Do you like paella?” – “Can you tell me if you like paella?”
“Can I smoke? – Do you mind if I smoke?”
“Would you mind telling me where the bus station is?”
“I’d like to know where the bus station is?”
“I wonder if you wouldn’t mind telling me where the bus station is?”
The music in this podcast is by Pitx. The track is called See You Later – licensed by creative commons under a by-nc license at ccmixter.org.

Si quieres mandarnos un comentario sobre este podcast o una pregunta sobre la gramática, la pronunciación or el vocabulario de inglés, Mandenos un email a [email protected].

 

FULL TRANSCRIPTION (kindly contributed by Patricia Alonso) 

C: Hola y bienvenido al episodio 8 de Aprender inglés con Reza y Craig. Welcome back. Hi, Reza.

R: Hi, Craig.

C: How are you doing?

R: I’m fine, what about you?

C: I’m pretty good, pretty good, looking forward to this episode of Aprender Inglés Con Reza y Craig, and we have no news this week. No news is good news, they say. Shall we jump in? ¿Vamos a saltar a la gramática?

R: Straight in with the grammar?

C: Straight in with the grammar, let’s go man.

R: Ok, well, today we are going to look at the words could and the negative couldn’t. I think a lot of listeners probably know that could and couldn’t are words that are related to can and can’t.

C: It’s the past, isn’t it?

R: It’s the past, indeed it is, but the thing is could and couldn’t can also be the conditional of can and can’t. In other words, looking at the grammar, the translation of the verb tense of could or couldn’t has two possibilities in Spanish. You can say “ I could swim when I was young” (yo podía nadar), or imagine I said to you “Tomorrow we could swim in the sea” tomorrow (mañana podríamos nadar). That’s conditional, so it can be past (podía) or it can be conditional (podría).

C: So it’s still the same verb in Spanish, it’s not like last week we had “He can swim” (él sabe nadar) and “poder” for permission.

R: Well, we’lll talk about the functions in a minute, because that’s kind of complicated. Could has more than one function just like can, but I’m just talking about the curious fact that the verbal tense of could has two translations in Spanish; it can be past or it can be conditional.

C: And what were they? Podría is could?

R: Well, they’re both could, podía y podría. Podía in the past, “Yo podía nadar cuando era niño”, “I could swim when I was a child”, that’s past, and “Mañana podríamos nadar en el mar”, “Tomorrow we could swim”, that’s the conditional.

C: I get confused with that in Spanish. Podría, podríamos…

R: Podía and podría.

C: We could go for a beer after this podcast.

R: That’s the conditional, that means it’s a possibility, it’s speculative, it’s imagination.

C: Right.

R: That’s conditional. The problem is in English they are both could but in Spanish they’re two different verb tenses, logically. The word could is a bit of an irregularity. So, as I said, could or couldn’t, they’re the past of can and can’t. For example, if you remember, last week Craig said that he can’t play a musical instrument.

C: No, but you can.

R: I can, yeah. In the past, could you play a musical instrument?

C: No, I’ve never played a musical instrument.

R: So you can’t play a musical instrument now and you couldn’t play a musical instrument when you were younger?

C: That’s correct.

R: So, we have can’t for the present and couldn’t for the past, so couldn’t here is simply the past of can.

C: Although, I’ll tell you something, I couldn’t speak Spanish when I was younger, before I came to Spain I couldn’t speak Spanish but I can now.

R: Aha, so he said “Antes no podía”, “I couldn’t speak Spanish”, “No podía hablar español”, “but now I can”, “pero ahora puedo”. So could past of can. We’re talking there about Craig’s ability to speak Spanish.

Also, we could talk about possibility, for example if I said to you, the example from last week, we said “My friend John can be very cold sometimes”, he can be very cold sometimes, it’s possible, sometimes he’s cold, sometimes he’s friendly. In the past, simply we would say “When we were younger my friend John could be very cold sometimes”.

C: So the meaning is the same, it’s just using the past for something in the past.

R: And that’s talking about possibility, so could is the past of can for ability and possibility, logical, no problem there.

However, here’s where it begins to get a bit strange and complicated. Do you remember I asked you last week Craig, I said “Can I ask you a question?” You remember that?

