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- João: Bom dia, D. Ana! João: Good morning, D. Ana!
- Ana: Bom dia, João! Ana: Good morning, João!
- Tudo bem? All is well?
- João: Sim, está tudo bem. João: Yes, everything is fine.
- E a senhora, como está? And how are you, ma’am?
- Ana: Estou bem. Ana: I am fine.
- Mas com fome! But hungry!
Premium Feature: Episode Quizzes
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Vocabulary
almoçarto have lunch bemwell a carnemeat comwith comerto eat cozinharto cook a fomehunger malbadly, poorly masbut muitovery, a lot, much mãemother paifather o peixefish as sobremesasdesserts tudoeverything 
Expressions
Bom diaGood morning Até logo!See you later! Está bemAll right, Okay, It’s fine Tudo bem?How's it going?, What's up?, All is well?, How are you? ter deto have to Premium Feature: Smart Review
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This is very helpful, but it demonstrated my problem with listening to conversations. Even when I understand most of the words, and in this case all of the words, I still had to read the transcript to get the gist of the conversation.
Me too!
Hang in there! It will get easier over time. The more you listen, the more your brain starts to pick up on patterns. After listening a few times with the transcript, try listening a few times without it. Even if you don’t understand everything, it will challenge you to put together the meaning and at least pick out some of the vocabulary you know.
I think I did well, only that there were some words in two questions I did not know. Maybe you should find a way of giving definitions of new words in context, whereby for instance one can simply put the cursor on the word and see the meaning or meanings.
Thank you
Great job! That’s a good idea. One language-learning skill that’s really helpful to have is to be able to find or guess the meaning of a word or phrase from context, without the translation to fall back on. So we do like to use these quizzes as a bit of a challenge for you – to see what you can figure out. Of course, if too many of the words are unfamiliar, it becomes frustrating, so we’re always searching for a good balance!
EDIT/UPDATE: You can now toggle on “Look Up” and click individual words to view them in our pop-up translator tool.
Found the quiz straightforward, but like the other poster, I have to read the transcript. You´re perfectly correct, I don’t listen to enough spoken portuguese!
The quiz went well but I have a question for you. ¿”Jantar” only means dinner? In Spanish “yantar” is an old and now literary way to say “comer” in general.
Also, concerning Dona and Senhora (Sra). Can we use Senhora as a generic way to address formally a woman whose name we do not know? Wouldn’t it avoid sensitivities as foreign speakers? And should we use Don (masculine)? And if we do, is it used under the same circumstances as Dona?
Obrigada. Gosto de aprender portuges
Olá, Maria! Yes, “jantar” is specific for dinner 🙂 Regarding Dona and Senhora, yes, you can use “Senhora” or “Senhor” when you don’t know the name of the person you’re talking to. But you can’t use “Dona” alone; it’s always paired up with the woman’s first name. Also, it’s a tricky form of treatment as far as knowing when to use it. “Dom” is not used at all today – it was only used historically for high-ranking noble men/royals. For example, we refer to the first king of Portugal (and to all other kings, of course) as “Dom Afonso Henriques”.
Here’s a good Learning Note regarding formal vs. informal forms of treatment: How to Address People Formally vs. Informally
Ter + de + cozinhar = (to) have/need to cook?
That’s it, Paula!
I have a question about ‘Bom dia’ (sorry, can’t do accents) at the end of the conversation. Presumably this is saying goodbye when the conversation takes place in the morning, but is it fairly common? I’ve not come across it before.
Yes, this is very common. Unlike English, you can use ‘bom dia’ both as a greeting and as a goodbye. Same with ‘boa tarde’ and ‘boa noite’. 🙂 Here’s a learning note with more info on greetings throughout the day: https://www.practiceportuguese.com/learning-notes/portuguese-greetings-throughout-the-day/
I find these conversations a challenge but also a reinforcement that I am making progress! I like to listen to the conversation, without looking at the transcript, and then trying to do the quiz. It would be helpful if you could go back and try doing the quiz again. In my case I would try again after listening a second or third time and reading the transcript.
So glad these are helping! Yes, they are meant to be a challenge, but it’s good to hear that you are pushing through it and making progress. 🙂
If you reload the page it will let you take the quiz again. You can do this by clicking the reload button to the left of the url bar in your browser, or by clicking Command-R (Mac) or F5 (Windows …I think).
I got the gist of what was said listening to the conversation, although I definitely missed a lot. Seeing the text helped clarify what was said, but I still looked at the English to bring it all home. Overall though I think this was at a perfect level of complexity at this stage in the lessons.
The formal/informal language rules are going to be hard to master. I was thinking about some experiences in Canada when I encountered this kind of thing. One time I had a boss who was from Britain. We all called him “Mr. Smith”, never by his first name. That was how he was introduced and even after ten years he was still Mr. Smith. I’ve had other bosses, both Canadian and American, and it’s always been on a first name basis. It’s obvious that the British follow some of the formal language customs common in Europe.
Hi, fabulous course, I’m really enjoying it and somewhere in my brain it’s coming together, I think! In this conversation why does he answer ” Sim, está tudo bem” and not “sim estou tudo bem” ? I’m a bit confused
Olá, Mandy. Thanks for your comment!
– Sim, está tudo bem -> Yes, everything is fine -> The subject of the sentence is not “me”, but “everything”, so to speak. What’s throwing you off is that the word order is reversed (“está tudo bem” instead of “tudo está bem” – both are correct, but the former is much more usual).
