Learn French: Un mec m'a demandé l'heure dans la rue. - A guy asked me the time in the street.

Un mec m'a demandé l'heure dans la rue.

A guy asked me the time in the street.

Breakdown of Un mec m'a demandé l'heure dans la rue.

the hour / o'clock (f)

demander

to ask (for) / to require / demand

Questions & Answers about Un mec m'a demandé l'heure dans la rue.

Is mec just regular vocabulary, or is it slang?

Mec is a very common informal word for a man, similar to "guy" or "dude" in English. You will hear it constantly in everyday spoken French, but you should avoid using it in formal writing or professional settings.

English says "asked me for the time". Why is there no French word for "for" here?

The verb demander follows the structure demander quelque chose à quelqu'un (to ask someone for something). The idea of asking "for" the thing is already built directly into the verb, so adding a word like pour before l'heure would be incorrect.

In m'a demandé, why does m' go before the auxiliary verb a instead of the main verb demandé?

In compound tenses like the passé composé, object pronouns (such as me, te, le, lui) must be placed immediately before the conjugated auxiliary verb, which in this case is a (from avoir). That's why it is m'a demandé and never a m'demandé.

Is the m' in this sentence a direct or an indirect object?