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'I care about the environment. ' This is for the intermediate and advanced Spanish learners. How do you translate this from the top of your head without looking at anything like a dictionary or asking somebody else? Robert, Steven, Dan, Christian, Ricardo and others. I just wonder. Even if you are a beginner, you can give it a try.

How about this question? What are you doing this weekend? Someone asked me that yesterday at the Beginning Spanish class and I said " Voy a ir a Los Angeles para shopping. The instructor corrected me with compras for shopping. I am getting impatient. This sounds very simple yet when push comes to shove, I still can't speak very simple sentences. I can read and understand more. I can take tests and score very well. Hopefully all this activity with Rocket Spanish, beginning Spanish classes and a tutor once a week will pay dividends in the near future. I really still enjoy the RS, the classes and the tutor.

Regarding the first sentence "I care about the environment", I don't off the top of my head know how to say "to care" so I will rephrase the sentence to something I can say in Spanish, e.g. "the environment is very important to me". My off the top of my head translation is "el environmento is muy importante por mi". As for your second sentence, I would say "voy a ir a Los Angeles para comprar". I still have a lot to learn (my vocabulary needs a lot of work). At least Spanish grammar is similar to English grammar. Chinese is a whole different story.

Like Robert, I do not know the verb meaning to care. So I worked on the sentence backward and then cheated a bit on the I care part (looked for appropriate words in the dictionary.) The best I can do is... Me preocupo del medioambiente, from the verb "preocupar," meaning to worry about. For me, anyway, when I think about the environment I am often worrying about its health or our effect on it. Aurora, I feel the same way as you. My vocab is pretty good and getting better by the day. My grammar ain't bad for a gringo. I can work out how to say things in my head when I am alone and just talking to myself. But when I am with a Spanish speaker my knowledge just gets stuck in my mind and refuses to come out properly. ¡Me siento como un ciervo en las linternas!

Hola a todos, I just keep trying to absorb as much as possible. Listening, talking aloud to myself, to the dog and speaking with native speakers, which is usually only in a restaurant or store. When I first started I was somewhat nervous and very unsure of myself. It gets better with time, but I still have a long way to go. Dan, your choice of preocuparse is perfect, as is the sentence. ¡Bien hecho! Saludos, Ricardo

lets give it a try xD me gustaría ayudar el environmento i don't know what : i care - replaces by like to help the word -environmento - cheated from Robert C7 im not good in spanish yet but was good to try

Aurora - Getting the verb tenses / grammar straight is the hardest part and in that sense your phrase is absolutely correct: "Voy a ir a Los Angeles para... ". Learning vocabulary takes time and responding in real-time takes practice. I liken it to reaching into a bag and whatever comes out, comes out: sometimes it's the right word, sometimes it's the wrong word but a similar sound, sometimes it's the right word in the wrong language... It's also an acquired skill to be able to express a thought but in a different way (i.e., than you might in American English) as in the examples cited above by others. - Me importa el medioambiente. - El medioambiente es muy importante para mí. - Me preocupo del medioambiente. - Necesitamos cuidar el medioambiente. The last phrase is the most literal. I think all of these phrases are in the Platinum course. I can take all of these phrases "off the top of my head" now but I certainly could not have 6 months or a year ago.

Hola a todos, I think Steven's reply, and his examples of different ways of expressing the same thought, is well said! Saludos, Ricardo

Hola amigos!. Me interesa el medio ambiente. Me preocupo por el medio ambiente. Me importa el medio ambiente. Me preocupa el medio ambiente. Tengo interés por el medio ambiente. Tengo preocupación por el medio ambiente. P.S You could say only "ambiente"without the 'medio' and it will still make sense. Saludos

Gracias Christian. Entonces, ¿medio ambiente es dos palabras, no uno como medioambiente?

Hi Dan, Both words are correct. You will find texts using both versions. I was reading that, the medioambiente (all together) is preffered. Saludos desde Tijuana!

Hola Cristian - I believe it would make sense, but if you said, "¡Me gusta el ambiente aquí!", people would think you were talking about the restaurant you were currently sitting in, n'est-ce pas?

Is ambiente the same as ambience? Thank you for everyone's input. A mí me importa mucho el medioambiente. From Rocket Spanish on "I care about the environment". I would translate this as "For me, the environment is very important". But then my Spanish would be "Para mi, el medioambiente es muy importante". These interactions are so invaluable. Muchas gracias todos.

Aurora: according to my dictionary, ambiente means air or surroundings, dar ambiente means to create a favorable environment, so I think it is close. Ambient doesn't seem to want to translate into anything in Spanish.

Ambient temperature. The temperature of the environment. Ambience is the environment that we try to create to give us a feeling of solace, peace, joy or anything that is uplifting.

Ambient temperature = La temperatura ambiente.