how do i say this in Spanish?

I have great difficulty with the word order in Spanish using personal pronouns. For example, how would I say: I gave him the book He gave me the tickets I gave them my telephone number She gave her the money Please help! This drives me nuts! :x

Hola. I recommend that you read the discussions of Direct Object Pronouns and Indirect Object Pronouns in the Rocket Spanish Beginners Book. After that, you should probably try to write in Spanish each of the sentences you've asked about, so we can see where specifically you're having difficulty.

Thanks nohablo. I have read these but am still not very confident in my answer. I seem to have a mental block on this. (yo) le di el libro I gave him the book I gave him it se lo di a el (el) me dio los billettes He gave me the tickets He gave me them me los dio (yo )los di mi numero de telefono I gave them my telephone number I gave them it lo di a ellos le dio el dinero a ella She gave her the money

[quo]*Quote from * 'kimisue Thanks nohablo. I have read these but am still not very confident in my answer. I seem to have a mental block on this. On the whole, I think you've done a good job and seem a lot less confused than your message led me to expect. I've made a few minor changes below and have put them in red so they'll be visible. I hope what I've said is correct, and I hope it helps. Basically, you're doing fine. Don't let yourself get too hung up on getting everything right. As long as you're understanding things pretty well, I'd suggest you just keep moving ahead. Things that seem complicated at first will begin to fall into place. (yo) le di el libro I gave him the book Looks good to me I gave him it se lo di a él (él) me dio los billetes (one "t," not two) He gave me the tickets He gave me them me los dio (yo )los di mi numero de teléfono I gave them my telephone number I think "los" should be "les" - it's an indirect object (telephone number is the direct object) I gave them it lo di a ellos *Se* lo di a ellos le dio el dinero a ella She gave her the money Looks good to me [/quo]

Thank you for taking the time to look at those for me. Perhaps it's not so bad as I think, although I have to say it did not come easy. I do ok when writing it down but I would not be able to think it off the top of my head! I guess thats just practice eh. Gracias a ti for tu tiempo en esto. Quizas no es como tanto mal como yo lo creo, aunque yo me digo que no fue tan facil. Yo hago bien cuando escribirlo pero no puedo hacerlo sobre mi cabeza??? supongo que practicarlo recuerdos kimisue (feel free to make corrections, this is how i will learn)!

Well, I'll take a stab at this, but please understand that I'm _very _far from being proficient in Spanish. [quo]*Quote from * 'kimisue Gracias a ti por tu tiempo en esto. Quizás no es tan malo como lo creo, aunque debo decir que no fue tan fácil para mí. Hago bien cuando escribirlo (I'd probably say cuando lo escribo, but your version may be OK, I'm not sure) pero no puedo hacerlo sobre mi cabeza (I suspect that this is not what a Spanish speaker would say, but I don't know what that would be. Perhaps you could say *pero se tarda mucho tiempo*??? supongo que necesito practicarlo [/quo] And yes, the more you practice, the more easily the words and phrases will come.

Thats fab nohablo. I can see where I went wrong. Perhaps your tag should be sihablo! This has now created another question for me. The term 'debo decir' expresses a obligation for me to do something. How do you express in Spanish: I __should __ do something e.g I should go to the dentist (because my tooth hurts). __I Should__ is not the same as 'I must' (debo) or 'I have to' (tengo que) is it? :?

[quo]*Quote from * 'kimisue This has now created another question for me. The term 'debo decir' expresses a obligation for me to do something. How do you express in Spanish: I __should __ do something e.g I should go to the dentist (because my tooth hurts). __I Should__ is not the same as 'I must' (debo) or 'I have to' (tengo que) is it? [/quo] Good question. However, the verb *deber* can mean both "should" and "must." In fact, here's an excerpt from the Vox Advanced Spanish/English dictionary that my online dictionary, Babylon Pro, uses: auxiliar 1 (obligación presente) must, have to, have got to *debo ir a comprar * I must go shopping *debes acabar antes de que lleguen* you have to finish before they arrive 2 (obligación pasada) should, ought to *debía haberlo comprado ayer* I should have bought it yesterday 3 (obligación futura) must, have to, have got to *deberás tenerlo a las cinco* you must have it ready by five o'clock 4 (obligación moral) should, ought to *no deberías haberlo hecho* you shouldn't have done it So while I agree that in English we distinguish between "should" and "must," I don't know how to make that distinction in Spanish. I hope that helps.