C: Yes.

R: I was asking for permission with the word can. Well, you can also use could to ask for permission. Craig, could I ask you a question?

C: Yes you can.

R: So I can say can or I can say could I ask you a question and the meaning is basically the same. It’s not a question of present and past in this case.

C: Is one more polite than the other?

R: That’s it. Could is a little bit more polite. In fact the Spanish speaker will understand this no problem, because in Spanish you say “¿Puedo preguntarte algo?” or you can say “¿Podría preguntarte algo?”.

C: But I make that mistake a lot, I think, in Spanish, because I would say to somebody “Can I ask you a question?”, it’s me making a request, but wouldn’t a Spanish person look at it more as an ability and think, well, you can but do you want to?

R: They might.

C: Claro que puedes, ¿vas a hacerlo o no?

1. I think perhaps in modern days in Spanish it’s just become a little bit excessively polite perhaps but I think in old fashioned Spanish, it was fairly normal.

C: So it’s ok for me to say “¿Puedo sentarme aquí?”?

R: Yes

C: ¡Claro que puedes, puedes sentarte!

R: No, Spanish people say it, they definitely do, Spanish people have said to me “¿Puedo preguntarte algo?”, they’ve said that.

C: Ok. Ok

R: For permission, just as in English, you can say can, you could use “poder” for permission in Spanish. Perhaps it is not so common but you can use the word can, and also you can use the word could, “¿Podría preguntarte algo?”. Now, in Spanish that’s really quite rare these days, “Podría preguntarte algo”. It seems excessively polite, but it’s possible. But listeners, in English we still use that a lot, particularly with people we don’t know very well or when we want to be extra polite; “Could I ask you a favor?”. I could say can but could is a bit more polite.

C: I have a theory. A ver lo que piensas tú. Yo creo que cuando pones más distancia entre tú y la persona con quien hablas es más polite y cuando empleas el pasado del verbo estás poniendo más distancia, ¿estás de acuerdo? So if I say “Could I sit here?” is more polite than “Can I?” because I distance myself. If I say “I was wondering if I could ask you” is more polite than “I’m wondering”. These past forms are usually more polite.

R: Yeah, that’s right, yeah.

C: Although perhaps it’s more important to have polite intonation than actually use just the past form of the verb.

R: Yeah.

C: “Can I? Can I sit here please?” Sorry, I interrupted you.

R: No, you were quite right. You were quite right. That basically sums everything up, basically could or couldn’t is both the past of can and can’t but also de conditional of can and can’t. Sometimes can and could are interchangeable, the only difference is could is a little more polite. When I say to you “Can I ask you a question?” or “Could I ask you a question?” or “Can I offer you a cup of tea?” or “Could I offer you a cup of tea?”, more or less the same but could is a little more polite. That’s when we’re asking for permission (or “Could I ask a question, can I ask a question”) or an offer (“Can I offer you a cup of tea, could I offer you a cup of tea”) or a request (“Can you help me, could you help me, please”).

C: “Could you do me a favor” is more polite than “Can you do me a favor”.

R: So, can and could are interchangeable there with a slight change of meaning of politeness merely. However, when we are talking about ability and possibility can and could are not interchangeable because ability “I can swim” is present but “I could swim” is not present, it’s past, so they are not interchangeable there. Also for possibility; “John can be very cold sometimes, John could be very cold sometimes”, is a different meaning, it’s the past, so for possibility can – present could – past, they are not interchangeable, but for permission, request, offer, can and could are more or less interchangeable. It’s tricky listeners, isn’t it? Modal verbs are not easy, but that’s enough for today.

C: Little by little we’ll be examining the differences with many popular modal verbs.

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C: Moving on to a little pronunciation, and this week I wanted to look at the pronunciation when a “vocal” (a vowel) is followed by a consonant (consonante), for example “have a”. It’s unusual for a native speaker of English to say have – a. Have – a – cup – of – tea, sounds strange. The stress is not equally put on each sound, it’s more common for a native speaker to join the two sounds together when the vowel is after the consonant, so they wouldn’t say, have – a, they ‘d say “hava”. “Hava a drink, hava a cup of tea”. And also, have – a – cup, cup finishes with the letter p, which is a “consonante” and ‘of’ begins with a “vocal”, so again it’s linked, está enlazado, the sound is joined together. So “Have – a – cup – of  – tea” becomes “Hava cupa tea”.

