small questions about Lesson 5.5

I have two questions about things in Lesson 5.5.

Why is the answer to ¿Qué tal la fiesta? ¡Divertido! instead of ¡Divertida!, since la fiesta is feminine? 

And why ¿Estás en el camino? but Estoy en camino? Should the el be there?

Thanks!

¡Hola DawnE26!

Thanks for your questions! I'll split my answers up to keep them easier to read.

1. Divertido or divertida?

This is a good question! You're right to think that divertido “fun” should change to the feminine form divertida when it's describing something feminine, like a fiesta “party.” So, in a full sentence like La fiesta es divertida “The party is fun,” we have to use the feminine form of the adjective. 

Since Amy doesn't use the feminine form, though, she must not be thinking of describing the word fiesta “party” when she speaks. Instead, she's likely thinking of the experience of being at the party in general terms (e.g. “It's fun here!” or “This is fun!”), as the masculine is used to describe abstract ideas or actions (i.e. things that don't have a gender).

I'll pass this on to the Spanish team to see if they can do something to make things clearer in the lesson here!

2. En el camino or en camino?

Both estar en el camino and estar en camino can be used to say “to be on the way.” So neither is wrong - the article el “the” is just optional!

I hope this clears things up for you - do let me know if you still have any questions!

Saludos,

Liss