Beginner's Portuguese

PDF generated using the open source mwlib toolkit. See http://code.pediapress.com/ for more information. PDF generated at: Sun, 09 Sep 2012 07:14:15 UTC

Contents
Articles
L1 Lesson One - Saying Hello Lesson Two - I Like... Lesson Three - What Are You Going To Do? Lesson Four - Where Do You Come From? Lesson Five - Going Shopping Lesson Six - The Train Lesson Seven - What Time Is It? Lesson Eight - Meeting People Lesson Nine - Getting The Groceries Lesson Ten - My House 1 2 4 8 10 12 14 15 17 18 19

References
Article Sources and Contributors Image Sources, Licenses and Contributors 20 21

Article Licenses
License 22

L1

L1
Level One - Learn To Speak Portuguese
Go Back To Contents Page Bem vindo! Welcome to this Portuguese Language Course. This is a collaborative effort by many contributors and so please feel free to edit these pages to improve as you see fit. This chapter is intended for the absolute beginner in Portuguese. No prior experience nor grammatical knowledge is required. Boa sorte! (Good luck!) Lesson One - Saying Hello Learn how to say hello, plus one of the ways to say "I am", "You are" etc. Lesson Two - I Like... How to say you like something, how to describe things and how to say "the" Lesson Three - What Are You Going To Do? Tell people what you're going to do, and on what day of the week. Lesson Four - Where Do You Come From? A bit more on describing things, plus nationalities.
Jardim Museu Agricola Tropical. Lisboa (Lisbon), Portugal

Lesson Five - Going Shopping Clothes, how to sound polite, plus how to say you want something. Lesson Six - The Train Learn how to ask a question in Portuguese Lesson Seven - What Time Is It? Tell the time and count to ten! Lesson Eight - Meeting People Knowledge - how to say "I know", Lesson Nine - Getting The Groceries 'This' and 'that' and 'those', more numbers, plus comparing things. Lesson Ten - My House How to say "I have" or "There is"

Ir Ao Segundo Nvel Go To Level Two

Lesson One - Saying Hello

Lesson One - Saying Hello

Return to Portuguese Return to Contents Go to Lesson Two Welcome to this Wikibook Portuguese Language Course. Good luck - or should we say, boa sorte!

Dialogue 1
Ricardo: Bom dia. O meu nome Ricardo. Tudo bem? Joo: Tudo bem, obrigado. E voc? Ricardo: Estou bem, obrigado. Qual o seu nome? Joo: O meu nome Joo. Ricardo: Muito prazer. Joo: Adeus! Ricardo: Adeus!

OK, obviously there's a bit of information to absorb there. But don't worry, let's just tackle it one thing at a time. Bom dia - this literally means "good day" but it is in fact used for "good morning". While "good day" in English sounds a little stuffy, you can use bom dia quite naturally until around 12PM. Other greetings include: Ol - hi Boa tarde - good afternoon Boa noite - good evening, good night. So Ricardo (which is the Portuguese version of "Richard") has started by saying "good day" or "hello". Next he introduces himself. O meu nome Ricardo - My name is Ricardo. In informal language, or in spoken language in general, "Chamo-me Joo" is more often used. This is in answer to a question asked by Ricardo: Como se chama? - What is your name? (literally, "How do you call/name yourself?") Como means "How?", and voc is one way of saying "you".
Before we go on, a word of pronunciation - 'ch' in Portuguese is always pronounced like the 'sh' in 'shine', never like the 'ch' in 'cheese'.

Let's go back to the first line. Ricardo asks Como est? We already know what como means. The next word, 'est' means 'is'. BUT - and here's our first big point of grammar - it can also mean 'are' in some circumstances. This is one part of the verb estar, which is one of two verbs that translate to our English 'to be'. Confused? Think of a verb like a tree. On the trunk there's the verb's name - this is called the infinitive. Some examples of infinitives are... ESTAR To be in SER To be TER To have COMER To eat FALAR To speak ABRIR To open

Now we have to imagine the branches of the tree. Each branch is a different TENSE of the verb. Example? 'I am running' is present continuous tense because it is happening NOW whereas 'I was running' is past continuous tense because it happened in the PAST.

