Learn how to use the Spanish verb that means "there is," "there are," and "there will be"
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Dylan: Hola, hola a todos. Habla Dylan, ¿cómo están? |
| Carlos: What’s going on pod101 world? My name is Carlos. |
| Dylan: In this lesson, you will learn about the impersonal usage of the verb “haber”. |
| Carlos: This conversation takes place in a bookstore. |
| Dylan: The conversation is between Ana, Andrés and an old woman. |
| Carlos: The speakers are strangers. So they will be speaking formally. Let’s listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Viejita: Ayy, ¡qué muchachos estos! ¡Nunca saben nada! Mi hijito, yo vi los diccionarios en el primer piso, si quiere lo ayudo. |
| Andrés: Ayy, señora, muchísimas gracias. |
| Ana: ¡Los vendedores de esta librería no saben nada! |
| Viejita: Tiene toda la razón, mi hijita. Por eso los clientes se van enojados. Aquí están los diccionarios. Hay muchos tipos de diccionarios, ¿qué tipo de diccionario buscas? |
| Andrés: Uno de español. |
| Viejita: Ohhhh, these guys, they never know anything… My boy, I saw the dictionaries on the first floor. If you want, I can help you. |
| Andrés: Oh, ma'am, thank you so much! |
| Ana: The salesmen in this bookstore don't know anything! |
| Viejita: You're right. You're completely right. Honey, that is why the clients leave angry. Here are the dictionaries. There are many kinds of dictionaries; what kind are you looking for? |
| Andrés: One in Spanish. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Carlos: Now Dylan, I know it’s very common to find Spanish teachers in Costa Rica or Latin America in general but how about bilingual Spanish teachers? |
| Dylan: I am not sure, Carlos. I mean you either go to a school to learn English or you go to the school to learn Spanish. I don’t really know about a teacher being completely bilingual. |
| Carlos: That’s right. And really tell me the story about the English teachers in your kid’s school. |
| Dylan: Yes. |
| Carlos: They don’t speak English. |
| Dylan: No, they are not. They do not. I am taking a stand on that. |
| Carlos: Yeah, that’s right. You take a stand on that. No, no, no but in my experience in Costa Rica, I have not met many completely bilingual Spanish teachers. With that said, there is also this theory that states that if you are learning a language, really you don’t – you shouldn’t be speaking the mother language any way. So they don’t need to learn English. |
| Dylan: They should at least understand. |
| Carlos: I should hope so. |
| Dylan: They should go to spanishpod101.com and learn some. |
| Carlos: Well, if they want to save some money, yes they should. Okay guys, let’s take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Dylan: “Ayudar”. |
| Carlos: “To help.” |
| Dylan: “A-yu-dar”, “ayudar”. “Piso”. |
| Carlos: “Floor.” |
| Dylan: “Pi-so”, “piso”. “Razón”. |
| Carlos: “Reason.” |
| Dylan: “Ra-zón”, “razón”. “Cliente”. |
| Carlos: “Customer”, “clientele.” |
| Dylan: “Clien-te”, “cliente”. “Enojado, enojada”. |
| Carlos: “Angry.” |
| Dylan: “E-no-ja-do, e-no-ja-da”, “enojado, enojada”. “Tipo”. |
| Carlos: “Kind”, “type.” |
| Dylan: “Ti-po”, “tipo”. |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Carlos: Okay guys, let’s have a closer look at the usage for some of the words and phrases from this lesson. |
| Dylan: The first word we will look at is “ayudar”. |
| Carlos: “Ayudar”. A very helpful verb that means “to help.” |
| Dylan: That’s right and we have a very nice woman here trying to help out Andrés and Ana. |
| Carlos: “Si quiere lo ayudo”. |
| Dylan: “If you want, I can help you.” Now how is the verb “ayudar” conjugated here? |
| Carlos: Well, we can tell by the “O” ending that it is being conjugated to the first person singular of the present tense. |
| Dylan: Correct. |
| Carlos: Now that is usually the conjugation that we learn first anyway. So it helps to point it out. |
| Dylan: You could be more right but let’s hear this verb with another conjugation. |
| Carlos: “Yo siempre trato de ayudar a mis amigos”. |
| Dylan: “I always try to help my friends.” Hey, that was the infinitive. |
| Carlos: What – the infinitive can be used? |
| Dylan: True. You are being “ayudado”. |
| Carlos: The adjective form meaning “helpful.” |
| Dylan: Next up, “piso”. |
| Carlos: “Piso”, “floor.” Man, that word does not seem related at all. |