R: And Craig, I think sometimes people in that sentence wouldn’t even say the word tea, because we drink so much tea in Britain and Ireland. Then when we say a cup it’s understood that it’s tea. So people say “Hava cup” or “Hava cupa” even, we don’t bother to say tea, “Hava cupa”.

C: Right, well, let’s face it Reza, we’re lazy. And in Spanish you would say “cuñao” instead of cuñado, sometimes, or “cortao” instead of cortado. So you remove sounds and you remove words from the language to make it easier and in reverse you could say “Have a coffee” when you really mean “Have a cup of coffee”, so you forget cup, “Have a beer”, not “Have a glass of beer”, etc. More examples: Beer often comes in a can, so can of beer.

R: Can I but in for a minute? Listeners, don’t confuse that with the modal verb can, by the way. This is a can, una lata, it’s a noun, it’s not a verb, I just want to clear that up.

C: Thank you for that, yeah, it’s a noun, can of beer.

R: Other examples?

C: Yeah, one I like very much that really, really shows how difficult it can be for Spanish speakers to understand English. Listen to this phrase and try to write it down: “Gotta getta lotofit”. That’s incredibly difficult for a Spanish  person. Let me slow it down: Got to, “gotta”, get a, “getta”, lot of, “lotof”, and again lot of it, “lotofit”. Got to get a lot of it, “Gotta getta lotofif”. Very, very difficult for Spanish speakers to understand. So just remember that when you’re listening to words that are often weak, que suenan muy débil, son las palabras que no llevan stress y son palabras sin significado, casi que son palabras de gramática; articles, prepositions, articles, auxiliary verbs, very often. And the words that are stressed, que llevan stress, son las palabras que llevan más significado, como los nombres, sustantivos, los adverbios, adjetivos y los verbos.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

C: Reza, do you have a phrasal verb for us this episode?

R: I do. Listeners, do you remember in the last episode the phrasal verb was set off and I mentioned that set is an extremely common verb in English, so I thought this week we’d do another phrasal verb with set but we’ll change the preposition to up. Set up is the phrasal verb for today. Here’s the first meaning of set up: “ I went camping with my friend and when we arrived at the campsite the first thing we had to do was set up the tent”.

C: Montar.

R: Montar, assemble, montar, to set up a tent. Also to do this podcast, Craig has to set up a microphone and other equipment.

C: I didn’t set it up very well today, we had some technical problems.

R: We had to re-set the equipment. So set up is to assemble or put things in position: a tent, equipment, anything really. Montar in Spanish.

Another meaning, another group pf meanings of set up is set up things like set up a meeting, set up a negotiation, set up a consultation. Where people get together to talk about something in a formal way, you set it up, you set up the meeting, the conference.

C: That would be more like arrange perhaps?

Arrange, organise. Arreglar, organizar. That´s another meaning of set up.

Another common meaning of set up is to set up a company, set up a business, set up a foundation, set up a charity, some kind of organisation which may make money, like a business or company, or maybe not, like a charity or a foundation, but you set them up.

C: That’s also montar, montar un negocio.

R: You could say, yes, you can say montar. Another meaning is fundar, to found in other words, to found. Not to find listeners, not the past of find, but to found, fundar, to set up a charity, company , business, etc.

C: So first you set up a business and then you run it. So, if you run it is “mantener el negocio”, then set up is the initial organization making the business happen.

R: Yeah, in Spanish montar.

C: Set up a restaurant, set up a bar, set up an online business.

R: Yeah, ok, and the last meaning of set up, a coloquial meaning, but very common, to set up a person, to trick them, to make them look bad.

C: Engañar, hacer trampas.

R: Yeah, hacer trampas. Especially so they look bad or that they do what you want them to do, but it’s not good for them. For example, the murderer killed the victim, then put the knife on my hand, so the police arrested me! He set me up! He killed them, not me, but he put the knife on my hand so I looked guilty, he set me up.

C: You can also use this as a noun: it was a set up.

R: Yeah, it was a set up, he made me look guilty.

