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- "¿Podemos estar en tu casa?"
131 Comments
Why offer STAY as a translation and then refuse it as a correct answer? I also believe CAN WE STAY is more common, especially in the form of spoken English!
In English, "Can we BE at/in your house?" is very different from "Can we STAY at/in your house?" A kid might ask their friend the first question before coming over for the afternoon, if their friend's parents aren't home. In English, "Stay" implies being at someone's house for an extended period of time (so you would ask this before spending the night, or the weekend).
I don't know which is intended by this sentence in Spanish - perhaps the latter is an accepted idiomatic translation in some countries.
In English we would never say; can we be in your house. We would say; can we come in, can we go in, or can we stay in. If we are translating to English, the common English should be accepted. Whichever ever would come as close the the meaning.
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"Can we BE backstage (at the concert), can we Be in your crime scene, kitchen" etc is a perfectly acceptable and normal query aimed solely at establishing whether an action is appropriate and permissible. In regards to the kitchen I would ask 'can we be in your kitchen (public health and safety codes for restaurants fro eg) far more often than i would "can I stay in your kitchen". This must obviously be able to be applied to the whole house for anyone seeking to know if it is considered appropriate/ permissible. And we need to be able to use all forms to differentiate nuances of permission. A employee may have been told that his friends "can't be at his placer of employment at all", or they can be waiting for him outside but cannot be inside/ come inside, or they may be inside briefly but may not stay for any extended period of time.
A child is at a friends house and realizes he might not be allowed without permission. That child might ask "can we be at your house?"
Not if he's already inside the house... Kids skipping school and at their friends house
"dude can we be here right now?"
"be where?"
"..can we be in your parents house right now?"
makes sense to me, that was a purely fictitious story btw.... ;)
Exactly - it sounds like a child speaking, not an adult who has mastered the language ....
I agree with you. I feel that if you wanted to say stay you would use "quedar" instead of "estar".
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I think an American English-speaking kid would be more inclined to say "Can I come over to your house?" instead of "Can I be at/in your house".
This translation is strange in English. Is the sentence in Spanish normal?
Hi Elizabeth! It is a bit strange, but it would be better with "to stay" instead "estar". We say more commonly: ¿Podemos ir a tu casa? or ¿Podemos quedarnos en tu casa?. The sentence of DL, for example, seems as a person runaway from the police and he ask a friend for a place to hide for a while. I hope you understand me. I speak spanish. Regards:)
While 'be' is grammatically correct and makes some sense in English, I think we would tend to be more specific such as 'Can we wait/stay/cook/play/read at your house?' rather than just use 'be'. It sounds like this is also the case in Spanish?
Stay = Permanecer, and this word is not used here.
This is a direct translation but has the same meaning!
OK, this is a thing too far. "Can we BE at your house?" Who's asking the question - Camus? Socrates? Descartes? "Stay" is clearly an option given and the one that should apply. There is no case in which, "Can we be at your house?" is even an acceptable idiomatic expression in everyday English.
Can we 'be' in your house or is your front door the portal between existence and non-existence?
Can we be at your house while the police are searching it?
I.e. Will the police allow us to remain in your house while they search it?
It does not even work in this instance. If police are searching, a person would ask "Should we be here" or to mirror your example, "Can we stay?" Tying 'can' and 'be' together in the same sentence is equivalent to asking if it is possible, ever, to exist in this situation. It sounds ridiculous.
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well actually there is in australia particularly if we were to be there at a certain time like " can we be at your house at 9.00 tonight ? "
can we be at your house? is a perfectly acceptable question in the context given above when no parents are at home. ( never say never)
"May we be at your house?" This is preferable. The speaker is asking for permission, hence "may." "Can" merely means are "we physically able" to be at your house. It has nothing to do with permission, which seems to be the point of the question of being at the house. "May" at least ought to be offered as an alternative to "Can," even if the language has slipped into using "can" all the time.
Stand up for English. Seriously, this is a bit loose. But what if the Spanish is also going a bit loose in some regions and the dilemma is knowing how to be correct and knowing how to be relaxed. What are we learning?
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I have wondered about this myself. "Poder" translates to "can" or "may" I gather. I assume a Spanish person decides from context if a person is asking permission or is asking if they can physically do something. I use only "can" on duolingo now because I think I used "may" one time and it was marked wrong.
Considering the vast majority of English speakers use "can" when they mean "may", this is something in Spanish that I think I'll like :p
May is shown as an option in the translation, but not accepted in the answer.
My problem is rather the translation of "estar". I am not happy with the translation "Can we BE at your house?" Would "STAY" be a correct alternative?