Lesson One - Saying Hello Finally, the leaves on the branches are different CONJUGATIONS. Example? We say 'I run' and 'you run' but 'he/she/it runS' with an 's' on the end. This is a different conjugation of the present indicative tense of the verb 'to run'. However in Portuguese there are more conjugations than in English. Let's take a look at the conjugations for the verb ESTAR. We already know that one of them will be 'est', from the dialogue.

ESTAR - To Be in
I am You (familiar) are He is She is You (normal) are We are You (plural) are They are (also elas, vocs) Eu est ou Tu est s Ele est Ela est Voc est Ns est amos Vocs est o Eles est o

Look back at the dialogue. Ricardo says Estou bem. We can see that the first word means 'am'. Bem simply means 'well'. So we have 'Am well.' We seem to be missing the 'I'! However, in Portuguese, because there are different conjugations for the different people, you can often leave out the 'I, we, they' etc. if it is obvious. In the case of 'I' and 'we' it is always obvious in the present tense. There's also always a bit of confusion at the start between the different forms of 'you'. Tu This is really mostly used in Portugal, and some regions from Brazil. It is a really casual way of saying you used between close friends or to children. If in doubt, dont use it, use 'o senhor/a senhora' (masculine/feminine). Voc It only refers to one person. Used in informal speech mainly in Brazil. Vocs Plural form of tu or voc. There is also one other form of you: Vs. However this form is less used and is mostly used by people in Northern Portugal and in classic literature. Therefore we shall ignore this form of "you". However if you need to understand it, the grammar references on this Wikibook include Vs - which, I should point out, is like vocs - it is currently only used when talking to more than one person. Still confused? Check out the Personal Pronouns of Subject page. Muito prazer means It's a pleasure. Adeus means goodbye.

Lesson One - Saying Hello

4
Let's practice a bit of what we've learnt. Translate the following into Portuguese. 1. I am called Lus. 2. My name is Helen. 3. How are you? (use the 'tu' form of estar) Translate the following into English 4. Ele est bem. 5. Muito prazer. 6. Chamo-me Derek. 7. O meu nome Jill. Answers 1. Chamo-me Lus. 2. O meu nome Helen 3. Como ests? 4. He is well. 5. It's a pleasure. 6. I am called Derek. 7. My name is Jill.

Return to Portuguese Return to Contents Go to Lesson Two

Lesson Two - I Like...

Return to Portuguese Return to Contents Go to Lesson Three Welcome to the second lesson in our Portuguese language course. If you haven't already, have a look at Lesson One - Saying Hello

Dialogue 2
Ricardo: Voc gosta de chocolate? Joo: Sim. E voc? Ricardo: Sim. Gosta de chocolate ao leite ou chocolate branco? Joo: Eu e a minha esposa gostamos de chocolate preto. Joo: At logo! Ricardo: Adeus!

Once again, don't worry if you don't pick up everything - or even anything. However some words are fairly obvious. o chocolate - this means the chocolate. The o we slipped in above means the in Portuguese - but here's the catch only for certain words. Because in Portuguese we introduce a concept called 'noun gender' which means that every noun - that is, every word that represents a thing - animal, mineral, vegetable - is either masculine or feminine. This is a mostly abstract concept. However, there are some words like 'man' (which is masculine) and 'woman' (which is feminine) that follow logical patterns (as do others that refer to something with a specific gender). Most words, however, like 'coal' (which is masculine) and 'house' (which is feminine) seem to be completely random. That is why you always have to learn the gender of a word when you learn a word. Have a look at these examples.

Lesson Two - I Like...

5
o gato - the cat (masculine) os pssegos - the peaches (masculine, plural) a casa - the house (feminine) as rvores - the trees (feminine plural)

As you can see, the word for 'the' changes with every gender. It also changes depending on the NUMBER of things you are talking about. If there is more than one object we call it 'plural' and so the word for 'the' changes again. Unfortunately, the word for 'the' isn't the only thing that changes with gender. Adjectives - words that describe an object - change depending on what gender the object they are describing is. Some more examples...
o gato amarelo - the cat is yellow os pssegos so amarelos - the peaches are yellow a casa amarela - the house is yellow as rvores so amarelas - the trees are yellow