C: I understand.

R: So, there’s a few meanings of set up. There are many phrasal verbs with set: set on, set upon, set to. Perhaps we’ll talk about them some other time in the future.

C: Ok!

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C: Moving on to the vocabulary corner of this episode, and I thought we’d look at the verb have and some collocations, some words that go together with have to from expressions. Can you think of any, Reza? Do you enjoy doing this podcast?

R: Oh, I do, yeah, a lot.

C: Are you having fun?

R: Ah, ok, having fun, indeed I am. I’m having a ball.

C: You’re having a ball. Having a wonderful time.

R: Having a ball, but that would be in Spanish pasarlo bomba.

C: Yeah, but it would be ball in the meaning of a big event, a big Fancy dinner with music, not ball as in pelota, it’s not having a pelota, is having a wonderful party.

Yeah, another confusing thing for Spanish speakers ir the difference between fun and funny, We said to have fun. And the main difference, if it makes you laugh, ja ja ja ja, it’s funny, so a funny joke, a funny TV program, but si te lo pasas bien, if you have a good time, you would say it’s fun. I had a lot of fun at the party, maybe you laughed, maybe you didn’t, but you had fun, you had a good time.

R: If you say someone’s funny, what would that be in Spanish?

C: Es divertido.

R: Are you sure?

C: No, what would you say?

R: Es gracioso.

C: ¿Gracioso?

R: Yes, he’s funny, he tells jokes, he makes me laugh, es gracioso. But if I say to you, she is fun, es divertida, I have a good time with her.

C: Ahh. What about the television or a film?

R: Yeah, so a funny film is a comedy film.. A fun film is good to watch, but maybe not funny, for example some action film are fun, bombs all over the place, people getting shot all over the place, can be fun, but it’s not funny.

C: So let me get this straight cause estoy un poco confused, so gracioso is funny?

R: Yes.

C: And divertido is fun?

R: Yeah.

C: Ok, I learned something.

Another expression is to have something in common with someone, if you have similar tastes por example, then you have something in common. I like jazz music, Reza likes jazz music, we have jazz music in common.

R: Do we have anything else in common?

C: House proud mothers?

R: House proud mothers…

C: WE like similar food! We have a lot of food in common.

R: We do, yeah.

C: We have a language in common.

R: Yeah. We have a job in common.

C: Yeah, so we have things in common, to have similar things.

And finally, to have time to do things, you can have time or nor have time. I know you’re very busy Reza, is there anything you would like to have more time to do? Do you have much free time?

R: Not as much as I’d like. I’d like to have more time to surf the internet, I rarely get the chance. When I use the internet it’s nearly always to do things I have to do for work or that Will help me with my job, but I don’t get much time just to surf the internet.

C: Well, now that you have a new phone, or as British people would say, you’ve got a new phone, you’ll have more time to surf the internet. It’s really useful when you have a phone that has internet connection 24/7, all the time, when you’re waiting at the doctor, when you’re waiting for the bus, when you’ve got dead time, you can use the phone to Access the internet and listen to our podcast.

R: Exactly.

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C: Reza, do you have a top tip for us this episode?

R: Yes, the tip for today is kind of related to last episode’s tip about being indirect, being polite. This time I want to talk about using indirect forms, so instead of asking a stranger in the street “Where is the bus station?”, that sounds a bit abrupt (why the hell I should tell you?), why don’t you say “Could you tell me where the bus station is, please?”?

C: Is that an indirect question?

R: That is an indirect question.

C: And “Where is the bus station?” is direct.

R: Direct.

C: And what’s the difference between the two?

R: Well, if we think about the grammar: “Where is the bus station”, first where, then is, then the bus station, but if I ask “Could you tell me where the bus station is” in that case the subject, bus station, comes before the verb to be. In other words, when it’s an indirect question the order of the subject and the verb is like a positive sentence, not like a question.

C: So the verb to be goes at the end of….

R: After the subject. What about auxiliaries? Well, exactly, no auxiliaries. If I say to you “Do you like paella?”

C: That’s direct.

R: With do, do you like, but I could say “Can you tell me if you like paella?”, there’s no ‘do’.

C: So you remove the verb to do.

