We are going to start off with something fairly simple and useful. Greetings, days of the week, numbers, key nouns and a few phrases!
Listen to the audio clips and repeat what you hear.
Each section has a short audio clip – Read first and then listen to the audio.
Let’s go through some phrases!
Bom dia! – Good morning!
Bom dia. Como está? – Good morning. How are you?
Estou bem, obrigada. E a senhora? – I am well, thank you. And you madam?
Estou muito bem, obrigada – I am very well, thank you.
We know that the people in that conversation are female because they are saying:
obrigada – thank you
a senhora – madam
A man would say:
obrigado
The word for sir is:
o senhor
Let’s change them around and make them masculine:
Bom dia. Como está?
Estou bem, obrigado. E o senhor?
Estou muito bem. Obrigado.
(End of audio) Practice saying them.
Take a look at this next phrase:
A senhora está aqui de férias? – are you on holiday madam?
we can change that to
O senhor está aqui de férias? – are you on holiday sir?
Eu sou a Maria – I am Maria (a + name – for a woman)
Eu sou o Mário – I am Mário (o + name- for a man)
Now you try it…
Eu sou a ………..– I am ……… (a + name – for a woman)
Eu sou o ……….. – I am …….. (o + name- for a man)
Eu gosto de cães – I like dogs
We could change noun and say that we like something else:
Eu gosto de Portugal – I like Portugal
Here are some other things you may like:
café – coffee
vinho – wine
filmes – films
so we could say:
Eu gosto de café
Eu gosto de vinho
Eu gosto de filmes
Practice saying those a little! You can even look up some nouns of your choice and substitute them for the nouns above.
Next we are going to learn the days of the week.
English | Portuguese | Alternate |
Monday
Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday |
(a) segunda-feira
(a) terça-feira (a) quarta-feira (a) quinta-feira (a) sexta-feira (o) sábado (o) domingo |
2ª. – feira
3ª. – feira 4ª. – feira 5ª. – feira 6ª. – feira sábado domingo |
In the column on the right you can see another way of writing the days of the week. This shows us that in Portuguese, days of the week are actually ordinals, or rather the numbers we use to denote place in competition; e.g. first, second, etc.
Speaking of numbers…
Audio
1 um/uma
2 dois/duas 3 três 4 quatro 5 cinco 6 seis 7 sete 8 oito 9 nove 10 dez |
Note: the numbers one and two can be masculine or feminine:
Note: um / uma can mean one or a/an.
Masculine:
Um carro – one car / a car
Dois carros – two cars
Feminine:
Uma casa – one house / a house
Duas casas – two houses
The –s at the end of a word sounds like the letter –s in the English word, pleasure
Nouns – or ‘the names of things’ are masculine or feminine in Portuguese. You have to always learn the noun with the definite article, or the word ‘the’.
Definite Article – the
In Portuguese there are two words for ‘the’. One is for the feminine nouns – ‘a’. And the other is for the masculine nouns, – ‘o’ . See table:
Definite Article | ||||
English (no gender) | feminine | feminine
plural |
masculine | masculine
plural |
the | a | as | o | os |
The above table may look a little complicated at this point, don’t worry if it doesn’t sink in right now, you always have this table to refer back to.
We use the definite article with names. It is just something you get used to.
a Dona Fátima – (the) Mrs. Fátima
o João – (the) John (yeah, not so great if your name is John…)
We use the definite article with nouns:
a casa – the house
o carro– the car (the double ‘r’ is rolled – can also sound like a heavy ‘h’.)
In the plural form, it all goes plural:
as casas – the houses
os carros – the cars
Here is a list of some of the nouns we are going to use in our next lesson and a few extra ones!
Audio for dialogue – read from left to right
Feminine | Masculine |
a filha – the daughter
a neta – the granddaughter a senhora – the lady a cadela – the female dog a gata – the female cat as férias – the holidays a Inglaterra – the England a sala (de estar) the living room a mala – the bag / suitcase a cozinha – the kitchen a casa de banho – the bathroom |
o cão – the dog
o filho – the son o neto – the grandson o marido – husband o gato – the tom cat o ano – the year o jardim – the garden o quarto – the bedroom o carro – the car o café – the coffee o vinho – the wine |
Some nouns will be obvious with regard to gender, like daughter, son, mother, father, etc. Most nouns ending in ‘a’ are feminine and most of those ending in ‘o’ are masculine. Of course, there are exceptions to this rule, like the word ‘dia‘ which is masculine and some nouns don’t end in ‘a’ or ‘o‘.
Feminine | Masculine |
a tarde – the afternoon
a noite – the night a idade – the age a mulher – the woman/ wife a mãe – the mother a filha – the daughter
|
o dia – the day
o homem – the man o senhor – the gentleman o calor – the heat o pai – the father o telemóvel – the mobile phone o filho – the son |
Adjectives are words we use to describe things. In Portuguese these can be feminine or masculine and plural.
bom – good (m) (like bong – but we don’t say the ‘g‘ – bon(g))
bons – good (m. pl.) (‘ns‘ sounds like the ‘ge‘ in sponge..)
O vinho é bom – the wine is good (nho – like the word new)
Os filmes são bons – the films are good
boa – good (f)
boas – good (f. pl.)
A mala é boa – the bag is good
As malas são boas – the bags are good
alto – tall (m)
alta – tall (f)
O pai é alto – the father is tall
A filha é alta – the daughter is tall
altos – tall (m. pl.)
altas – tall (f. pl.)
Os prédios são altos – the buildings are tall
As netas são altas – the grandchildren are tall (f. pl.)
eu digo – I say
tu dizes – you say
ele diz – he says
nós dizemos – we say
eles dizem – they say
Tip of the Day:
‘Dia’ is masculine even though it ends in an ‘a’. Many nouns ending in ‘e’ are feminine.
Até amanhã!! 🙂