Can you see a pattern? We started with amarelo to translate "yellow". Can you see the similarity between the word for "the" in this instance - o - and the ending of the adjective, amarelo? When the word for "the" changes to a, so too does the end of the adjective - we get amarela. So to change an adjective from masculine to feminine, we just change the final letter from an o with the masculine form to an a in the feminine. To get to the plural forms, add an s - amarelos and amarelas. Try the following exercise out.
Fill in the following chart for the word vermelho - which means "red". 1. Masculine Singular = ______________ 2. Feminine Singular = ______________ 3. Masculine, Plural = ______________ 4. Feminine, Plural = ______________ Complete the following phrases by converting the word in the brackets, which is the masculine singular adjective, to the appropriate form of the adjective. 5. As meninas so _________ (bonito) - The girls are (pretty) 6. O gato __________ (branco) - The cat is (white) 7. Os tios so __________ (educado) - The uncles are (polite) 8. A casa __________ (bonito) - The house is (pretty) Answers 1. vermelho 2. vermelha 3. vermelhos 4. vermelhas 5. bonitas 6. branco 7. educados 6. bonita

How did you do? It's not that tricky if you keep in mind the link between the word for "the" and the ending of the adjective.
Before we move on to even more difficult ideas, let's have another quick pronunciation tip: the "lh" in vermelho is pronounced in Portuguese like the "ll" in the English word billiard or million. That is to say, it sounds like an "l" followed by a "y".

Lesson Two - I Like...

Before we go, let's have a look at three things. 1. The Verb SER You may have noticed that, despite the fact that we said last lesson that the verb for "to be" is estar, when we said "The house is yellow" we translated it as a casa amarela. Shouldn't that be a casa est amarela? Unfortunately in Portuguese there are two verbs that translate to the English verb "to be". One is estar - the other is ser. Let's have a look at its verb table for SER in the Present Indicative Tense:

SER - To Be
I am You (familiar) are He is She is You (formal) are We are You (plural) are They are (also elas, vocs) Eu s ou Tu s Ele Ela Voc Ns s omos Vocs s o Eles s o

So when to use ser and when to use estar? One way to remember the difference is to remember where they came from. Ser comes from the Latin word 'esse'. In English, we derive the word essence from the same Latin root. Ser is used to talk about WHAT something or someone is. The verb estar that we met in Lesson One comes from the Latin stare, from which we also get out English word status. Estar is used to talk about the state of something, HOW is it. Some examples...
Uses of SER O sol amarelo. The sun is yellow. Meu nome Jim. My name is Jim. Ns somos portugueses. We are Portuguese.

Uses of ESTAR A cerveja est gelada. The beer is ice-cold. Eu estou doente. I am sick. O livro est em cima da mesa. The book is on the table.

When talking about the location of something, use ser if the thing being located is always or usually there (like a building) but estar if (like a person, or animal) they tend to move around and are only in the spot for a period of time. If you still find ser and estar confusing, go the this page - Ser and Estar 2. The second thing we still haven't got around to the main point of this article - how to say we like something. In the dialogue Ricardo asks Voc gosta de chocolate? This means "Do you like chocolate?" Joo responds, Sim, gosto de chocolate. This means "Yes, I like chocolate." So we have a formula for asking someone whether they like something. We can also respond.

Lesson Two - I Like...

Voc gosta Do you like

do chocolate (of the) chocolate da bebida (of) the drink dos livros (of) the books das mas {of the) apples'

The response will be

Sim, Yes, No, No,

gosto I like no gosto I don't like

do/da/dos/das chocolate/bebida/livros/mas (of)(the) chocolate/drink/books/apples

OK, but why do we have the options of do/da/dos/das? Perhaps you have picked up on the endings of these words? They correspond to the words meaning "the". But why do we say do instead of o or das instead of as? Well, because in English we talk of "to like" wheras in Portuguese the phrase is gostar de which means "to like of". The word for "of" in Portuguese is de. However when it appears before the words 'o, a, os and as we contract it we squeeze the two words up. So, for instance gostar de a amiga - "to like the friend". This is incorrect. Squish 'de' and 'a' into one word - 'da'. We now have gostar da amiga. 3. The final thing we need to look at is the order of adjectives. Usually in English the adjective (or describing word) comes BEFORE the word it is describing. For example. The YELLOW dog. The POLITE mother. However in Portuguese the opposite (usually) happens. O co amarelo - The yellow dog (literally, "The dog yellow") A me educada - The polite mother. (literally, "The mother polite") However there are some adjectives which DO come before the noun. The main ones are bom which means good and mau which means bad. However many adjectives can be placed BEFORE and AFTER the word they describe and change their meanings accordingly. However we will deal with those a little later on. That is all for Lesson 2. Have a little rest then see how you fare on Lesson Three.

