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| cezah Newbie Belgium Joined 5895 days ago 19 posts - 21 votes Studies: French, Italian | Message 1 of 6 31 December 2008 at 7:23am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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Hello,
I have a couple of French questions which I cant find in the books 1) Is there a difference between il y a and il existe for example il y a un singe sur la table and il existe un singe sur le table and if I can use il existe do I pluralise it eg ils existent beaucoup de singes sur la table 2) What is the difference between 'aussi' and egalement', are they interchangeable; is it just where they are put in the sentence Ta 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| cezah Newbie Belgium Joined 5895 days ago 19 posts - 21 votes Studies: French, Italian | Message 2 of 6 31 December 2008 at 9:48am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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oh and also when I say 'then' I use puis for
je suis allé au magasine et puis je suis allé etc etc, But can I use puis for Si je n'ai pas une voiture puis je dois aller a pied In other words one is a list the other is a 'therefore', can puis be used for both types of 'then' Ta 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Spiderkat Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5818 days ago 175 posts - 248 votes  Speaks: French*, English Studies: Russian | Message 3 of 6 31 December 2008 at 10:30am | IP Logged | ||||||||
"Il existe..." is an impersonal verb so it has to be in singular. I would say that we don't make use of "il existe..." in this kind of sentence. It just sounds too weird. But you can say for instance "il existe différentes races de singes...." 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Neutrin0 Tetraglot Newbie France Joined 5836 days ago 7 posts - 7 votes Speaks: Kabyle, French*, English, Spanish Studies: Japanese, German, Italian | Message 4 of 6 31 December 2008 at 10:34am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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Hi Cezah,
For your questions:
In fact, there's no difference (both are correct on a grammatical point of view) but it's exactly the same thing as "there is" and "there exists". I mean: you can use both to express the fact that that *%!?@ monkey is on the table but it's more usual to say "there's a monkey on the table". In fact, if you say something like "il existe un singe sur la table", ce sentence is quite weird and it's looks more like you're in some math exercise ;-) In brief: "il y a..." is a better (because more usual) way to traduce "there's...". Il existe works better for things more general, "il existe beaucoup de gens qui s'intéressent aux langues" for example.
Even there's a lot of monkeys on this (big) table, the good way to express this is: Il existe beaucoup de singes etc...
Again, it's about words more or less usually used. When you talk, you would usually use "aussi" but "également" could be used as well, except that the first is a little more common. Hope that I expressed it in a clear way... 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Neutrin0 Tetraglot Newbie France Joined 5836 days ago 7 posts - 7 votes Speaks: Kabyle, French*, English, Spanish Studies: Japanese, German, Italian | Message 5 of 6 31 December 2008 at 10:43am | IP Logged | ||||||||
Right.
No: "puis" can be used where you should have to say "et" without wanting to repeat it, for the last sentence, the word you'd better use because the first part of the sentence is the reason of the second part is "alors". The words "Si" and "alors" walk togheter if you want to express a condition. Si je n'ai pas de voiture alors je dois aller à pied. Last 2 possible sentences meaning the same thing: Puisque je n'ai pas de voiture, je dois aller à pied à (place). Puisque je n'ai pas de voiture, alors je dois aller à pied à (place). PS: When you use the expression "aller à pied", don't forget to use the word "à" meaning "to" in the sense of the place where you go TO. Except if you meant by your sentence that you have to walk, then, the correct sentence is: Si je n'ai pas de voiture, alors je dois MARCHER. Hope this helps. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Spiderkat Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5818 days ago 175 posts - 248 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Russian | Message 6 of 6 31 December 2008 at 10:47am | IP Logged | ||||||||
Therefore means "donc, par conséquent" which would fit in the second sentence as "Comme je n'ai pas de voiture je dois donc/par conséquent aller à pied". Next and then mean "puis" and will be used in the first sentence "Je suis allé au magasin puis (je suis allé) à/au..." 1 person has voted this message useful |
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