R: Because it’s not a direct question, it is an indirect question, so “Can you tell me if you like paella?”, you subject, like, no ‘do’.

C: And I also noticed that you put the word ‘if’ in there.

R: I had to because in an indirect question, if the answer is yes or no, you need to use the word if, for example I could say to you “Do you mind if I smoke?”

C: Yes, I do actually.

R: It’s more polite than “Can I smoke?”

C: Ok.

R: It’s indirect, more polite. So, we tend to add a little bit before the real question. So if my real question is “Can I smoke?”, I say “Do you mind if I smoke”, or if my real question is “Where’s the bus station?”, I say “Can you please tell me where the bus station is?”, so you add a bit at the beginning. Another one is, if you wanted to be very polite, “Would you mind telling me where the bus station is?”

C: I’d like to know…

R: I’d like to know, or very polite and old fashioned, but for fun you could say it listeners,  “I wonder if you wouldn’t mind telling me where the bus station is”. Imagine that! I wonder if you wouldn’t mind telling me, me pregunto si no le molestaría a usted decirme dónde está la estación.

C: But let’s be…face it Reza, it’s a long way to say “Where’s the bus station”. Many words to say, but it’s more polite.

R: But 50 years ago people did really speak like that quite a lot.

C: And do you agree that you would probably use these indirect questions in English when you’d use usted in Spanish?

R: Definitely, usted the polite form. If you feel the need in Spanish to used usted the polite form for a question, then in English you should probably be using an indirect question, because it’s our way of doing usted because we don’t have a different word for tu and usted in English, we tend to have indirect questions. So, Craig, do you think we might have done enough for today?

C: Would you mind telling me…

R: In other words, is that enough for today?

C: Would you mind telling me if we’re enough for today? Is that the end of the podcast?

R: That’s what I’m asking, Do you think we’ve done enough? Craig, do you think we might have done enough for today?

C: I think we might have done enough.

R: Como usted diga.

C: Thank you for listening. Remember, if you like this podcast, please would you mind being kind enough to write a short review on the itunes, so that more people can find us on the internet? So until next episode, thank you for listening, thank you to my co-host Reza and we’ll see you in the next episode.

The music in this podcast is by Pitx, the track is called See you later, licensed by Creative Commons under a by-nc license at cc mixter.org.

Si quieres mandarnos un comentario sobre este podcast o una pregunta sobre la gramática, la pronunciación o el vocabulario de inglés mándanos un email a [email protected].

Gracias y que ustedes pasen un buen dia. Igualmente.

C: Reza, do you have a top tip for us this episode?

R: Yes, the tip for today is kind of related to last episode’s tip about being indirect, being polite. This time I want to talk about using indirect forms, so instead of asking a stranger in the street “Where is the bus station?”, that sounds a bit abrupt (why the hell I should tell you?), why don’t you say “Could you tell me where the bus station is, please?”?

C: Is that an indirect question?

R: That is an indirect question.

C: And “Where is the bus station?” is direct.

R: Direct.

C: And what’s the difference between the two?

R: Well, if we think about the grammar: “Where is the bus station”, first where, then is, then the bus station, but if I ask “Could you tell me where the bus station is” in that case the subject, bus station, comes before the verb to be. In other words, when it’s an indirect question the order of the subject and the verb is like a positive sentence, not like a question.

C: So the verb to be goes at the end of….

R: After the subject. What about auxiliaries? Well, exactly, no auxiliaries. If I say to you “Do you like paella?”

C: That’s direct.

R: With do, do you like, but I could say “Can you tell me if you like paella?”, there’s no ‘do’.

C: So you remove the verb to do.

R: Because it’s not a direct question, it is an indirect question, so “Can you tell me if you like paella?”, you subject, like, no ‘do’.

C: And I also noticed that you put the word ‘if’ in there.

R: I had to because in an indirect question, if the answer is yes or no, you need to use the word if, for example I could say to you “Do you mind if I smoke?”

C: Yes, I do actually.

R: It’s more polite than “Can I smoke?”

C: Ok.

R: It’s indirect, more polite. So, we tend to add a little bit before the real question. So if my real question is “Can I smoke?”, I say “Do you mind if I smoke”, or if my real question is “Where’s the bus station?”, I say “Can you please tell me where the bus station is?”, so you add a bit at the beginning. Another one is, if you wanted to be very polite, “Would you mind telling me where the bus station is?”