Lesson Three - What Are You Going To Do?

Lesson Three - What Are You Going To Do?

Return to Portuguese Return to Contents Go to Lesson Four

Dialogue 3
Ricardo: Ol! Como vai? Joo: Bem, obrigado. E voc? Ricardo: Bem. O que vai fazer no sbado? Joo: Eu vou passear com a minha me. E voc? Ricardo: Vou ao cinema. Joo: No gosta de nadar? Ricardo: No, eu e a minha esposa no gostamos de nadar. Joo: Eu e a minha famlia gostamos de nadar.

In this dialogue Joo and Ricardo are talking about what they are going to do. What day? Well, let's have a look at the days of the week before we go any further.
Os dias da semana Monday segunda-feira Tuesday tera-feira Wednesday quarta-feira Thursday quinta-feira Friday sexta-feira Saturday sbado Sunday domingo

Note: If it's clear that you are talking about days of the week, you don't actually have to say 'feira'. So Ricardo says Ricardo: Ol. O que vai fazer no sbado? Ol of course means 'hello'. O que voc vai fazer (no sbado) ? This is a very useful phrase that basically means 'What are you going to do (on Saturday)?' You can of course replace the 'sbado' with whichever day you want to use. 'No' is a contraction of 'em' (in) and 'o' ('the', masculine). Weekend days are masculine, whereas week days are feminine, so you'll say 'no domingo' (on Sunday) but 'na segunda(-feira)' (on Monday). The answer will be something along the lines of: (Eu) vou (fazer, nadar, comer) This means 'I am going'. 'Vou' is one part of the word 'ir' which means 'to go' in Portuguese. Just like in English, we say what we will do by saying 'going to', in Portuguese we can use the verb 'ir' (which, as a verb, changes for each person that it refers to, like 'estar' and 'ser') to talk about the future. First we need to look at how to conjugate (change for each person) the verb 'ir'. Remember the tree analogy? 'Ir' is called the infinitive - the trunk - of the verb. We can't just simply use it, we have to change it. IR - Present Indicative Tense Eu vou - I go Tu vais - You (familiar) go Voc vai - You (informal) go Ele/Ela vai - He/She goes Ns vamos - We go Vocs vo - You (plural) go Eles/Elas vo - They (group of males or mixed) / They (group of females) go You need to memorize the conjugations for this verb because it is IRREGULAR - it has no pattern to it.

Lesson Three - What Are You Going To Do? You may also recognize a word from the dialogue. Ricardo asked Joo, Como vai? - How are you doing (literally "How are you going?") This is another way to ask how someone is. Do you remember Como est? from the first lesson? Remember that como means "how". So como vai? literally means "How are you going?". It can be replied to exactly like "Como est".
PRONUNCIATION TIP You may be asking how the word vo is pronounced. Whenever an accent has a tilde (that's the squiggly thing above the "a") you nasalize the vowel. This may be the hardest phonem for a non-native to pronounce. What this means precisely is very difficult to explain. If you speak French you will know how that (in French) the word marron is pronounced without the 'n' on the end. Instead the sound of the "o" comes out of your nose rather your mouth. With any luck we will be able to get some sound files up soon to show you this difficult pronunciation

Now that we know how this verb conjugates for every person, we can use it to say what someone is going to do.

Eu vou I am going...

nadar- to swim falar com um amigo - to talk with a friend Ns vamos beber - to drink We are going... ir ao cinema - go to the cinema
Of course you can use any of the conjugations we have learned, not just eu vou and Ns vamos. Try out the following exercise
Fill in the following phrases using the appropriate form of the verb 'ir'. 1. Vocs ___vai___ beber. - You (plural) are going to drink 2. Eu ___vou___ comer no domingo. = I am going to eat on Sunday. 3. Ricardo e Joo ______ ___________ - Ricardo and Joo are going to swim. {Hint: Which type of conjugation is the phrase "Ricardo and Joo"?) 4. ____ vais falar com um amigo - You are going to talk with a friend 5. Ela ______ ler na tera-feira. - She is going to read on Tuesday. 6. __ ______ ________ fazer ____ ________?What are you going to do on Thursday? 7. ______ _______ ____ ________ ____ ____________ - You (use voc) are going to go to the cinema on Friday. Answers 1. vo 2. vou 3. vo nadar 4. tu 5. vai 6. O que vais fazer na quinta-feira? 7. Voc vai ao cinema na sexta-feira. If you got the last sentence right, well done! You have successfully translated your first sentence from English to Portuguese

