Dialogue

Vocabulary (Review)

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Lesson Transcript

INTRODUCTION
Paloma: Olá! Bem-vindos ao PortuguesePod101.com! I’m Paloma!
Gina: Gina here! This is Upper Beginner Season 2 Lesson 24 - Getting Away For The Weekend in Brazil. In this lesson you’ll learn about discussing future plans.
Palom: This conversation is between two friends, and it takes place in the afternoon.
Gina: The speakers are friends, so they’ll be using informal Portuguese.
POST CONVERSATION BANTER
Paloma: What are you going to do this weekend?
Gina: I'm going to stay at home and do homework.
Paloma: You’re not going to a party?
Gina: Nope. Are you?
Paloma: Nope. (laughs) Okay so we wanted to say this because Brazilians often have a reputation for being big party-ers, as if every single weekend all Brazilians all over the world have parties. Or every day of the week they have parties, if we were to believe all of the rumors.
Gina: That’s right. Brazilians, just like everybody else all across the planet, have to go to work, have to clean the house, have to go to school, and have to do many other things besides parties.
Paloma: And not all parties that Brazilians throw have fifty or more people at them. In the dialogue, these two friends have planned a very simple weekend at a nearby area called "Diamantina." Now, what is this "Diamantina" place? There are so many places in Brazil called "Diamantina".
Gina: It could be another city, some kind of resort, or even some kind of national park. We just wanted to point out that when a Brazilian asks "what are we doing this weekend?" you don’t necessarily need to start organizing some kind of huge party.
Paloma: Okay, I think the listeners get it!
KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES
Gina: Let’s take a closer look at some of the words and phrases from this lesson.
Paloma: The first phrase were going to look at is de desconto
Gina: This translates to "of discount" but most of the time it means just "off", as in 20% off.
Paloma: In the dialogue we heard the phrase um cupom de quinze por cento de desconto.
Gina: Word for word, this is translated as "a coupon of 15% off discount" but it means "a coupon for 15% off".
Paloma: This also works when you’re talking about money directly. For example, trinta reais de desconto.
Gina: “30 reals off." Ok, what’s next?
Paloma: The next phase is tô dentro. This phrase is slang and not something you should use in a job interview.
Gina: The idea behind this phrase is "I can do that", "I agree with that", or "I understand." In fact, this phrase is very similar in feeling and use to the English slang term "I’m down with that."
Paloma: There are two things to pay attention to with this phrase. First, the pronunciation of the first word tô might sound a lot like the letter "O" in English but in fact it’s called a closed ô in Portuguese.
Gina: In other words, it is not a diphthong. There is only one sound, and only one vowel. Could you say this for us really slowly please?
Paloma: tô. Okay and the second thing is also the pronunciation of the word dentro.
Gina: Could you repeat it one more time?
Paloma: den-tro. dentro. Can you hear how the "E" sounds really tight, as if the throat is being constricted?
Gina: That’s because this "E" is also what’s called a closed "E". Just to give you a comparison, could you say this word with an open "E?"
Paloma: déntro. Wow that’s hard!
Gina: Sounds like it! Now let’s hear it correctly again please.
Paloma: dentro
Gina: Excellent! Okay, now onto the grammar.
:
GRAMMAR POINT
Paloma: In this lesson, you’ll learn how to suggest and discuss future plans.
Gina: Giving suggestions is a very polite thing to do in Portuguese and is often much better received than simply telling somebody what to do or giving your opinion.
Paloma: So, the first phrase we wanted to look at is que tal. This phrase literally translates as "that such." But it means "what do you think?" or "what about?"
Gina: This is a fixed phrase in Portuguese. In other words, you will only rarely see this phrase changed in some way. Also, this phrase can be used either at the beginning of your suggestion or at the end.
Paloma: For example, our dialogue sentence could also have been Vamos para a cachoeira esse final de semana, que tal?
Gina: This would translate as "Let’s go to the waterfall this weekend, what do you think?"
Paloma: The second phrase we’ll look at is seria bom
Gina: Literally, this is "would be good", but it means "wouldn’t it be good".
Paloma: A good example of this phrase would be Seria bom ir para o restaurante hoje à noite, which literally translates as "It would be good to go to a restaurant tonight."
Gina: But it’s much closer to the phrase "Wouldn’t it be nice to go to a restaurant tonight?" Could you give us another example using this phrase?
Paloma: Sure! You could say Um sorvete seria bom, which translates to "some ice cream would be good".
Gina: The last phrase we wanted to look at isn’t the same kind of phrase as the other two. The verb poder, in fact, can be used in a couple of different ways. What was the example from the dialogue?
Palom: Podemos ir para Diamantina. Here, the verb poder is used to offer a suggestion.
Gina: This phrase means "We can go to Diamantina."
Paloma: This phrase could also have used the verb poder in the form of podíamos, in which case the sentence would’ve been Podíamos ir para Diamantina.
Gina: "We could go to Diamantina."

Outro

Gina: Well, that’s all for this lesson. Make sure to check the lesson notes, and we’ll see you next time.
Paloma: Thanks for listening, Até mais!

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