C: I’d like to know…

R: I’d like to know, or very polite and old fashioned, but for fun you could say it listeners,  “I wonder if you wouldn’t mind telling me where the bus station is”. Imagine that! I wonder if you wouldn’t mind telling me, me pregunto si no le molestaría a usted decirme dónde está la estación.

C: But let’s be…face it Reza, it’s a long way to say “Where’s the bus station”. Many words to say, but it’s more polite.

R: But 50 years ago people did really speak like that quite a lot.

C: And do you agree that you would probably use these indirect questions in English when you’d use usted in Spanish?

R: Definitely, usted the polite form. If you feel the need in Spanish to used usted the polite form for a question, then in English you should probably be using an indirect question, because it’s our way of doing usted because we don’t have a different word for tu and usted in English, we tend to have indirect questions. So, Craig, do you think we might have done enough for today?

C: Would you mind telling me…

R: In other words, is that enough for today?

C: Would you mind telling me if we’re enough for today? Is that the end of the podcast?

R: That’s what I’m asking, Do you think we’ve done enough? Craig, do you think we might have done enough for today?

C: I think we might have done enough.

R: Como usted diga.

C: Thank you for listening. Remember, if you like this podcast, please would you mind being kind enough to write a short review on the itunes, so that more people can find us on the internet? So until next episode, thank you for listening, thank you to my co-host Reza and we’ll see you in the next episode.

The music in this podcast is by Pitx, the track is called See you later, licensed by Creative Commons under a by-nc license at cc mixter.org.

Si quieres mandarnos un comentario sobre este podcast o una pregunta sobre la gramática, la pronunciación o el vocabulario de inglés mándanos un email a [email protected].

Gracias y que ustedes pasen un buen dia. Igualmente.

C: Moving on to the vocabulary corner of this episode, and I thought we’d look at the verb have and some collocations, some words that go together with have to from expressions. Can you think of any, Reza? Do you enjoy doing this podcast?

R: Oh, I do, yeah, a lot.

C: Are you having fun?

R: Ah, ok, having fun, indeed I am. I’m having a ball.

C: You’re having a ball. Having a wonderful time.

R: Having a ball, but that would be in Spanish pasarlo bomba.

C: Yeah, but it would be ball in the meaning of a big event, a big Fancy dinner with music, not ball as in pelota, it’s not having a pelota, is having a wonderful party.

Yeah, another confusing thing for Spanish speakers ir the difference between fun and funny, We said to have fun. And the main difference, if it makes you laugh, ja ja ja ja, it’s funny, so a funny joke, a funny TV program, but si te lo pasas bien, if you have a good time, you would say it’s fun. I had a lot of fun at the party, maybe you laughed, maybe you didn’t, but you had fun, you had a good time.

R: If you say someone’s funny, what would that be in Spanish?

C: Es divertido.

R: Are you sure?

C: No, what would you say?

R: Es gracioso.

C: ¿Gracioso?

R: Yes, he’s funny, he tells jokes, he makes me laugh, es gracioso. But if I say to you, she is fun, es divertida, I have a good time with her.

C: Ahh. What about the television or a film?

R: Yeah, so a funny film is a comedy film.. A fun film is good to watch, but maybe not funny, for example some action film are fun, bombs all over the place, people getting shot all over the place, can be fun, but it’s not funny.

C: So let me get this straight cause estoy un poco confused, so gracioso is funny?

R: Yes.

C: And divertido is fun?

R: Yeah.

C: Ok, I learned something.

Another expression is to have something in common with someone, if you have similar tastes por example, then you have something in common. I like jazz music, Reza likes jazz music, we have jazz music in common.

R: Do we have anything else in common?

C: House proud mothers?

R: House proud mothers…

C: WE like similar food! We have a lot of food in common.

R: We do, yeah.

C: We have a language in common.

R: Yeah. We have a job in common.

C: Yeah, so we have things in common, to have similar things.

And finally, to have time to do things, you can have time or nor have time. I know you’re very busy Reza, is there anything you would like to have more time to do? Do you have much free time?