The infinitive forms of verbs - like gostar, ser and ir - are used quite a bit in Portuguese - but usually only when there is another verb before them. For instance, we know that we use the infinitive after the verb 'ir'. We also know how to say "I like something". But how do we say "I like to do something"? This is nearly as simple as saying "I am going to do something". Except here we use the verb gostar (remember, this means to like) instead of ir - and we slip the word de in as well.

Lesson Three - What Are You Going To Do?

10

Eu gosto I like

de ler- to read de falar - to talk de dormir - to sleep de ir ao cinema com um amigo - to go to the cinema with a friend

Return to Portuguese Return to Contents Go to Lesson Four

Lesson Four - Where Do You Come From?

Return to Portuguese Return to Contents Go to Lesson Five

Dialogue 4
Ricardo: Bom dia, Joo. De onde voc ? Joo: Sou de Lisboa. E voc? Ricardo: Sou de Londres. Joo: ingls? Sou americano, mas agora moro em Lisboa. Ricardo: Gosta de Lisboa? Joo: Sim, muito. Ricardo: Os meus pais so portugueses. Eles moram em Londres.

This time Ricardo and Joo are talking about where they live, and what nationality they are. De onde voc ? - Where are you from? By now you may have picked up that, like in a couple of other European languages, the word for "of" or "from" is de. The word onde means "where". To avoid ambiguity, in this case voc is used most of the time. And finally, you should remember - it means "he/she/it is" or "you are" (when using voc) - as part of the verb ser. Joo responds thus: Sou de Lisboa - I am from Lisbon. Can you remember what sou means? It means "I am" (when using ser as the verb). So we have "I am from...". Of course, you can put anything after the "de".

Lesson Four - Where Do You Come From?

11

Translate the following into English. 1. Sou de Melbourne. 2. Voc de Washington 3. Eles so do Rio de Janeiro. 4. Tu s de Paris. Translate the following into Portuguese 5. I am from Edinburgh 6. You are from Auckland. (use tu) 7. Where is she from? 8. Where do we come from? Answers 1. I am from Melbourne 2. You are from Washington 3. They are from Rio. 4. You are from Paris. 5. (Eu) sou de Edinburgh 6. Tu s de Auckland 7. De onde ela? (Use ela in this case because context doesn't tell us who refers to) 8. De onde somos? (But because somos is only used to mean "we are" we can always omit the word for "we")

If you were looking closely at the dialogue, you may have spotted a way to tell someone where you come from in a different way. Instead of saying, "I am from France" - Sou de Frana - you can say "I am French". In Portuguese, this is done as in English - by using the verb "ser" and an adjective, like "French" or "Australian". Why do we use ser? Because your nationality is a permanent feature of you. It is WHAT you are, rather than HOW you are at a particular moment. However first we need to have a look at the different nationalities.
MASCULINE SINGULAR FEMININE SINGULAR MASCULINE PLURAL FEMININE PLURAL

The following adjectives (plus more like them) are like regular adjectives- their endings are as follows... -o americano American australiano Australian americana -a americanos -os americanas -as More adjectives like these: mexicano - Mexican indiano - Indian brasileiro - Brazilian britnico - British italiano - Italian'

australiana

australianos

australianas

The following adjectives are changed a litte differently. Their endings are... -s ingls English francs French inglesa -esa ingleses -eses inglesas -esas More adjectives like these: chins - Chinese japons - Japonese portugus - Portuguese

francesa

franceses

francesas

The following adjectives are quite strange: they don't change with masculine and feminine: only plural. belgaBelgian belga belgas belgas

Some examples?

Lesson Four - Where Do You Come From?

