Learn French: J'ai bavardé avec mon voisin hier. - I chatted with my neighbor yesterday.

J'ai bavardé avec mon voisin hier.

I chatted with my neighbor yesterday.

Breakdown of J'ai bavardé avec mon voisin hier.

Questions & Answers about J'ai bavardé avec mon voisin hier.

How do we form the past tense for bavarder here?

In French, the passé composé has two parts. First, we use the present tense of avoir (to have) — here, J'ai (I have). Second, we use the past participle of the main verb. For regular verbs ending in -er like bavarder (to chat), you drop the -er and add -é to get bavardé. Literally, it translates to 'I have chatted'.

Do bavarder and bavardé sound different when spoken?

No, they sound exactly the same! The -er ending on the dictionary form of the verb and the -é ending on the past participle are both pronounced like the English sound 'ay'. You rely on hearing the helper verb (ai) to know it is in the past tense.

What if my neighbor is a woman?

You would say ma voisine. The word voisin is masculine. To make it feminine, you add an 'e' to the end to get voisine, and you must also change the word for 'my' from the masculine mon to the feminine ma.

Where else can I put the word hier?

Time words like hier (yesterday) are flexible. You can put it at the very end of the sentence, like we did here, or at the very beginning: Hier, j'ai bavardé avec mon voisin.