Advanced verb structures

English says "I have just eaten" with an adverb. Spanish has no neat equivalent of "just" in that sense; instead it uses a verb: acabar de + infinitive. Acabo de comer means "I have just eaten", literally "I finish from eating".

Two tenses do almost all the work:

• present acabo de, acabas de, acaba de for "has/have just"

• imperfect acababa de, acababan de for "had just", usually followed by cuando and an interruption in the preterite

The common trap is translating "just" word for word as justo or solo. Justo means "exactly" or "right" (justo a tiempo, "just in time"), and solo means "only". Neither says that something happened a moment ago.

Notice that acabar de stays in the present even though the action is past: acaba de salir, "she has just left". Do not use the preterite acabó de salir; that means "she finished leaving", which is odd.

In the Southern Cone and the Andes you will also hear recién (recién llegué, "I just arrived"), and in Mexico apenas (apenas llegué). Both are fine, but acabar de is understood everywhere and is the form to master first.

To say how long something has been going on, English uses the present perfect continuous: "I have been living here for five years". Spanish does not translate that tense. The most natural way is llevar + time + gerund: llevo cinco años viviendo aquí.

Notice what happens:

• llevar is in the present, because the action is still going on

• the period of time comes straight after it, with no preposition

• the main verb becomes a gerund: esperando, trabajando, estudiando

The classic English-speaker mistake is he estado viviendo aquí por cinco años. You will hear it in Latin America, but it sounds translated; for a period that is still running, Spanish reaches for llevar or desde hace, not por.

For something you have not done for a while, use llevar + time + sin + infinitive: llevo un mes sin fumar, "I haven't smoked for a month". To ask, say ¿cuánto tiempo llevas…?

You can say the same thing with hace … que (hace cinco años que vivo aquí) or desde hace (vivo aquí desde hace cinco años). Those are correct too, but llevar is the one that makes you sound at home.

English often needs a dummy noun to talk about a quality in general: "the good thing", "the hard part", "what's important". Spanish does it with one small word: lo + the masculine singular adjective.

• lo bueno — the good thing

• lo difícil — the hard part

• lo importante — what's important, the important thing

• lo mejor / lo peor — the best / worst thing

These usually open a sentence and are followed by es que… or fue…: lo bueno es que no llovió, lo difícil fue empezar. To say what the quality belongs to, add de: lo mejor del viaje fue la comida.

Two traps for English speakers. First, translating "thing" literally: la cosa buena es que… sounds clumsy. Second, making the adjective agree with something feminine or plural in the sentence. Lo refers to an idea, not a noun, so the adjective is always masculine singular: lo bueno de la casa, never lo buena.

Lo is not the article el. El bueno means "the good one" (a person or object); lo bueno means "the good part" (an idea). The difference is exactly the difference between "one" and "thing" in English.

When you tuck a question inside a longer sentence ("I don't know where she lives", "he asked me if I was hungry"), it becomes an indirect question. Spanish has two simple rules.

For yes/no questions, use si (no accent), the word for "if/whether": no sé si viene, "I don't know if he's coming". Never use que here.

For other questions, keep the question word with its accent: no sé dónde vive, me preguntó qué quería, dime a qué hora sales. The accent stays because the word is still asking something.

English reorders the words ("where is she" becomes "where she is"). Spanish word order is flexible, so this is rarely a problem. Do not add que after no sé or dime (no sé que dónde vive is wrong); after preguntar you will hear me preguntó que dónde vivía, which is accepted in speech but never needed.

When the reporting verb is in the past (me preguntó, quería saber), the tense inside shifts back, as in ordinary reported speech:

• "Are you tired?" → me preguntó si estaba cansado

• "Where will you go?" → me preguntó adónde iría

The same backshift applies to statements: "I'm busy" becomes me dijo que estaba ocupada.

English often talks about actions without naming who does them: "Spanish is spoken here", "you can't smoke inside", "how do you say this?" The everyday Spanish tool for all of these is se + verb in the third person.

• passive se: the verb agrees with the thing: se vende casa, se venden casas, aquí se habla español

• impersonal se: no subject at all, verb singular: se vive bien aquí, no se puede fumar, ¿cómo se dice "spoon"?

The trap is reaching for the English passive: el español es hablado aquí is grammatical but sounds stiff and bureaucratic. The ser passive is for news reports and formal writing; in conversation, se wins.

Watch agreement with the passive se: if the thing is plural, so is the verb (se necesitan camareros). But with people introduced by a, the verb stays singular (se busca a los responsables).

Spanish also uses the third person plural without a subject (dicen que…, "they say") and, in informal speech, a generic tú. Both are fine, but for instructions, rules, recipes and how-to questions, se is the natural choice.

English uses "get", "go", "turn" and "become" for almost any change. Spanish splits them by the kind of change, and the choice matters.

• ponerse + adjective: a quick, usually temporary change in mood, appearance or health: ponerse nervioso, ponerse rojo, ponerse serio, ponerse pálido

• volverse: a deeper, involuntary shift in character: se volvió muy desconfiado

• hacerse: a change you work for or choose: hacerse médico, hacerse vegetariano, hacerse rico

• quedarse: the state you end up in, often after a loss or shock: quedarse sordo, quedarse sin trabajo, quedarse dormido

• convertirse en + noun: a full transformation: se convirtió en un problema

This lesson drills ponerse, the one you need every day. The trap is using volverse or hacerse for a blush or a moment of nerves. Ask yourself: will this pass in an hour? If yes, it is ponerse.

Many changes also have their own pronominal verb: enojarse or enfadarse, cansarse, aburrirse. Those are fine; ponerse covers the adjectives that have no such verb.

English adds "again" or the prefix "re-" to say an action is repeated. Spanish can do that too (otra vez, de nuevo), but the most idiomatic way is to fold the repetition into the verb: volver a + infinitive.

• volvió a llamar — she called again

• no vuelvas a hacerlo — don't ever do it again

• tuve que volver a empezar — I had to start over

• nunca volvimos a verlo — we never saw him again

Volver carries all the tense and person; the infinitive never changes. With object pronouns, attach them to the infinitive or put them before volver: volver a verla or la volví a ver.

The trap is literal translation: llamó otra vez is correct, but in a warning, a promise or a narrative of repeated disappointment, volver a is what a native reaches for. It is also more economical with negatives: no volvió a hablarme says "he never spoke to me again" in four words.

Do not confuse it with volver alone, "to come back": volvió a casa is "she came home", while volvió a salir is "she went out again". The a + infinitive is what turns the verb into a marker of repetition.

English "must" does two jobs. "You must sign here" is an obligation; "she must be tired" is a guess. Careful Spanish keeps them apart.

• deber + infinitive: obligation or advice. Debes firmar aquí, no debemos olvidarlo.

• deber de + infinitive: probability or assumption. Debe de estar cansada, debían de ser las tres.

For a guess about the past, use the preterite or imperfect, or the perfect infinitive: debió de perder el tren, debe de haber llamado.

In real speech the line is blurred in one direction: many natives say debe estar cansada for a guess, and the Real Academia accepts it. The other direction is the one to avoid: debes de firmar aquí for an obligation is widely considered a mistake. So the safe rule is: add de only when you are guessing.

Spanish has other ways to guess, too: the future of probability (estará cansada) and seguramente. They are all correct; deber de sounds slightly more deliberate, the reasoning of someone weighing the evidence.

When "must" means obligation, tener que is also common and a little more forceful. Deber sounds more like a moral duty or a rule.