12

as meninas canadianas - the Canadian girls (feminine, plural) a mulher australiana - the Australian woman (feminine, singular) o homem belga - the Belgian man (masculine, singular) os homens franceses - the French men (masculine, plural - notice the change from homem to homens)

As pointed out above, something strange goes on when we talk about more than one homem (man). Instead of homems we get homeNs (men).
You now know how to say who you are, where you come from, what you like doing and what you are going to do on a certain day. As a practice, write a letter to an imaginary Portuguese penfriend, using your knowledge of basic Portuguese vocabulary. Include questions - for example, 'Como se chama voc?

Return to Portuguese Return to Contents Go to Lesson Five

Lesson Five - Going Shopping

Return to Portuguese Return to Contents Go to Lesson Six

Dialogue 5
Ricardo: Bom dia. Quero comprar uma camisa. Carla: Sim, certamente. As roupas esto ali. Ricardo: Obrigado. Quero uma camisa branca. Carla: O senhor quer tambm uma camisa preta? Ricardo: No. Mas quero um chapu Carla: Certamente. Obrigada.

Here, Ricardo is in a clothes shop. He asks the attendant, Carla, if he can have a white shirt - uma camisa branca. He also asks for something else - um chapu. This means "a hat". We've come across the words for "a". These are called, properly, "indefinite articles" (as opposed to the words for "the", which are called "definite articles"). This is because the word "a" or "an" is indefinite - it doesn't specify which shirt or hat. Let's have a look at this table.
A/AN Masculine singular um A/AN Feminine singular uma SOME Masculine plural uns SOME Feminine plural umas

Some examples? Sure.

o gato e um gato - the cat and a cat os pssegos e uns pssegos - the peaches and some peaches a casa e uma casa - the house and a house as rvores e umas rvores - the tree and some trees

Quickly, what does that e mean by itself? Simple - e means "and". Let's have some practice.

Lesson Five - Going Shopping

13
Convert the following from "the" to "a" or "some 1. Os sapatos = ______ sapatos (some/the shoe) 2. As gravatas = ______ _________ (the/some ties) 3. A saia = ______ _________ (a/the skirt) 4. O chapu = ______ _________ (the/a hat) Answers 1. uns 2. umas 3. uma 4. um

Another major word we need to get to know is Quero. This word means "I want". Of course, there are other conjugations... Voc quer alguma coisa? - Do you want something? Sim, quero uma camisa branca. - Yes, I want a white shirt. O senhor quer tambm uma camisa preta? Tambm means quite simply "also". So we have "Do you want also a black shirt?". But what on earth is this phrase, o senhor? Well, we've already learnt that voc is more polite than tu. However, there is another level of politeness used in Portuguese. This form of "you" is used to people you don't know well, or people you have to show respect to, like bosses, or teachers. However, this strange form of "you" (which is roughly equivalent to "Mr." or "Mrs." in English) changes according to the gender of the person you're talking to, plus how many people you are talking to as well! Have a look at the table below...
o senhor talking to only one male (equivalent to "Mr") a senhora talking to only one married female (equivalent to "Mrs") a menina talking to only one unmarried female (equivalent to "Miss") os senhores talking to more than one male or a mixed group as senhoras talking to more than one married female as meninas talking to more than one unmarried female

Lesson Six - The Train

14

Lesson Six - The Train

Return to Portuguese Return to Contents Go to Lesson Seven

Dialogue 6
Ricardo: O senhor pode me dizer a que horas parte o prximo comboio para o Porto? Alberto: s trs horas. O senhor tem bilhete? Ricardo: No. Posso comprar um bilhete? Alberto: Sim. Quer um bilhete de segunda classe? Ricardo: Sim. Quanto custa? Alberto: Trs euros. Ricardo: De que plataforma parte o comboio? Alberto: Da plataforma trs.

Here Ricardo is buying a ticket on a train station (o comboio in Portugal, "the train" is translated as o trem in Brazil). He also asks some other questions about the train he wants to catch. In this lesson we're going to learn how to ask question in Portuguese. We've already seen one way of asking questions, when we looked at verbs like "gostar".
Voc gosta de Lisboa? - Do you like Lisbon? O senhor gosta da viagem? - Do you like the voyage/trip?

These are almost exactly the same as stating something.

Voc gosta do gato. - You like the cat. A senhora gosta da amiga - You like the friend.