Alternatively, you can say “Sim, está tudo bem comigo” (Yes, everything is fine with me), but “Estou tudo bem” is grammatically incorrect.
when Dona Anna speaks to Joao why does she not refer to him as ” o Joao” , rather than just ” Joao”
Olá, Guy. João’s use of “a senhora” and “a Dona Ana” is justified because he’s addressing her formally. Note how he also conjugates verbs in line with the formal you (você). Since Dona Ana is addressing João informally, she uses his name directly instead of going “o João”, and she also conjugates any verbs concerning him in the informal second person. This Learning Note explains formal vs. informal treatment in detail: Tu and Você in European Portuguese
You could try using a dictionary in another window on your browser to translate the words you don’t understand. I struggle with many sentences, too, but using a dictionary rather than a translator I usually get the stem form of verbs and therefore can conjugate the right form to match the sentence. This also trains the understanding why which form was used and the sense for how this language works.
Tudo bem 🙂
Very useful
It would be useful to have translations of the answers to the quiz questions once you have answered them – even better to have the question translated too. Sometimes I answer the quiz and don’t know why I got a question right/wrong. It would also help to see translations for words that are new.
Thanks for the feedback! We’re definitely considering this. We’ve been hesitant because it’s also a good exercise to not have the translations to rely on. That way, it forces you into a more realistic situation where you know some of the words, but not all, and you have to try to determine the meaning. This makes the learning process more deliberate and thus more effective. (These are also similar to how the questions are set up for the A2 CIPLE exam that a number of people are studying for, where the questions and answer are both in Portuguese.) That said, I completely understand that you want to be able to check yourself, so maybe we can find a way to toggle the translation on and off. On the list. 🙂
EDIT/UPDATE: You can now click the icon next to the quiz questions and answers to open the translation in our pop-up translator tool.
Thanks Molly. I would only want to see the translations after I have answered them, or even as a list at the end of the quiz. This is probably more useful at the beginning of the course when some of us (probably us English!) are still struggling with the basics!
Throughout all of these lessons I notice that Senhor/senhor and Senhora/senhora and Sn./sn. and Sra./sra. all sometimes appear capitalized and all sometimes not. Is capitalizing them optional? Dona/dona também?
Olá, Whit. Yes, it’s somewhat flexible. I’d say these are the usual standards:
1) When “senhor/senhora” are used on their own, they should not be capitalized. “Dona” is never used alone.
2) When part of a longer and very formal form of address or when preceding a personal name (especially if you perceive the person as “important” or are in a professional context), they can be capitalized for extra reverence.
3) The abbreviations Sr./Sr.ª/D. are usually capitalized too and are usually used in combination or before someone’s name.
Some examples of each:
1) Ele é um senhor simpático. (He is a nice man)
1) Eu estou bem. Como está a senhora? (I’m fine. How are you, ma’am?)
2) “Excelentíssimo(a) Senhor(a), …” (Dear Sir/Madam,…)
2) Muito obrigada, senhor João. / Muito obrigada, Senhor João. (Thank you very much, Mr. João)
3) Sr.ª Prof.ª, tem um minuto? (Professor, do you have a minute?)
3) O Sr. Pedro não está disponível. (Mr. Pedro is not available)
3) Boa tarde, D. Ana! (Good afternoon, Mrs. Ana!)
The words in the questions are new, hiw am i to understand what is asked?
These quizzes are meant to challenge you to use what you do know to help you determine the meaning of the words and phrases you don’t know. This deliberate Portuguese-only process is more difficult, but it’s also very effective and it helps you more naturally piece the elements of the language together.
That said, we don’t want to drive you crazy! It sounds like maybe we didn’t strike a good balance with this quiz, so I’ve updated it to be a little bit simpler. There will still be words you don’t know, but hopefully this will help you determine the meaning a little more easily.
Thank you, it was excellent
That clip was the perfect length for me to keep up. I’d say I understood at least 75% of that one! A personal best.
Is there any case where the articles o and a are not used before names? In other words, just saying the name.
Thanks, Jess
Oh, thanks for your comment. 75% is very good!
Literary and journalistic writing/speech are good examples of cases where articles may often be omitted before names.
I love these quizzes! They introduce new words and terms and I’m able to understand them without reading the scripts for the most part. Even if an unfamiliar word or phrase is introduced, I am still able to use the context to guess the correct answer.
I really enjoy the dialogues and how they tie together many of the concepts and phrases in the chapter. I have been both surprised and encouraged that so far I have been able to understand at least the gist, if not all the sentences, of the dialogues without looking at the transcript. I’m finding that my knowledge of Spanish really helps me guess the meaning of words despite the significant differences in pronunciation.
I love “Practice Portuguese”! You all did such a great job in this website/app. I wonder, though – Is there a way to have these dialogues repeat play automatically? I would like to listen over and over while washing dishes, working out, etc. It would be awesome if you could add that feature! (Or am I just missing how to turn that on?) Thanks!
Thank you for the nice words! 🙂
Unfortunately, we (still) don’t have that feature, but I’ve passed along your feedback to the tech team!
Here’s another Shorty that features informal and formal forms of “you” in European Portuguese: À Conversa No Supermercado
I get bom and boa, but in what context would I use bem
Olá. This same dialogue already shows multiple contextual uses of the word ‘bem’ (which means ‘well’), which you can contrast with the use of ‘bom’ (meaning ‘good’) right at the end 🙂 More on that on this Learning Note: Good/Bad vs. Well/Badly | Practice Portuguese
Thank you Joseph, now clear as to the use of “bem” 👍
It’s great to listen, and slowly (very slowly!) you start to pick out patterns and sounds. In this exercise the most difficult for me was “mas o meu pai” because my brain was automatically going to “mais o menos”. It’s coming -slowly!