Day 2 of 90
Saying who you are
Today you can introduce yourself and understand the answer when someone introduces themselves back. You also meet ser, which is one of the two verbs Spanish uses for the English word am.
Your name
Two ways to give a name, and Spanish prefers the second one.
llamar on its own means to call. The extra me and te are what turn it back on the speaker, so me llamo is I call myself. You will meet this pattern again in verbs like levantarse, to get oneself up, so it is worth filing under a pattern rather than under a phrase to memorise.
Where you are from
One preposition and one verb form does all of it.
Nationality words behave like adjectives, so they change to match the person speaking, not the country. That is why a man is inglés and a woman is inglesa, mexicano and mexicana, and why the country name Inglaterra never changes at all. The word describing you agrees with you.
The verb ser
Three forms today, the rest on day nine.
Spanish verb endings already say who is doing the action, so the pronoun is redundant and gets dropped. soy can only mean I am, so saying yo soy is like saying I I am. You use yo only for emphasis or contrast, which means that when you do hear it, it is carrying weight.
Most Spanish speakers carry two family names, the father's first and the mother's second, and neither is a middle name. Ana García López is Señora García on a form and in polite address, not Señora López. Nothing about it is optional or old fashioned, and getting it right is noticed.
Check yourself
Eight questions. Get 5 of them right to finish the day.
More from this course
Weeks 1 to 2: first words, first sentences.
See all 90 days of the course →