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Let’s explore two new regular Spanish verbs, Comer, which means “to eat”, and Suceder, which means “to happen” or “to occur”. We’ll get lots of practice using them in a variety of real sentence contexts.
Sucede algo nuevo.
Intro: Join us on a rigorous, step-by-step journey to fluency. I’m Timothy and this is LearnCraft Spanish.
Today we’re going to learn two new verbs that are very easy to use.
First we have Suceder, which means “to occur” or “to happen”. For example:
I don’t think that’s going to happen.
No creo que eso vaya a suceder.
Of course, we’ve already been using the verb Pasar to mean “to happen” or “to come to pass”. In our quizzing for the next few episodes, we’re generally going to translate Suceder as “to occur” just to make it clear which verb you should choose.
Suceder is conjugated exactly like the verb Deber. So the most common forms in the present tense are sucede for “it happens” and suceden for “they happen”. And the most common preterite forms are sucedió and sucedieron. Here are some examples:
It occurred one time last year.
Sucedió una vez el año pasado.
These things do occur sometimes.
Estas cosas sí suceden a veces.
The participle, sucedido, is also pretty common, as is the gerund sucediendo. Here are some examples:
What is occurring here?
¿Qué está sucediendo aquí?
Something occurs that had never before occurred.
Sucede algo que nunca antes había sucedido.
In that last one, notice the phrasing as sucede algo rather than algo sucede. For sentences involving the verb Suceder, it’s very common to put the subject after the verb. Here’s another example:
Very strange things occurred yesterday.
Ayer sucedieron cosas muy extrañas.
And here’s another example where the subject is “what you said was going to occur”, and that whole phrase is at the end of the sentence, after está sucediendo. Check this out:
Is occurring what you said was going to occur.
Está sucediendo lo que dijiste que iba a suceder.
This sentence doesn’t translate well into English at all, but it’s very idiomatic in Spanish.
Next, here’s a sentence that uses the subjunctive form suceda.
I don’t want this to occur in my city.
No quiero que esto suceda en mi ciudad.
Let’s practice this verb.
Do you know what occurred? He has gotten lost.
¿Sabes lo que sucedió? Él se ha perdido.
Because of that issue, things occurred that we weren’t expecting.
Por ese asunto, sucedieron cosas que no esperábamos.
I don’t lose it because I know what has occurred.
No lo pierdo porque sé lo que ha sucedido.
You lost that opportunity, but I don’t think it will occur again.
Perdiste esa oportunidad, pero no creo que suceda otra vez.
If that occurs, it’s because it had to occur.
Si eso sucede, es porque tenía que suceder.
All those things occur because we don’t have the information.
Todas esas cosas suceden porque no tenemos la información.
Next, let’s learn the verb Comer, which means “to eat”. For example:
Do you want to eat before the party or afterwards?
¿Quieres comer antes de la fiesta o después?
Comer is also conjugated exactly like Deber. And it’s very easy to use, because just like in English, it can be used either by itself or with direct objects. So let’s go ahead and just start quizzing with this verb, in various forms.
I eat with them every time that I can.
Como con ellos cada vez que puedo.
They got lost and now they want to eat something quickly.
Se perdieron y ahora quieren comer algo rápido.
They don’t give us their attention while they eat.
No nos dan su atención mientras comen.
(formal) You eat fast and you want me to eat fast too.
Usted come rápido y quiere que yo también coma rápido.
We have thirty-six hours to talk about this situation.
Tenemos treinta y seis horas para hablar de esta situación.
The thirty-one men at the party are eating.
Los treinta y un hombres en la fiesta están comiendo.
Eat! We need you to eat so that she also eats.
¡Come! Necesitamos que comas para que ella también coma.
He ate a lot because he hadn’t eaten in thirty-nine hours.
Comió mucho porque no había comido en treinta y nueve horas.
For more practice with any of this, feel free to dig deeper at LCSPodcast.com/177. Or if you’re ready, let’s go on to today’s final quiz.
I don’t eat good things and they don’t want me to eat like that.
No como cosas buenas y no quieren que coma así.
Don’t lose it! I can’t even think about losing that.
¡No lo pierdas! Ni siquiera puedo pensar en perder eso.
She doesn't want to think about what’s occurring while she eats.
No quiere pensar en lo que está sucediendo mientras come.
I don’t know what’s going to occur when I’m thirty-one.
No sé qué va a suceder cuando tenga treinta y uno.
The place where I’ll eat is near the green house.
El lugar donde comeré está cerca de la casa verde.
Eat! You have thirty-eight minutes to finish everything.
¡Come! Tienes treinta y ocho minutos para terminar todo.
The view from where we are eating is very pretty.
La vista desde donde estamos comiendo es muy bonita.
We have thirty-three but I don’t want him to lose any.
Tenemos treinta y tres, pero no quiero que pierda ninguno.
Every time you eat with them, those things occur.
Cada vez que comes con ellos, suceden esas cosas.
Did you eat that blue thing without her permission?
¿Comiste esa cosa azul sin su permiso?
I’m twenty-seven years old and I never got lost in this city.
Tengo veintisiete años y nunca me perdí en esta ciudad.
If you lose them, we’re not going to know what occurred.
Si los pierdes, no vamos a saber qué sucedió.
We eat where they eat, but nothing occurs.
Comemos donde ellos comen, pero no sucede nada.
If he loses any of the thirty-one things, we’ll have problems.
Si pierde alguna de las treinta y una cosas, tendremos problemas.
He doesn’t want to get lost because there are thirty more people there.
Él no quiere perderse porque hay treinta personas más ahí.
They are losing by twenty-four points.
Están perdiendo por veinticuatro puntos.
We never lose anything, but you lose everything.
Nosotros nunca perdemos nada, pero tú pierdes todo.
We lost thirty-five books and he lost thirty-two.
Perdimos treinta y cinco libros y él perdió treinta y dos.
Lose those messages! I don’t want to know anything about that.
¡Pierde esos mensajes! No quiero saber nada de eso.
We have eaten where they wanted to eat.
Hemos comido donde ellos querían comer.
They don’t want me to get lost and that’s why I’m near the red car.
No quieren que me pierda y por eso estoy cerca del auto rojo.
(formal) Lose it! A lot of bad things occurred because of having that.
¡Piérdalo! Sucedieron muchas cosas malas por tener eso.
I already ate what he ate and now we want her to eat it.
Ya comí lo que él comió y ahora queremos que ella lo coma.
We don’t want you to get lost, but that has already occurred.
No queremos que te pierdas, pero eso ya ha sucedido.
From our point of view, it might be that it occurs.
Bajo nuestro punto de vista, puede que suceda.
For more practice with all of this, go to LCSPodcast.com/177.
In tomorrow’s episode, we’ll learn a bunch of new adverbs, including the words for “simply”, “besides”, and “including”.
This show is brought to you by LearnCraftSpanish.com. The Spanish voice in this episode was our coach Michael Agudelo. Our music was performed by the Seattle Marimba Quartet, and I’m Timothy, encouraging you to do the hard work of learning Spanish. Acquiring a second language is one of the most fulfilling things you can do, so start your fluency journey today at LCSPodcast.com.