| Dylan: No, no it does not but you might use it in the sense of the conversation more commonly. |
| Carlos: “Yo vi los diccionarios en el primer piso”. |
| Dylan: “I saw the dictionaries on the first floor.” |
| Carlos: You know, I can’t ever think of a time when I have said I dropped the book on the floor in Spanish. |
| Dylan: “Se me cayó el libro al piso”. |
| Carlos: “I dropped the book on the floor.” |
| Dylan: Yes. |
| Carlos: Okay, I spilled things a lot and I dropped things a lot. So I have to practice that. |
| Dylan: Can you think of a related word? |
| Carlos: “Piso”, “floor.” Well, you just gave me one. What was it again? |
| Dylan: “Se me cayó el libro en el suelo”. |
| Carlos: “Suelo”? |
| Dylan: “Suelo”. |
| Carlos: “Suelo” means “floor”? |
| Dylan: Yes. |
| Carlos: Synonym, but you know what else? “Pared”, “wall.” |
| Dylan: You are right. I will take that or you had reason. |
| Carlos: Ahh, tengo razón. |
| Dylan: “Razón”, “reason.” Our next noun. |
| Carlos: Now whenever I hear the word “razón” I think “Razor.” |
| Dylan: That would be a long jump but if you think about the two words here, “reason”, “razón”, they are phonetically quite similar. |
| Carlos: Yes, they are and I’d like the use of it too. I like being right. |
| Dylan: How was it used in the conversation? |
| Carlos: “Tiene toda la razón”. |
| Dylan: “You are right.” What else did you learn from that example that we had not mentioned? |
| Carlos: That while “razón” is a noun, it has all the markings of a masculine noun. It is in reality... |
| Dylan: A feminine noun. |
| Carlos: That is correct ma’am. |
| Dylan: How about a sample sentence? |
| Carlos: “Tengo una buena razón para no ir a clases”. |
| Dylan: “I have a good reason not to go to class.” I certainly hope so. |
| Carlos: You know, Dylan, I was never a cutter. I usually always, always went to class and in college, that’s a different story. |
| Dylan: Well, I bet you are a very hard worker. I will bet you are “razonable”. |
| Carlos: An adjective that means “reasonable” and that’s a good thing to call someone always. |
| Dylan: Always. Next up, “clientes”. |
| Carlos: “Clientes”. Now if I were a betting man, I would say that word means “clients.” |
| Dylan: In a way yes, but here we are using it with its more commonly used translation, “customer.” |
| Carlos: Right, “Tiene toda la razón, mi hijita. Por eso los clientes se van enojados.” |
| Dylan: “You are completely right, honey. That is why the customers leave angry.” |
| Carlos: Man, I always leave stores in Latin America angry although I will say that I also left stores in Europe angry also. |
| Dylan: They don’t have the same sense of customer service as the States. I know that completely. |
| Carlos: We mentioned this in another lesson but one complaint I have about both regions is that “los meseros atienden muy mal a los clientes”. |
| Dylan: In a nontipping culture, the waiters have no incentive to treat the customer well. You just hope you get someone with a good attitude. |
| Carlos: Yep, and that doesn’t happen very often, “la clientela”, “the clientele”, is not always right. |
| Dylan: No, most of the time they are wrong. |
| Carlos: And that makes me angry. |
| Dylan: Perfect. |
| Carlos: What, perfect that I am angry? |
| Dylan: No, perfect in the sense that our next word is “enojado, enojada”. |
| Carlos: Ah, an adjective that means “angry.” |
| Dylan: Correct. |
| Carlos: Now we already heard an example from the conversation. |
| Dylan: Right. Let’s hear it one more time. |
| Carlos: “Por eso los clientes se van enojados”. |
| Dylan: “That is why the customers leave angry.” |
| Carlos: You know, I always try to keep chill. |
| Dylan: Me too, “Yo nunca estoy enojada. Siempre estoy feliz y tranquila”. |
| Carlos: “I am never angry. I am always happy and cool.” I will say, Dylan, that you are one of the coolest, chilliest person that I’ve ever met. |
| Dylan: Ah thanks, Carlos. |
| Carlos: It’s the truth. |
| Dylan: Well, we stay away from the verb form. |
| Carlos: Right, “enojarse”, “to anger.” That’s not good. |
| Dylan: Last but not least, we have a common noun that is quite useful to practice. |
| Carlos: And what’s that? |
| Dylan: “Tipo”. |
| Carlos: “Type” but also “kind.” |
| Dylan: Correct. When you are looking for specifics, this is the verb that you want. |
| Carlos: Yeah, which is why the helpful old woman is using it when she asks... |