Not in this case. Aa someone already pointed out, stay would translate to "quedar". The example doesn't ask to stay but rather "to be" in the house. In English vernacular, you could say "may we come in to your house?" but "stay" is not implied in the example
Don't know if this is just me, but this seems like a very strange way to phrase this. Like, I wouldn't say "Can we be in your house", but rather "Can we come to your house" or "can we stay at your house"
In reality the kids would say something like "is it OK for us to go to your house " or "is it OK for us to hang out in your house " I don't believe anyone is going to say "can we be in your house" if they are already at the house they would say " are we allowed to be here " stay is preferable to be in this sentence .
''¿Podemos estar en tu casa?'' en español implica un día o un corto tiempo. Creo que en inglés 'to stay' es un tiempo muy prolongado (a long time), entonces en español diríamos: ¿Podemos quedarnos en tu casa?. To stay = quedar = estar harto tiempo, o, dormir ahí. Perdón, aún estoy aprendiendo inglés.
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No, en inglés, "to say" podría ser un corto período de tiempo también. Por lo general, "can I stay at your house" quire significa más tiempo (por ejemplo durante la noche), pero no necesariamente.
(Por supuesto, Duolingo escribió "to be (in your house)" y es differente de "to stay.")
¿Por cierto, qué quiere decir "harto."?
Gracias!
En este contexto: Harto = Mucho (casi igual). Aunque MUCHO "suena" a más que HARTO. En otro contexto puede significar saciedad: "Estoy harto de este pan". Aquí harto = aburrido, saciado, cansado.
I am so excited, I could read most of what you said. I did look up 'aprendiendo' and 'diriamos', but really happy that my duolingo time is starting to pay off :)
This is the oddest sentence I've met on this course so far. I'm sure no English speaker has ever said it.
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I couldn't hear this as a question at all; I thought it was a statement. (Good thing punctuation doesn't count!) Is there some inflection that I am missing in the audio?
Same problem for me. Played it back in slow and normal speed and could not detect an inflexion. Reported it as "not sounding correct"!
Amazing! Can/may has generated 70 comments. What will happen 10 lessons from now when the lessons get even funkier. I'm just visiting the past here to review. The answer is the comments get even funkier.
Not sure why "could we stay in your house" was marked wrong. Seems remarkably similar to the above and a lot less stilted.
English natives are having the problem because we know what Duo is saying/trying to teach us, the oroblem lies with we do not know how to translate " can we be in your house" to "can we stay at your house" Stay does not have to mean extended, but even for a time, for example, the pool party or the homework. To say "can we be at your house" would seem to mean to us " are we allowed to be at your house" for any reason. The usage, " Can we stay at your house" was accepted 07/20/16
When and where the English translation may or may not be used is not really my interest. I'm here to learn Spanish. I want to be exposed to Spanish sentences that communicate clearly and are actually used -- and better yet, are commonly used. And I do start to wonder about Duolingo a veces. Is this sentence spoken in Spanish at all, or much? Maybe a servant or migrant worker would say this...seems a little cowed. We then should learn to say: Si, como no?!!
Hi Hum! I speak Spanish. It is a bit strange, but it would be better with "to stay" instead "estar". We say more commonly: ¿Podemos ir a tu casa? or ¿Podemos quedarnos en tu casa?. The sentence of DL, for example, seems as a person runaway from the police and he ask a friend for a place to hide for a while. I hope you understand me. Regards:)
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Many people in this thread are remembering those grammar-school rules pounded into our heads at a young age (can=be able to; may=permission). However, "poder" covers both in Spanish, so Duolingo should accept both.
Modern grammarian's (e.g, Garner, Fogarty) advise us not to get too fussed over the may/can divide. Sometimes "may I" sounds too formal and "can I" works just fine.
Re the "be" discussion, I can imagine a number of situations in which one might ask whether it's possible to "be" at a house (after damage, if someone who doesn't want us to be there is there, etc.).
On the other hand, perhaps "estar" is an alternative for "quedarse" when you want to ask permission to stay somewhere. We need a native to weigh in on this latter question.
Hi MrHazard! I speak Spanish. It is a bit strange, but it would be better with "to stay" instead "estar". We say more commonly: ¿Podemos ir a tu casa? or ¿Podemos quedarnos en tu casa?. The sentence of DL, for example, seems as a person runaway from the police and he ask a friend for a place to hide for a while. I hope you understand me. Regards:)
Yo puedo tener poder para que podamos pedir vacaciones.