In fact, the only difference between these sentences are that there is a question mark at the end of the questions. In Portuguese, you can ask a yes/no question by just stating something, and putting a question mark at the end of it. In the spoken language, you should pronounce with a raising entonation to the end of the sentence, just like in English. This is an extremely easy way to form a question.

STATEMENT & QUESTION MARK = YES/NO QUESTION

And how do we answer such questions? Well, of course, with a "Yes" or a "No". When Alberto asks Ricardo O senhor tem bilhete? Ricardo could answer with...
Yes No

Sim

No

We've also encountered another way to ask questions. Back in lesson three we learnt how to ask someone what they were going to do on a certain day. Do you remember? O que vai fazer na tera-feira? - What are you going to do on Tuesday? O que eles vo fazer no domingo? - What are they going to do on Sunday? The two words 'O que' mean "what?"
O que que ela quer comer? - What does she want to eat? De que que tu gostas? - What do you like?

Lesson Seven - What Time Is It?

15

Lesson Seven - What Time Is It?

Return to Portuguese Return to Contents Go to Lesson Eight
OS NUMERAIS the numbers 1 um, uma 4 quatro 7 sete 10 dez 2 dois, duas 5 cinco 8 oito 3 trs 6 seis 9 nove

Here are the numbers 1-10 in Portuguese. It is essential that you learn these by heart. Next is a table with some other numbers in portuguese.
English eleven twelve thirteen fourteen fifteen sixteen seventeen eighteen nineteen twenty thirty forty fifty sixty seventy eighty ninety hundred onze doze treze quatorze / catorze quinze dezesseis dezessete dezoito dezenove vinte trinta quarenta cinquenta / cinqenta sessenta setenta oitenta noventa cem Portuguese

hundred and one cento e um two hundred three hundred 400 500 600 duzentos trezentos quatrocentos quinhentos seiscentos

Lesson Seven - What Time Is It?

16
700 800 900 thousand 1001 1101 3000 200 000 setecentos oitocentos novecentos mil mil e um mil cento e um trs mil duzentos mil

Now, to our usual dialogue.

Dialogue
Ricardo: Que horas so, Joo? Joo: Agora, so dez para as seis. Ricardo: A srio? Minha mulher e eu vamos ao cinema s seis e cinco. Joo: A que horas comea o filme? Ricardo: s seis e dez.

In Portuguese, the way you tell the time is similar to English. You first say the hour number, then the word e and finally the minute number. Ex: So sete e vinte. - It's seven twenty. For half an hour, you say e meia in the place of "and a half" or e trinta as in thirty and in case the minute number is very close to the full hour (bigger than 30), it is more common to say the remaining time to the next hour, using the structure: So + remaining time in minutes + para a(s) + next hour. Ex: So duas e meia. - It's two and a half. So cinco para as quatro - It's five to four. Also, there are synonyms for midnight and midday in Portuguese: meia-noite and meio-dia, respectively. These words are used the same way. Ex: meio-dia. - It's midday. Now, let's do some exercises: 1)Tell the times below in Portuguese: a)10:30 PM b)8:55 AM c)3:15 AM d)7:25 AM e)1:00 PM f)4:40 PM g)12:50 PM h)11:55 AM Answers: 1) a)So dez e meia. b)So cinco para as nove. c)So trs e quinze. d)So sete e vinte e cinco. e) uma hora.* f)So vinte para as cinco. g)So dez para uma. h)So cinco para meio-dia.

Lesson Seven - What Time Is It? Note that since one hour is singular, the verb ser is in the singular form.

17

Lesson Eight - Meeting People

Return to Portuguese Return to Contents Go to Lesson Nine
Desculpe, eu conheo voc? - Excuse me, do I know you? Voc no conheces me. Sou Joo. Prazer em conhecer voc - No, you don't know me. I'm Joo. Nice to meet you. Prazer em conhecer voc tambm - Nice to meet you, too.

In this case ( Do I know you? = Eu conheo voc?) I know how is it. ( Eu sei como isso) Who are you? Quem voc? What is your name? Qual o seu nome? Where are you from? De onde voc ? What are you working in? No que voc trabalha? Remember What is this? O que isso? What is your name? Qual o seu nome? Who is he? Quem ele? How can I help you? Como posso ajudar voc? Espero ter ajudado, qualquer coisa editem pessoal.

