We can also use hacer to indicate that an action started in the past but it is still taking place today. Hace unos días (que) nuestros vecinos volvieron de sus vacaciones (It has been a few days since our neighbors came back from their vacation.) Hace with Actions That Started in the Past and Continue Today Hace seis meses (que) mi hermana se casó (It has been six months since my sister got married.) Hace cinco años (que) compré mi primer coche (It has been five years since I bought my first car.) Just this one time, I am going to use the same examples and in the previous section so you can clearly see the changes that need to be made: You can translate this into English as “it has been some time since someone did something.” As you can see, the order of the words is different and we have added an optional que to the construction, but the intrinsic meaning and the use are the same. The exact same can be said about this second construction. Nuestros vecinos volvieron de sus vacaciones hace unos días. (Our neighbors came back from their vacation a few days ago.) hace + time expression + ( que) + past tense action Mi hermana se casó hace seis meses. (My sister got married six months ago.) Use this construction to say that someone did something some time ago:Ĭompré mi primer coche hace cinco años. (I bought my first car five years ago.) In order to do that, we have two different constructions: past tense action + hace + time expression The first main use of the verb hacer with time expressions is to indicate the time that has passed since an action took place. Hace with Actions That Took Place Some Time Ago Leo en inglés desde hace 15 años. (I have been reading in English for 15 years.)Įach of these purposes have different constructions, so let’s see them one by one. Literally: “It does/makes a month that I do not see him.”) Hace un mes que no lo veo. (It has been a month since I last saw him. Lo compré hace tres meses. (I bought it three months ago.) Here are three examples in the hopes that they will whet your appetite for more: I will give you plenty of examples in the following sections, so that by the end of the post you will know how to translate any hacer time expression correctly. Overall, though, there are three main ways of translating hacer when using these kinds of expressions: “ago,” “since” and “for.” Its translation will vary, as you will see in the rest of the post, depending on the construction of the sentence. Hacer is one of the most important Spanish verbs when it comes to time expressions. Time to learn! Hacer Time Expressions to “Make” Time Clear as Day You might notice that hizo substitutes the c for a z-this is solely a written change, done to keep the soft s sound intact.Īnd now that you remember all the relevant conjugations of hacer, let’s move on to time expressions that use it. Vosotros/as hicisteis (you did, you made) Él/ella hizo (he/she/it did, he/she/it made) The preterite is indeed irregular, but the irregularity repeats itself in all the conjugations, making it very easy to learn, too: *Remember that many times we can translate the Spanish imperfect as “used to,” “would,” a past continuous tense and even a past perfect tense. Él/ella hacía (he/she/it did, he/she/it made) When it comes to the imperfect, hacer is not one of the only three irregular verbs that exist in the Spanish imperfect tense. Él/ella hace (he/she/it does, he/she/it makes) However, it is a fairly easy verb to learn if we take into account that the rest of the present tense persons are regular: Hacer is considered an irregular verb in the present tense because of its first person singular. This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that youĬlick here to get a copy. In order to make it much more manageable, this time I will only focus on hacer time expressions, and we will leave the rest for another day.īut before we delve into the crazy world of hacer time expressions, let me quickly remind you the conjugations of the three tenses we are going to be using: the present, the imperfect and the preterite. Trying to cover the vast amount of information there is about it would take us around 25 long posts, if not more. In case you have not guessed it yet, today’s post is all about the Spanish verb hacer. Moreover, the present tense third person singular hace (he/she/it does, he/she/it makes, it is ) is the 84th most commonly used word in the Spanish language! Now, that is an important verb form! The “Diccionario de la Real Academia Española”(“Spanish Royal Academy Dictionary”) lists 58 different meanings and uses of the word, and over 43 verbal phrases that use hacer! It seems we really love this cute, little verb. SpanishDict includes over 30 different meanings for this verb, which may tell you about its importance for Spanish speakers. Most of the time, the Spanish verb hacer means “to do” or “to make.” AugTime Flies: Hacer Time Expressions to “Make” Time Clear as Day
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