I can have the power to ask for vacations, PODER is a word is used to demonstrate or to ask that you may get some action done, and also is used to say that something or someone has the power of something. for example:
Yo tengo el poder de hacer lo que yo quiera. (I HAVE THE POWER TO DO WHAT I WANT)
Yo quisiera poder hacer lo que yo quiera. (I WOULD LIKE TO DO WHAT I WANT)
In this sentence the phrase is used to ask if they arre allowed to remain or to stay in the house (note that in spanish this phrase also is used to ask if you can be on the total area of the house which is the garden, garage, front garden etc and there's no need to ask...¿Podemos estar en el Jardín? (CAN WE STAY AT THE GARDEN?) unless you really need the garden for some purpose or get some action done like playing.
So many people saying "Can we be in your house?" makes no sense, that it would never ever be used. I disagree. I think it would be used any time where it might not be safe to be in the house or where it is questionable as to if you have permission to be there. Say you had plans to get together with a friend at their house. But your friend's house had a gas leak earlier in the day and you are not sure if the fire department has cleared it as safe yet. So you call up your friend and ask "Hey, has the fire department cleared your house as being safe yet?, What with the gas-leak, can we be in your house? Is it safe? Or should we meet at my place instead?" Just because Duo-Lingo has come up with yet another uncommon sentence, doesn't mean that it is not a real sentence.
Why is it "estar"? I understand that it means "to be", but when I look at this sentence, I understand it as "Can we to be in your house?". How is it that "to" is omitted when translating it?
As I understand it "estar" is more of the state of mind of "being". The translation of "to be" is just shorthand. "In Spanish, a different verb is used to express "to be" depending on whether the speaker intends to address a condition or an essential quality." http://www.studyspanish.com/lessons/serest1.htm
I have read the whole thread, but I am still not clear on why it is Podemos estar, and not podemos estamos? Can someone please clarify? thank you
Saying "podemos estamos" is "we can we are", and I don't think "we can we are" makes any sense (although I really like the sound of those two words together). Also, "podemos estamos" are two conjugated verbs. We don't conjugate two verbs; we only conjugate one (the first one).
Take your question "Can someone please clarify?". Now, conjugate the two verbs into their third person singular forms ("someone" is third person singular) and tell me what you get?
If you have done it correctly, you should have gotten "Can someone please clarifies?". That should sound strange and incorrect to you. If so, then that is the same effect as "podemos estamos".
I am not happy about "Are we able", The phrase is more like"Is it possible for us", basically: "can we". As curtisnelson wrote: the speaker is asking for permission (I add:wants to know if it is possible). Not because of our "ableness" but because it is allowed or the circumstances permit it.
Bingo. Remember that phrases will usually need some "colloquial running" and can't always be interpreted literally. The goal of the example phrase is to ask permission, not feasibility
Can is about ability, not permission. Permission is May.
Poner = To be able to. Can is just a shorter way of saying it.
The correct English is may we stay - can is not correct grammar maybe commonly accepted, but not correct, so it should not be marked as wrong when it is a question - May I stay at your house?
'May we stay...' seems to be grammatically and more politely correct. Duolingo allows us to comment but does not seem to offer a settlement to our comments.
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Have a look here: http://www.spanishdict.com/answers/154286/english-can-vs.-may-and-spanish-poder
The "can/may" divide is muddied by those who want one or the other to be "correct." See my post above for more. The grammar-school rule is simply not really workable, beyond "may" being more polite. On the page above it is noted that you could say, "Por favor, permítame..." or "¿Me permites...?" if you want to be more polite.
Also as the page notes, English has a lot more modals (can I, should I, may I, etc.) that are translated with one word in Spanish. If you want to be more subtle, you may have to add a few more words, as indicated in the example above.
Of course, in English, both "can" and "may" should be accepted by Duolingo as we have no contextual information to guide us.
I thought it would be 'Podemos nosotros estar en tu casa?' because I learned that like in English you would put 'we, he, she, you... ' after the verb since we are saying 'Can WE be in your house... ?' no?
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Hello Riich3lle: To answer your question, no. Podemos has the "we" built into the verb form, meaning "we can" or if asked in a question as in this example "can we?"
Somebody smart said we have to except that duo lingo is not really fluent in English
I believe HOME, considered wrong by Duolingo, is better than HOUSE for the translation of this sentence. HOUSE is used to refer to a building. HOME, rather, is a noun that indicates where someone lives in a more personal/emotional way, usually with the preposition AT instead of IN.
Duolingo uses strict dictionary definitions to make sure we understand the exact meaning. What we do with those meanings later is up to us, but at least we will know what people expect.
In this case, casa can refer to home as you mentioned, but strictly defined, it is just a house. If you talk of your house (casa), then people will probably assume it is also your home (hogar) unless you are listing it for sale. But if you are writing poetry, saying casa will have an impression of four walls and a roof while hogar will have an impression of four walls and a roof around a fireplace next to a table with family and friends being happy. However, it appears that for daily use in many regions casa is becoming more commonly used for "home".
http://spanish.stackexchange.com/questions/10696/home-in-a-non-literal-sense
Lo siento. Duo is incorrect. The sentence is a question of permission. Therefore 'may' is correct. 'Can' refers to ability.
