Spanish by Choice/SpanishPod newbie lesson A0002/Print version

A0002: Birthday Party

Introduction

How to ask someone to go together to a birthday party—in Spanish? With Liliana's and JP's guidance it's pretty easy. Of course, that doesn't mean that the answer is always “yes”! In any case, the keyword is la fiesta de cumpleaños – the birthday party.

• related SpanishPod lessons: A0010: I'm hungry, A0021: I'm sleepy, A0127: Flirting
• discussion: visit the readers' forum for this lesson to discuss it or to ask questions about it
• source: SpanishPod, the original MP3 lesson content of this lesson is licensed by PraxisLanguage Ltd. under a Creative Commons 3.0 Unported license.

Dialogue

hombre:	¡Hola! ¿Vas a la fiesta?
mujer:	¿Cuál fiesta?
hombre:	La fiesta de cumpleaños de Javier.
mujer:	Sí voy a ir. ¿Vamos juntos?

Dialogue with Translation

hombre:	¡Hola!	¿Vas	a	la	fiesta?
	hello	(you) go	to	the	party
man:	Hello! Are you going to the party?

mujer:	¿Cuál	fiesta?
	which	party
woman:	What party?

hombre:	La	fiesta	de	cumpleaños	de	Javier.
	the	party	of	birthday	of	Javier
man:	Javier's birthday party.

mujer:	Sí	voy	a	ir.	¿Vamos	juntos?
	yes	(I) go	to	go	(we) go	together
woman:	Sure I'm going to go. Shall we go together?

el cumpleaños – the birthday

juntos/juntas – together

Vocabulary for Dialogue

el hombre	noun (masculine)	the man
la mujer	noun (feminine)	the woman
¡hola!	interjection	hi!, hello!
ir	verb (infinitive)	to go
(tú) vas	verb (present tense)	you go (informal, singular)
a	preposition	to
la fiesta	noun (feminine)	the party
¿cuál?	interrogative pronoun	what?, which?
de	preposition	of
el cumpleaños	noun (masculine)	the birthday
la fiesta de cumpleaños	phrase	the birthday party
Javier	noun (masculine)	Javier
sí	adverb	yes, sure
(yo) voy	verb (present tense)	I go
(yo) voy a ir	phrase	I am going to go
(nosotros/-as) vamos	verb (present tense)	we go (m./f.)
junto/junta	adjective (m./f.)	together
juntos/juntas	adjective (plural, m./f.)	together

Vocabulary for Audio Lesson

la piñata	noun (feminine)	traditional Mexican game
el mariachi	noun (masculine)	traditional Mexican band or musician
el sombrero	noun (masculine)	the hat
los sombreros	noun (plural, masculine)	the hats
el trío	noun (masculine)	the trio
el bolero	noun (masculine)	the melancholic love song
los boleros	noun (plural, masculine)	the melancholic love songs
hasta	preposition	until
luego	adverb	then
hasta luego	phrase	see you later

 

More Vocabulary

This section includes grammatically related words. Some of them are required by the exercise Dialogue Recast.

ir	infinitive	to go
(yo) voy	present tense	I go
(tú) vas		you go (informal, singular)
(él/ella) va		he/she(/it) goes
(usted) va		you go (formal, singular)
(nosotros/-as) vamos		we go (m./f.)
(vosotros/-as) vais		you go (informal, plural, m./f.)
(ellos/ellas) van		they go (m./f.)
(ustedes) van		you go (formal, plural)

Exercises

Dialogue Translation

Cover the right column, translate from Spanish to English and uncover the right column line by line to check your answers. If possible, read the Spanish sentences aloud.

¡Hola! ¿Vas a la fiesta?	Hello! Are you going to the party?
¿Cuál fiesta?	What party?
La fiesta de cumpleaños de Javier.	Javier's birthday party/the birthday party of Javier.
Sí voy a ir. ¿Vamos juntos?	Sure/yes I'm going to go. Shall we go together?

Dialogue Recall

Now translate from English to Spanish. Remember to say the Spanish sentences aloud.

Hello! Do you go to the party?	¡Hola! ¿Vas a la fiesta?
Which party?	¿Cuál fiesta?
The birthday party of Javier.	La fiesta de cumpleaños de Javier.
Sure I'm going to go. Do we go together?	Sí voy a ir. ¿Vamos juntos?

Dialogue Remix

Translate this variant of the dialogue from English to Spanish.

Are you going to go to the party?	¿Vas a ir a la fiesta?
Yes, I'm going to go to the party of Javier.	Sí, voy a ir a la fiesta de Javier.
Are we going to go together to the party?	¿Vamos a ir juntos a la fiesta?
What party?	¿Cuál fiesta?
Hello? Javier's party.	¿Hola? La fiesta de Javier.
Yes, the birthday party of Javier.	Sí, la fiesta de cumpleaños de Javier.
Yes. Do we go together to the party?	Sí. ¿Vamos juntos a la fiesta?
Sure I am going to go to the party.	Sí voy a ir a la fiesta.

Dialogue Recast

This translation exercise requires some of the words from the More Vocabulary section.

Hello! Do you go to the party? (formal)	¡Hola! ¿(Usted) va a la fiesta?
Which party?	¿Cuál fiesta?
The birthday party of Javier.	La fiesta de cumpleaños de Javier.
Sure I'm going to go. Do you go together? (formal, plural)	Sí voy a ir. ¿(Ustedes) van juntos?

Image Credits

• “Image:Nuvola apps 3 cookie.png” by David Vignoni (GNU Lesser General Public License)
• “Image:Tango couple closeup.jpg” by Christian Aastrup (Public Domain)