Gracias otra vez nohablo. Eres muy valioso. El extracto era muy util y voy a buscar en este diccionario en la red. Por cierto, creo que los servicios de rocket forum son excelente!

De nada. Estoy contenta que pueda ayudarte. Debo añadir que el diccionario Babylon Pro no es gratis. Lo compré hace unos años después de alguien en otro foro lo recomendó. Es bastante caro (el precio ha aumentado 40% desde que lo compré), pero ¡me gusta muchísimo! Me gusta en particular el diccionario Vox Advanced Spanish/English/Spanish que Babylon Pro incluyó cuando lo compré. (Uso la versión 6, la que no es la versión actual.)

[quo]*Quote from * nohablo [quo]*Quote from * 'kimisue This has now created another question for me. The term 'debo decir' expresses a obligation for me to do something. How do you express in Spanish: I __should __ do something e.g I should go to the dentist (because my tooth hurts). __I Should__ is not the same as 'I must' (debo) or 'I have to' (tengo que) is it? [/quo] Good question. However, the verb *deber* can mean both "should" and "must." In fact, here's an excerpt from the Vox Advanced Spanish/English dictionary that my online dictionary, Babylon Pro, uses: auxiliar 1 (obligación presente) must, have to, have got to *debo ir a comprar * I must go shopping *debes acabar antes de que lleguen* you have to finish before they arrive 2 (obligación pasada) should, ought to *debía haberlo comprado ayer* I should have bought it yesterday 3 (obligación futura) must, have to, have got to *deberás tenerlo a las cinco* you must have it ready by five o'clock 4 (obligación moral) should, ought to *no deberías haberlo hecho* you shouldn't have done it So while I agree that in English we distinguish between "should" and "must," I don't know how to make that distinction in Spanish. I hope that helps.[/quo][quo]*Quote from * nohablo [quo]*Quote from * 'kimisue This has now created another question for me. The term 'debo decir' expresses a obligation for me to do something. How do you express in Spanish: I __should __ do something e.g I should go to the dentist (because my tooth hurts). __I Should__ is not the same as 'I must' (debo) or 'I have to' (tengo que) is it? [/quo] Good question. However, the verb *deber* can mean both "should" and "must." In fact, here's an excerpt from the Vox Advanced Spanish/English dictionary that my online dictionary, Babylon Pro, uses: auxiliar 1 (obligación presente) must, have to, have got to *debo ir a comprar * I must go shopping *debes acabar antes de que lleguen* you have to finish before they arrive 2 (obligación pasada) should, ought to *debía haberlo comprado ayer* I should have bought it yesterday 3 (obligación futura) must, have to, have got to *deberás tenerlo a las cinco* you must have it ready by five o'clock 4 (obligación moral) should, ought to *no deberías haberlo hecho* you shouldn't have done it So while I agree that in English we distinguish between "should" and "must," I don't know how to make that distinction in Spanish. I hope that helps.[/quo] I am very far from being an expert in Spanish but it appears 'should' uses the conditional form of the verb and must uses the other forms.

[quo]*Quote from * Scott11 I am very far from being an expert in Spanish but it appears 'should' uses the conditional form of the verb and must uses the other forms.[/quo] Hola Scott. Bienvenido al foro. What you say makes sense, but I'm afraid it doesn't turn out to be so simple. Even in one of the examples I quoted from the dictionary, "should" is translated not in the conditional but rather in the _imperfect_: *debía haberlo comprado ayer* I should have bought it yesterday And it gets even murkier. Over at the WordReference.com forums, several native Spanish speakers were quite comfortable with the following: *Bush no debió haber empezado esta guerra* - Bush should not have started this war. Here, we see the _preterite_ used. Moreover, the WordReference.com dictionary offers the following example of "should": you should have thought of that before - *deberías* or *debieras haber pensado en eso antes*. So there's yet another possibility for should: the imperfect subjunctive. Arrgh :( And, to cite one more example, a native Spanish speaker quotes someone's suggestion and then says the following: "Debo = I must Deberia = I should" *No es muy utilizado esta diferenciación * The discussions of the difference between "should" and "must" go on and on and on. Apparently, there's no easy answer.

Ah, the nuance of language!