Hi irene! I speak Spanish. "Ser" is a more permanente state. For example: Soy alta (I am tall), "soy joven" (yes, it is not permament but it changes slowly like childhood) "soy rubia" (I am blonde) "soy linda" (I am pretty). "Estar" is for a time or a moment: "Estoy en el teatro" (I am in the theater), "Estoy enferma" (I am sick). "Estoy viajando" (I am traveling). Be careful: I put a beatiful dress on and """Estoy linda"" (Why "estoy" instead "soy"?, because I am beatiful for a while and for the dress). Greetings:)
Im so happy it accepted "can we stay at your house" as a translation. It makes more since to me. Can we be at your house, is hard for me to accept.
If you're learning English, you'll want to use a thought for thought translation here depending on context. Can we go to your house? Also, proper English would use 'may' in place of 'can' in many translations of poder.
I wrote "We can be in your house?" which was accepted, but for another translation below it said "Can we be in your house?". Which one do you recommend using and is there a difference?
"In your house" is grammatically correct. You could say "there is someone in your house".
It depends on the context of the sentence. Different contexts will have different wordings and grammar.
well well well again like always i put can we ❤❤❤❤ in my house put they put that wrong JUST BECAUSE I HAVE A LIFE AND HAVE LOST MY VIRGINITY TO MANY BITCHES DOESNT MEAN I CANTG ❤❤❤❤ IN MY OWN HOUSE OR DOES IT?
When I hover over the word podemos, the 3rd English translation listed is "could we." However my answer, Could we stay in your house?, was marked wrong. It says I "used the wrong word," and gives the correct answer as, Can we...
Can we be at your house whilst it's being fumigated? Can we be at your house by 10pm? Can we be at your house to accept the delivery? They seem slightly clumsy, but are correct.
When I wrote, "Can we stay in your house?" they accepted it as a correct answer.
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I am having particular problems with the "to be" verbs as well as the past tense verbs. The tiny cards don't seem to be enough. Can anyone recommend an alternative or something to add? I'm struggling here.
Hi Iris! I speak Spanish. "Ser" is a more permanente state. For example: Soy alta (I am tall), "soy joven" (yes, it is not permament but it changes slowly like childhood) "soy rubia" (I am blonde) "soy linda" (I am pretty). "Estar" is for a time or a moment: "Estoy en el teatro" (I am in the theater), "Estoy enferma" (I am sick). "Estoy viajando" (I am traveling). Be careful: I put a beatiful dress on and """Estoy linda"" (Why "estoy" instead "soy"?, because I am beatiful for a while and for the dress). You must memorize the verbs. If I can help you, just tell me. Greetings:)
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Thank you ever so much, Grace. I pasted your comments into a document and is is now hanging by my computer desk.
Hi Iris! Sometimes you can use both forms, for example: "soy feliz" , "estoy feliz". "Soy" means that you are a happy person in all your entire life, obviously in general, but you can also say, "estoy feliz" for a particular reason at this day (present) or last week (past) or next month (future) it maybe because you will make something nice and new . You can also say both at the same time (soy feliz y estoy feliz), for example:You are with a friend and she will say you, why?(about the "estoy")Then you tell her, because I am planning a travel. Another example: "Estoy orgullosa", "Soy orgullosa". The first, means: I am proud about someone or something (Estoy orgullosa de mi hijo porque él consiguió un buen trabajo "I am proud of my son because he got a good job"), this is a good expression instead of "Soy orgullosa" it is more like an arrogant word, but it depends of the context, you can be proud (in a good way) because you have made something good for yourself or for someone else. I hope this helps a little more, I understand you all because is the same for me about various English topics. Regards!
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Estar is used to indicate a temporary condition or a location. It's also used for progressive tenses.
Estoy aquí-- I am here. Estoy bien-- I am fine Estoy hablando-- I am talking
Wouldent it be can we be inside your house? Im probrably wrong nevermind
Yes, paulmetz has the only answer. The translation offered 'be in your house,' is nonsense and would never be used however one likes to excuse it. I have now got into the habit of translating the words not putting what we would say in English.
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I think 'Can we enter your house' is another good translation. At least it's way better than 'be in house'. LOL
Perhaps this means something similar to "Is it okay for us to be at your house?" = ¿Está bien que estemos en tu casa?
As an english speaker can we come in your house makes far more sense. I'm not sure I've ever heard it asked with be in it before.