| Dylan: “¿Qué tipo de diccionario buscas?” |
| Carlos: “What kind of dictionary are you looking for?” |
| Dylan: Now another common question you might ask could concern music. |
| Carlos: Right, “¿Qué tipo de música le gusta escuchar?” |
| Dylan: “What type” or “what kind of music do you like to listen to?” |
| Carlos: When I was younger, rap, but my tastes have matured. |
| Dylan: I am sure they have. |
| Carlos: They have completely. |
| Dylan: A good related word for you would be “el estilo”. |
| Carlos: “The style” but you mean it in another context. Don’t you? |
| Dylan: Yes, okay, grammar. |
| Carlos: Grammar. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Dylan: The verb “haber” can be either a verb of existence or an auxiliary verb in the compound tenses. |
| Carlos: So what are we looking at here? |
| Dylan: Our concern here is with it as a verb of existence. |
| Carlos: Right. As long as we are clear. |
| Dylan: In the present tense, we saw that this verb does not change form when the noun that it talks about is in the singular or plural. |
| Carlos: We also saw that the same thing occurs when we use it in the future tense. |
| Dylan: So when we use “haber” as a verb of existence, it is impersonal and always takes the third person singular form. |
| Carlos: Let’s check out formation. |
| Dylan: The verb form for the present tense is “hay”. |
| Carlos: Which we heard in today’s conversation... |
| Dylan: “Hay muchos tipos de diccionarios”. |
| Carlos: “There are many kinds of dictionaries.” |
| Dylan: In English, we translate this as “there” plus “is” for singular, and “there” plus “are” for plural. |
| Carlos: Now the verb forms in the future tense are “habrá” in the singular and “habrán” in the plural. |
| Dylan: In English, we translate this as “there” plus “will be.” |
| Carlos: Let’s check these out. Singular, present. |
| Dylan: “Hay”. |
| Carlos: “There is.” Future... |
| Dylan: “Habrá”. |
| Carlos: “There will be.” Plural, present... |
| Dylan: “Hay”. |
| Carlos: “There are.” Future... |
| Dylan: “Habrá”. |
| Carlos: “There will be.” Now let’s put these to some use with some example sentences. |
| Dylan: “Hay comida en la mesa”. |
| Carlos: “There is food on the table.” |
| Dylan: “Habrá comida en la mesa”. |
| Carlos: “There will be food on the table.” |
| Dylan: “Hay nubes en el cielo”. |
| Carlos: “There are clouds in the sky.” |
| Dylan: “Habrá nubes en el cielo”. |
| Carlos: “There will be clouds in the sky.” |
| Dylan: “Hay siete personas en la sala”. |
| Carlos: “There are seven people in the living room.” |
| Dylan: “Habrá siete personas en la sala”. |
| Carlos: “There will be seven people in the living room.” |
| Dylan: Notice that when we use the verb “haber” as a verb of existence, we always use the third person singular. For example, the impersonal. |
| Carlos: Thus we see that we use “hay” in the present tense to mean “there is”, “there are”, and we use “habrá” in the future tense to mean “there will be.” |
| Dylan: Because we are used to making sure that verbs agree with their subjects in number, this can be tricky since if the noun is plural and the verb of existence is still singular, there may appear to be a lack of agreement even though it is grammatically correct. For example, “Habrá muchas personas”. |
| Carlos: Trust me. That does get tricky. |
| Dylan: Aside from using “haber” as a verb of existence, we can also use it to express obligation in a very emphatic way we can use it in the present tense of the indicative mood along with the preposition “de” and then a verb in the infinitive. |
| Carlos: For example? |
| Dylan: Well, for example, “Has de viajar”. |
| Carlos: “You must travel.” |
| Dylan: “Hemos de hablar”. |
| Carlos: “We must speak.” |
| Dylan: “Han de regresar”. |
| Carlos: “They must return.” |
| Dylan: This phrase is very, very emphatic and we often replace it with the construction... |
| Carlos: “Tener que” plus infinitive. For example... |
| Dylan: “Tienes que viajar”. |
| Carlos: “You have to travel.” |
| Dylan: “Tenemos que hablar”. |
| Carlos: “We have to talk.” |
| Dylan: “Tienen que regresar”. |
| Carlos: “They have to return.” |
Outro |
| Carlos: Clear guys, do you see the comparison? Well, let us know because that just about does it for today. |
| Dylan: ¡Hasta luego! |
| Carlos: Nos vemos, ¡chao! |
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