Notes on "Antes de Empezar", Teach Yourself Spanish

Lesson: There is an informal and a formal way of addressing a person you are speaking to.

Informal:
Como te llamas?

Literally, it means "how are you called? "Como" is "how" while "te" is equivalent to "you". Llamas is the conjugation of llamar which is to call. This is an example of a conjugation:

Verb - llamar
I- Llamo
You - Llamas
He/she/polite You - Llamo
We - Llamamos
You (Plural) -Llamais
They- Llaman

Incidentally, the first few chapters of my Teach Yourself Spanish book did not include the conjugation for we, you and they so I will have to check later if "llamamos", "llamais" and "llaman" are correct.

So going back to "Como te llamas?", that is the question you ask when meeting a classmate for the first time. However, when asking an elderly person his name, you are supposed to say:

"Como se llama, usted?"

It is really bad when you just memorize and do not understand the use of the word. On second thought, I could have just forgotten but anyway, I now know why sometimes, instead of saying "you" to a person your are speaking to, in Spanish, you have to refer to the person in the third person. I find it weird cause its just like saying "What is his name?" rather than "what is your name?"

Note that, literally it means, "what is his name?" which actually sounds weird in English. In Filipino, this is similar to asking "Ano po ang pangalan nila?" which is a more polite way of asking "Ano ang pangalan mo?" , the "po" being used similar to "usted". Unfortunately, I rarely hear the distinction lately which is bad because it reflects either the fact that the Filipino language is deterioration into an impolite language or it is so badly taught or ignored by Filipinos that it has begun its natural death. But don't make me start ranting about that!

Anyway, this is how to reply when asked the "how are you? question:

Como te llamas? ---> Me llamo Maria. Y tu? (literally means, "and you?")

Como se llama? ---> Me llamo Maria? Y usted? (Note that the reply is also formal or polite.)

Another basic lesson to learn is the equivalent of the I, you, he/she, we, you (pl.) and they. Here it is:

I - Yo (pronounced as "dyo" as in george)
You - Tu/Usted(formal)
He/she - El/Ella
We - Nosotros/as
You (pl.) - Vosotros/as/ustedes
They - Ellos/Ellas

Note that El is he while Ella is she; Nosotros is we if we are all male and nosotras when we are all female. Same with vosotros/as.

The first verb that is important to learn is the verb "to be" or "ser". It denotes a permanent state such as one's nationality or name or gender (uh, well, biological gender that is) or the place you are from. There is another verb "estar" which is also losely translated as "to be" but refers to less permanent state of things such as where a thing is presently located. There is a helpful website on "ser" and "estar" which you can access here.

Here it the comparative table:

Pronouns	Ser	Estar
Yo	Soy	Estoy
Tú	Eres	Estas
Él / Ella/ Usted	Es	Esta
Nosotros/as	Somos	Estamos
Vosotros/as	Sois	Estais
Ellos/Ellas/Ustedes	Son	Estan

I already has my Menudo album in cassette entitled "Somos el hijos del rock" for a very long time before I learned that what is actually mean was - (you guess)

We are the sons of rock!

Hehe.