"Eles passaram a levar trabalho para a delegação."
Translation:They started to take work to the delegation.
24 Comments
I'm not used to passar with this meaning yet, so I peeked to see what passaram could mean and was told it was "they spread" or "they have spread." This has little to do with the sentence; I had to spend a heart to learn what the word actually means in this context.
I'm not sure I understand the translation of passaram here. Passar means 'to pass', can it also mean 'to start'? The hints don't indicate that, neither do other resources.
Passei a morar aqui em 1998. (I started living here in 1998) Passar = pass (by), stop (by), to iron, to spend, to start
Present of start: passam. Past of pass by: passaram. Both conjugated for the 3rd plural person.
As well as in English when a word can have more than one meaning ;) Passar has many meanings in Portuguese: to stop(by), to pass(by/on), to iron, to spend, to get through.
This one took a while to decipher. My answer was accepted: "They started to take work to the delegation."
"They started to take work to the delegation" (o.O)? I'm pretty confused here. Any help with English please?
I too am confused! I'm native in English and this sentence means nothing to me.
But if I were to guess, maybe they mean something like, they started to give or divide work to/between everyone in the delegation.
it can be taken literally (take something to somewhere) or symbolic (take an action "ele passaram a levar vida dupla"?- they began to live double lives).
I think your translation would be right if it said 'pela' instead of 'para a'. I'm not native though.
Another false clue. I looked it up in my dictionary and there is no mention that the "passar" can have the meaning of "begin or start". This is not a good way to teach idiomatic phrases.
Why it is as transaltion (passaram"-"spread"- it is most confusing..... And as I can see- others have also had the same trouble. Could not it be changed?
Well, a Portuguese word may have many meanings in English =) choose the best for each context ;)
Looked up passar in the dictionary, no mention of start. http://www.wordreference.com/pten/passar
"passar a" can mean "start to": http://dictionary.reverso.net/portuguese-english/passar
