Coffee Break Spanish - CBS 2.06 | Using the correct version of the verb "to be"

Episode Date: February 4, 2010

In lesson 6 Mark and Kara look at the difference between ser and estar, the two verbs which mean ‘to be’ in Spanish, and a grammar point learners often find difficult. Please note that lesson 6 of Season 2 was originally known as lesson 206 of Coffee Break Spanish. We have renumbered the lessons of each season as lessons 1-40 to make things more simple for our listeners.This season of Coffee Break Spanish features a total of 40 lessons, all of which will be included in the podcast feed. Just stay subscribed to the podcast to enjoy each episode. If you’d like to benefit from video versions, lesson notes and bonus audio materials, you can access the premium version of Coffee Break Spanish in the Coffee Break Academy.Don’t forget to follow Coffee Break Spanish on Facebook where we post language activities, cultural points and review materials to help you practise your Spanish. Remember - a few minutes a day can help you build your confidence in the language. Access the Coffee Break Spanish Facebook page here.If you’d like to find out what goes on behind the scenes here at Coffee Break Languages, follow @coffeebreaklanguages on Instagram.You can also check out our Coffee Break Spanish Twitter page and the Coffee Break Languages YouTube channel. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello and welcome to Coffee Break Spanish. Welcome back to Coffee Break Spanish. Now, this is lesson 46, and it had to happen sooner or later. Over the course of the lessons, we've been looking at two verbs, CER and Estar, both of which mean to be, but sometimes it's quite tricky to know when you use CER and when you use estar. Well, after this lesson, I'm sure you'll be able to sort this out in your head and work out when to choose which of these verbs.

I hope you enjoy the lesson. Mark, before we start, I do have to say that I hate Ser and Esther. I find it really, really difficult. Cara, no te pre-coupes. Don't worry about it. It is very, very straightforward. There are a few tricky things. But once we cover the main situations in which you use Ser

and the main situations in which you use estar, you'll be fine. Estes bien. Fantastic. Okay, let's begin with estar, because in actual fact, that's the easy one to put. into categories. Estar, when I asked you,

Estes lista, and you said, I'm doing estar. The reason that you're using estar there is because it's a temporary situation. Are you ready? Yeah, I'm ready. At this moment and time, in this moment, I'm lista.

Well, you would say, Estoy lista, I would say, I would say, estoy listo. It's a temporary condition. Let's think of other temporary conditions in which we'd use estar. For example, when I ask you how istas?

I'm fine. Give me some other examples. How would you say I am tired? I'm canada. Canzado if you're a boy. Exactly. I'm canzaza, canzado, I'm fine,

Estoy phenomenal. All these situations you use estar because it's a temporary situation. So what would be another temporary situation. For example, another adjective that you might think that you are currently feeling at the moment.

Estoy contenta. Very bien. I'm happy. I am happy. Now, you could be a happy person, but at the moment, I'm contenta. Really, if you can say at the moment before any description, then you kind of need to use estar. So at the moment Jorge is happy.

In this moment Jorge Ista contento. And of course we can conjugate Estar. Estoy Estas, estes, estes, estamos estais, stand. Estoy, estas,

is ta, we use estar with temporary situations. temporary descriptions. I'm content, I'm cancadro, I'm depressed, Deprimido, Deprimido is depressed, I'm

sad. Temporary situations, these are all things that can change. Okay. That's the first situation where we use estar. The second situation where we use estar is one of the most straightforward, easy things to work out, okay? If you're talking about a location, then you have to use estar. Okay.

