Quote:
Originally Posted by Jessica
How do you say "to lie"?
|
Well interesting question
That would depend if you mean 'to lie' as in telling a lie, or to lie, being horizontal on a bed for instance.
To lie (tell a lie) = liegen.
A lie = een leugen
A liar = een leugenaar (or if female: een leugenares)
To lie (being horizontal on a bed) = liggen
In fact it is interesting that you asked this because I have been thinking about this very verb (the latter that is, being horizontal.
) to mention here because it's an interesting verb in that in Dutch it is often used to express a rather specific kind of present continuous (i.e. the 'ing' form in verbs: dancing, walking, reading etc).
In Dutch we use the present continuous far less so than it would be used in English or even Spanish.
In many cases we just use the indicative instead (I was walking the street minding my own business = Ik liep op straat, en deed mijn ding..' for example).
In fact if we do use the present continuous in Dutch there are two ways to express it. We do so :
1. if we want to explicitly say that we were in the middle of doing something when something suddenly happened
2. if we want to emphasize that something was lasting for quite a while (as in narrating an event or a story for example)
The first way to express the present continuous = 'aan het + infinitive'.
This is probably the most commonly used way of expressing it.
'I was cooking in the kitchen when suddenly the doorbell rang'
'Ik was in de keuken
aan het koken toen de deurbel plotseling ging'.
'I was reading on the couch when my husband came home'.
'Ik was op de bank een boek aan het lezen toen mijn man thuiskwam'.
in fact the latter example might also be said in the second way of expressing the present continous in Dutch. We use the second one to give more emphasis to the duration or to narrate something with more 'spunk' (
) i.e. to spruce it up a little or to emphasize how long something was taking.
(I think the Dutch in spite of the natural down-to-earthedness and understated way of speaking have a secret flair and desire for drama..
)
For this we would use only a couple of verbs:
1. zitten ------ to sit / sentarse
2. staan ------ to stand/ to be standing -estar de pie
3. lopen ------ to walk /andar
4. liggen ------- to lie/tenderse- estar tendido
5. hangen ------ to hang/ pender
Of these the first 3 are by far the most used in these types of sentences.
You would use them for example like this:
'I had been waiting in waitingroom for hours when finally it was my turn..'
'Ik zat al uren te wachten in de wachtkamer toen ik eindelijk aan de beurt was'.
'I have been waiting outside for you for ages, where have you been..?'
'Ik sta al uren buiten op je te wachten, waar was je nou..??'
'I was thinking about it the whole afternoon, but then I decided just to do it..'
' Ik liep er de hele middag over na te denken, maar toen besloot ik het gewoon maar te doen'.
These verbs are used to express a certain kind of impatience or emotion in general, to emphasize the suddenness or the length/duration of the action and the contrast to something happening suddenly.
In fact the confusing bit (confusing to foreigners anyway, for us it's quite logical of course..
) is that you can actually literally mean 'to sit' , to walk etc but this needs not be. I could be 'zitten te wachten' while impatiently pacing the room for instance... I would still say ' Ik zat te wachten' instead of 'ik liep te wachten' (although lopen literally means to walk).
'Ik liep na te denken' could mean I was walking and thinking, but it may also mean that I am sat down thinking deeply...
I guess what happens is that we use the verb that is intrinsically more suited to the action we want to emphasize, so as to stress this more.
The verb 'zitten' (to sit) is far more passive than the verb 'lopen' (to walk).
So when waiting, we want to stress that we were just sitting there (literally or figuratively) waiting and being passive and not able to actively do something about the situation which frustrated us....
Or when thinking, we want to stress that this is a very active process and we would be more likely to say something like 'Ik liep na te denken', to stress that we were very occupied actively thinking about all that was going though our minds...
You could also say ' ik lag na te denken' which is more likely used when you are actually lying down and more or less being pensive, reflecting on something more in a pensive and abstract way.
' Ik zat te denken' is another option but this would be used more if you are thinking about something concretely, as in overthinking something and getting back to someone on a certain issue. Like ' You know, I've been thinking...' , 'Weet je, ik zat er nog eens over na te denken...'
So I guess it all depends on how much activity you want to stress which of these 5 you would be using...
I hope this (probably more than..
) answers your question Jessica?
Please ask if anything is not clear.