R: Not as much as I’d like. I’d like to have more time to surf the internet, I rarely get the chance. When I use the internet it’s nearly always to do things I have to do for work or that Will help me with my job, but I don’t get much time just to surf the internet.

C: Well, now that you have a new phone, or as British people would say, you’ve got a new phone, you’ll have more time to surf the internet. It’s really useful when you have a phone that has internet connection 24/7, all the time, when you’re waiting at the doctor, when you’re waiting for the bus, when you’ve got dead time, you can use the phone to Access the internet and listen to our podcast.

R: Exactly.

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C: Reza, do you have a top tip for us this episode?

R: Yes, the tip for today is kind of related to last episode’s tip about being indirect, being polite. This time I want to talk about using indirect forms, so instead of asking a stranger in the street “Where is the bus station?”, that sounds a bit abrupt (why the hell I should tell you?), why don’t you say “Could you tell me where the bus station is, please?”?

C: Is that an indirect question?

R: That is an indirect question.

C: And “Where is the bus station?” is direct.

R: Direct.

C: And what’s the difference between the two?

R: Well, if we think about the grammar: “Where is the bus station”, first where, then is, then the bus station, but if I ask “Could you tell me where the bus station is” in that case the subject, bus station, comes before the verb to be. In other words, when it’s an indirect question the order of the subject and the verb is like a positive sentence, not like a question.

C: So the verb to be goes at the end of….

R: After the subject. What about auxiliaries? Well, exactly, no auxiliaries. If I say to you “Do you like paella?”

C: That’s direct.

R: With do, do you like, but I could say “Can you tell me if you like paella?”, there’s no ‘do’.

C: So you remove the verb to do.

R: Because it’s not a direct question, it is an indirect question, so “Can you tell me if you like paella?”, you subject, like, no ‘do’.

C: And I also noticed that you put the word ‘if’ in there.

R: I had to because in an indirect question, if the answer is yes or no, you need to use the word if, for example I could say to you “Do you mind if I smoke?”

C: Yes, I do actually.

R: It’s more polite than “Can I smoke?”

C: Ok.

R: It’s indirect, more polite. So, we tend to add a little bit before the real question. So if my real question is “Can I smoke?”, I say “Do you mind if I smoke”, or if my real question is “Where’s the bus station?”, I say “Can you please tell me where the bus station is?”, so you add a bit at the beginning. Another one is, if you wanted to be very polite, “Would you mind telling me where the bus station is?”

C: I’d like to know…

R: I’d like to know, or very polite and old fashioned, but for fun you could say it listeners,  “I wonder if you wouldn’t mind telling me where the bus station is”. Imagine that! I wonder if you wouldn’t mind telling me, me pregunto si no le molestaría a usted decirme dónde está la estación.

C: But let’s be…face it Reza, it’s a long way to say “Where’s the bus station”. Many words to say, but it’s more polite.

R: But 50 years ago people did really speak like that quite a lot.

C: And do you agree that you would probably use these indirect questions in English when you’d use usted in Spanish?

R: Definitely, usted the polite form. If you feel the need in Spanish to used usted the polite form for a question, then in English you should probably be using an indirect question, because it’s our way of doing usted because we don’t have a different word for tu and usted in English, we tend to have indirect questions. So, Craig, do you think we might have done enough for today?

C: Would you mind telling me…

R: In other words, is that enough for today?

C: Would you mind telling me if we’re enough for today? Is that the end of the podcast?

R: That’s what I’m asking, Do you think we’ve done enough? Craig, do you think we might have done enough for today?

C: I think we might have done enough.

R: Como usted diga.

C: Thank you for listening. Remember, if you like this podcast, please would you mind being kind enough to write a short review on the itunes, so that more people can find us on the internet? So until next episode, thank you for listening, thank you to my co-host Reza and we’ll see you in the next episode.

The music in this podcast is by Pitx, the track is called See you later, licensed by Creative Commons under a by-nc license at cc mixter.org.

Si quieres mandarnos un comentario sobre este podcast o una pregunta sobre la gramática, la pronunciación o el vocabulario de inglés mándanos un email a [email protected].

Gracias y que ustedes pasen un buen dia. Igualmente.