Even if that location is not temporary. Okay. Okay. Now, in this moment, we're in the studio. Okay, at the moment we're in the studio. Okay. but el studio ista

in Scotia so the studio is in Scotland now I have to say that the studio will always be in Scotland unless we decide to immigrate to Spain

or wherever but El Estudio is sta in Scotia it's the location that matters here not the fact that it's temporary or otherwise because the studio is fairly permanently in Scotland but it's the location that's the important thing

I'll give you another example of this. Madrid ista in Spain Madrid isa in Spain Okay now Madrid will always be in Spain

It's not like the city is going to suddenly move or anything like that Madrid ista in Spain okay it's a location It doesn't matter how temporary or permanent it is It's always

Estar if it's a location Okay, so so far we've got temporary feelings, temporary descriptions and any kind of location whether it's temporary or permanent and those are really

your two most important rules for estar okay yes so Madrid ista in Spain Madrid is that in Spain So, We're

in the studio So temporary description or temporary or permanent location Let's start Let's think now about

Ser, the other verb which means to be and let's conjugate ser first of all. How do you say I am? Soy. Okay, I have to say ser It's quite an irregular verb.

Okay, so I am as soy. You are? I don't know. How do you say, are you from Scotland? Eres. Eres, okay. Soi, eres, and then here she is. Es?

Yeah, soy, eres, es, and then we are. Can you remember how you would say we are? Somos. Somos, very well. Somos, we are. you are the fifth person Sois Sois

Okay that's something that we've not come across before Sois You are in the plural informal version used in Spain Sois Sois And then they are Is son

Sun Sun Sun And this is also used As the polite plural you Son Osteris

Son So you're So you're of Guadalajara Soon Uyghurahara Very well So soy Eres is Somos

Sois son Soi eres Es Somas sois Son Very well Let's now talk a little About when you use

Ser As opposed to Estar Now one of the easiest ways we could say here It doesn't always work, but let's say if it's not a location and if it's not a temporary description, then the chances are you're going to be using ser. Let's put that to the test.

If I were to say, I am Scottish, is that a location? Nope. Is it a temporary situation? Not likely. So I have to use ser. So I use soy. I'm a Scoce. Exactly.

Now, if I say that I'm a teacher, is that a temporary description? No. Is it a location? No. Definitely not. So, what I'm going to use? Soy.

I'm professor. I'm professor. Ah. Yeah, you would be professor a, but in actual fact, you are estudiente. Yes, so I could never ever say say, estas, estudiente.

It just completely doesn't make sense. So, eres estudiente. Si, so I'm a studiant. So one of the main ways that we use ser is when we're talking about sort of inherent or inbuilt characteristics of someone, talking about their job,

talking about their nationality, talking about what they're like as a person, their religion, their moral attributes, if you like. For example, if you describe someone as a very honest person, you would say, is honrado. Is honorado.

Honrado, honrado, H-O-N-R-A-D-O, honorado. Honorado. Or you could say, is Catholica. Is Catholic. See, or is Mexicano. Is Mexicano.

Yeah. So, inherent characteristics that tend not to change describing someone's characteristic, someone's personality, not how they are in a particular moment. So, is a person contenta. She's a happy person. Is a person contenta. But in this moment,

is ta triste. But in this moment is ta... Ista... Triste. Triste. Triste means sad. So she's a happy person,

but at the moment she's sad. Now in English we use the same word. She is a happy person, but at the moment she is sad in Spanish. Es a person contenta, but is ta triste. So two different words in Spanish for the one word in English. Okay, we'll be back in just a moment. When you're not listening to Coffee Break Spanish, you can still practice your Spanish with our regular posts on social media.

Find us on Facebook, just search for Coffee Break Spanish. We're Learn Spanish on Twitter, and you can keep up with the team through our regular posts on Instagram. Follow coffee break languages. It's our mission to help you turn your downtime into your due time. Okay, let's get on with the lesson. So that's one of the main areas for Ser, another area, that I probably should have mentioned first is when you actually say, I am Mark. So, Soi Mark. I would not say

I'm in the moment I'm feeling like Mark but I'm always Mark I'm always Mark Soi Mark When we're talking about Relationships Soi

I'm the Padre of Matthew Matthew's not been on the show for a long time And perhaps we should get them back But Soi el Padre of Matthew I'm I'm the

Iha My mother Yes, you are the daughter of your mother. Now, another, let's think of another situation where we use ser. In actual fact, this is something that we've come across a few times

when we would use the word S, or more likely, son. Kara, can you think what I'm thinking about here? Time? Exactly, yeah. Time, son las dos. Son las dos de la madrugada.

are the two of the madrugada Okay, just taking it back a couple of lessons If you're back Pachanga, if you're out partying And yeah, are the two of the madrugada And it's already two o'clock in the morning

Yeah is tardy That's really quite late No, that's early Okay, I'm showing my age So I'm showing my age, I'm mejo, so I'm old. Yeah.