Lesson Nine - Getting The Groceries

18

Lesson Nine - Getting The Groceries

Return to Portuguese Return to Contents Go to Lesson Ten

Demonstratives Pronouns
A demonstrative pronoun is used to point out something : this/these for something close to the speaker and that/those for something further away. In Portuguese there are three sets of demonstrative pronouns:
Demonstrative Pronoun this/these near the speaker, near me that/those near the listener, near you M sg este F sg esta M pl estes F pl estas Neuter isto "this thing" isso "that thing"

esse

essa

esses

essas

that/those (over there) aquele aquela aqueles aquelas aquilo beyond the speaker and the listener, away from both of us "that thing (over there)"

Remember that the trailing "s" denotes plural. Demonstratives ending in "a" or "as" refer to feminine nouns. Isso and essa means that, este means this. Isso is only used for a neuter meaning "this thing". Masculine nouns use este meaning. 1. Essa bola "That ball" (feminine singular). 2. Este carro "This car" (masculine singular). 3. Isso or Isso ai "That one" or "That thing over there". Read the sentences below: 1. Poderia-me / Podias-me dar isso? "Could you / Can you give me that?" 2. O que aquilo? "What is that?"

Lesson Ten - My House

19

Lesson Ten - My House

Let's take a look at the conjugations for the verb TER.

TER - To Have
I have You (familiar) have He has She has You (formal) have We have You (plural informal) have You (plural formal) have They have Eu Tu Ele Ela Voc Ns Vs Vocs Eles Elas tenho tens tem tem tem temos tendes tm tm tm

Article Sources and Contributors

20

Article Sources and Contributors

L1 Source: http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?oldid=1111374 Contributors: Jguk, Serge, Subtlechaos, Tannersf, Tommciver Lesson One - Saying Hello Source: http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?oldid=2015804 Contributors: Arcenciel, Harry Wood, Jguk, Jomegat, Palhoto, Serge, SourceCode, Tannersf, Wikkalex, 39 anonymous edits Lesson Two - I Like... Source: http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?oldid=1301613 Contributors: Jguk, Mindyou, Serge, SourceCode, Tannersf, 13 anonymous edits Lesson Three - What Are You Going To Do? Source: http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?oldid=2068943 Contributors: Arcenciel, Geoking66, Jguk, Jordanmills, Serge, SourceCode, Tannersf, Van der Hoorn, 13 anonymous edits Lesson Four - Where Do You Come From? Source: http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?oldid=2368278 Contributors: Arcenciel, Jguk, Jordanmills, Serge, SourceCode, Tannersf, Tommciver, 8 anonymous edits Lesson Five - Going Shopping Source: http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?oldid=2223362 Contributors: Herbythyme, Jguk, Jordanmills, Onbox, Serge, SourceCode, Tannersf, 8 anonymous edits Lesson Six - The Train Source: http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?oldid=1111373 Contributors: Jguk, Jordanmills, Onbox, Serge, SourceCode, Tannersf, 3 anonymous edits Lesson Seven - What Time Is It? Source: http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?oldid=2015790 Contributors: Geoking66, Harry Wood, Jguk, Jordanmills, Onbox, Panic2k4, Robert Horning, Serge, SourceCode, Tannersf, 9 anonymous edits Lesson Eight - Meeting People Source: http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?oldid=2223417 Contributors: Harry Wood, Irishbanter, Tannersf, Thenub314, Xania, 11 anonymous edits Lesson Nine - Getting The Groceries Source: http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?oldid=2223474 Contributors: Adrignola, Harry Wood, Panic2k4, 7 anonymous edits Lesson Ten - My House Source: http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?oldid=2379723 Contributors: Harry Wood, Tannersf, Thenub314, 3 anonymous edits

Image Sources, Licenses and Contributors

21

Image Sources, Licenses and Contributors

Image:Jardim_Museu_Agricola_Tropical_Lisboa_1.JPG Source: http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?title=File:Jardim_Museu_Agricola_Tropical_Lisboa_1.JPG License: Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike 2.0 Contributors: AndreasPraefcke, Joseolgon, JotaCartas, Lusitana, OsvaldoGago

License

22

License
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported //creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/