"Pardon me sir, are you busy?"
Translation:Disculpe señor, ¿está usted ocupado?
30 Comments
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Because you're using "sir," you are being formal. That is why esta is being used and not estas. I'm assuming.
Yes, if you are talking in a casual tone to a friend or family. In this case, it is implying (with the "senor") that this is a formal setting.
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No, if you use the formal words "señor" and "usted" in the same sentence, because "estás" is informal.
You can say formally: Disculpe señor, ¿está usted ocupado?
or informal: Disculpa, ¿estás ocupado? with your family, friends...
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I came to ask the same question. I put "Perdón señor, ¿eres ocupado?" and was corrected to "Perdón señor, ¿es ocupado?"
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I believe this is because it is implied to be a formal statement with the usted. For example if you talk to your boss, would you say you? No, you would say boss or sir or something. This would fall under the he/she/it category which is es (though i think it should be esta). At least this is all speculation.
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It is a formal question and thus you use the formal "es". You would use "eres" for a friend.
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"Tú" is very informal. Because you are addressing the man as "señor" ("sir"), you can assume it is a formal situation, and "usted es" should be used instead.
I tried, "Perdon senor, eres ocupado?". Can anyone confirm that this grammar would tank in the Spanish speaking world? Cheers
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There are several mistakes in your sentence:
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As it is not permanent, you have to use "estar"
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"Perdón señor" would be formal, while "eres ocupado" is informal. They do not match.
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The right sentence would be: Perdone señor, ¿está (usted) ocupado?. "Usted" can be omitted almost with the same meaning. You can also say Disculpe instead of Perdone (verb - imperative) or Perdón (noun).
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Disculpe (excuse me) and perdón (pardon me) are synonymous with one another.
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OK. Is there a rule about tu vs usted? Is usted in formal settings b/c I can't figure out why Duolingo so frequently uses usted, not tu.
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Yes, Usted is formal and Tù is informal. If you see Señor/Señora then you can assume that it is formal and use Usted.
Also I've noticed that as a rule of thumb tù is normally followed with a word ending in S. "Tù comes" or "Tù bebes" compared to "Usted come" or "Usted bebe".
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It comes from Latin:
amo > amo, amas > amas, amat > ama. amamus > amamos, amatis > amáis, amant > aman
The "usted - ustedes" forms are the same as the third person (sing. plur.)
él ama - usted ama
ellos aman - ustedes aman
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I answered "disculpe senor, como se ocupardo" but was wrong (fine, no problem, because I used SE and not USTED and used COMO and not ESTA) ,But DL's correction was "Disculpe señor, ud. es ocupado?", yet the dropdown didn't have "ud" or "es" in the options, and then I come to the discuss page and it says the translation is: "Disculpe señor, ¿está usted ocupado?" How do we get it right if there is no consistency in DL and it fails to add these other options?
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Learning a new language is not only to know the equivalent word in each language. There are some important differences between English and Spanish in the use of the 2nd person:
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In Spanish the 2nd person is different in singular and plural, and it is not in English. So "you are" can be "(tú) eres" or "(vosotros) sois".
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If you have to use the formal 2nd person, you can say: (usted) es " or "(ustedes) son".
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You can always omit the suject pronoun.
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In Spanish we distinguish if we talk to a friend, relative, etc with the use of informal "tú" or "vosotros", or if we talk to a unknow person, official, elderly, etc with the formal "usted" or "ustedes".
That's what i wrote and it was marked wrong! it said correct solution afanado, what ever that means
if i were paying for this i'd be raising hell! why is there always two answers, when i go to discuss there is a differint answer