And you're old. Yeah. So I'm young. So I'm young. Very well. And this is where we're actually coming into a very, very common use of ser. Describing people physically.

Okay, so I'm old. So I'm alto. I'm tall. And so moreno. Moreno means I have dark here. I'm dark. Okay.

And to cara? So, I'm joven, I'm a quite Alta, and I'm

Morena also. Very well. We will come back to descriptions in a couple of weeks

time, but just now we're just concentrating on ser and estar. Let's run

through the situations where you use ser again. And these are the most common ones.

The most common ones, first of all, start with saying who you are. So I Mark. Then talking about physical characteristics.

I'm tall. Soi Alta. Kara's tall as well, using descriptions, using adjectives here that change for masculine and feminine. It's also used for describing someone's inherent qualities or inherent characteristics that aren't likely to change. So for example, talking about their profession, es ingenero, or their religion,

is protestante or indeed their nationality is Italian and it's also used for talking about time is la una son las dos and in a sort of related way to this

when talking about price son four euros or son 100 pesos now what you're probably finding here is that all of these situations are perhaps getting quite complicated.

It's quite complicated to keep track of all these different situations where you use ser. So if you want to turn it around, you could say if it's not a temporary description and if it's not a location, whether temporary or permanent, then it's ser.

Because the locations and the temporary descriptions are... Estar. Estar. Very well. Okay, before we finish today, a little test. I'm not actually going to ask you to translate these into Spanish. I simply want you to tell me which verb is going to be. Is it said or is it estar? In each case I'm going to use a part of the verb is or to be in English so am, is R and so on. And I want you to tell me is it ser or estar in Spanish. Okay. There will be a couple of trick questions in here so pay attention. Right. Number one. I am I'm Scottish. Ser.

Exactly. It's Soe Scotses. Soe Scoce. Very good. Number two. She is sad. Estar. Okay, exactly.

It's estar. We're not saying that she's a sad person all the time, that that's an inherent characteristic of her. At the moment, she's sad. We can substitute or we can add in, in este momento, and it makes sense. in this moment is a Triste

Okay No, number three It's 10 pesos Ser Okay, a straightforward one because it's a price So you know that it's

Ser It's 10 pesos Son 10 pesos Note that in English we see It is 10 pesos

But in Spanish Because there's more than one Bezo you have to use the plural form Okay, number four, Luisa is in the swimming pool. Estar. Exactly.

It's a location. So although we could see at the moment Lucia is in the swimming pool, is in the pistina at this moment. It's a location. So it doesn't matter. It has to be estar. Number five, Rome is in Italy.

Estar. Are you sure? about that kind of. Yes, because it's a location and Rome is always in Italy. Exactly. Rome is always in Italy. It's a location.

It's always esth. So, one final one, and this is not really a question for this little quiz, but I've got a question for you. Ser and estar. It's facile, no? Si, very facile.

Es facile. It's easy because it's not a temporary thing. It's an inherent characteristic of ser and estar that is always easy no matter what. So it's an inherent characteristic it must therefore be... Ser? Very well. And that's where we're going to leave it today

for this edition of Coffee Break Spanish. Thanks for joining us and we hope it's been useful. You can join the Coffee Break Spanish community on Facebook at facebook.com slash coffeebreak Spanish and follow at Learn Spanish on Twitter. Much grazie, and hasta pronto. This is the production of the Radiolingua Network. Find out more at radiolingua.com.