In this lesson of our English Spanish Parallel Texts course and we are going to practice physical descriptions with Ser and Tener in Spanish. Start by reading the text in Spanish below. The English translation is provided later but please try not to look at it until you have read the Spanish version various times and tried your best to understand it.

There may be some words and phrases in the text that you are unfamiliar with, but you should be aiming to capture the main essence of what is happening. There will always be words and phrases popping up in real-life situations that you have never heard before, so it is important never to get too distracted by details.

If you want to investigate some of the words you don’t know with a dictionary that would be great, please do, but do this after trying your best to understand with what you already have in your head.

Check out this video lesson with information relevant to this topic:

Physical descriptions with Ser and Tener

Image by birgl from Pixabay

Spanish Text

Daniel: Hola Carmen, ¿cómo estás?
Carmen: Muy bien, ¿y tú?
Daniel: Muy contento. Tengo una novia nueva.
Carmen: ¿Y Lucía?
Daniel: No es mi novia ahora. No quiero hablar mucho de Lucía. Tiene un novio nuevo.
Carmen: ¡Qué dices! ¿Quién?
Daniel: Roberto.
Carmen: ¿Yo conozco a Roberto?
Daniel: Si, Roberto García. Tiene el pelo muy largo y le gusta el heavy metal.
Carmen: ¿Es bastante alto? ¿Con ojos azules?
Daniel: Sí eso es. No habla mucho. Está gordo.
Carmen: Bueno. Y tu nueva novia, ¿quién es?
Daniel: Se llama Patricia López. Vive cerca de aquí. Trabaja como enfermera en el hospital del pueblo.
Carmen: No sé si conozco a Patricia.
Daniel: Es muy guapa. Tiene los ojos marrones. El pelo largo y castaño. No es alta pero tampoco es baja. Es delgada porque hace mucho deporte. Le gusta nadar y correr.
Carmen: Creo que no conozco a esa Patricia. Pero estás contento, ¿no?
Daniel: Sí, estoy muy contento.
Carmen: ¿Hablas con Lucía?
Daniel: No quiero hablar con ella y no me importa si está contenta con ese hippy raro.

English Text

Daniel: Hello Carmen, how are you?
Carmen: Very well, and you?
Daniel: Very happy. I have a new girlfriend.
Carmen: And Lucia?
Daniel: She’s not my girlfriend now. I don’t want to talk much about Lucia. She has a new boyfriend.
Carmen: No way! Who?
Daniel: Roberto.
Carmen: Do I know Roberto?
Daniel: Yes, Roberto García. He has very long hair and likes heavy metal.
Carmen: Is he quite tall? With blue eyes?
Daniel: Yes that’s right. He doesn’t talk much. Fat.
Carmen: Okay. And your new girlfriend, who is she?
Daniel: Her name is Patricia López. She lives near here. She works as a nurse in the town hospital.
Carmen: I don’t know if I know Patricia.
Daniel: She’s very pretty. She has brown eyes. Long brown hair. She is not tall but not short either. She is slim because she does a lot of sport. She likes to swim and run.
Carmen: I don’t think I know this Patricia. But you’re happy, aren’t you?
Daniel: Yes, I’m very happy.
Carmen: Do you talk to Lucia?
Daniel: I don’t want to talk to her and I am not interested if she’s happy with that weird hippy.

So, how did you get on? How much did you understand of the original text before checking the translation? Please let me know in the comments section below…

Don’t worry if you didn’t understand that much, practice makes perfect! Be patient and keep reading, hearing, writing, and speaking Spanish. See you next time!