Word
Nous regardons les touristes qui flânent devant le stand.
Meaning
We watch the tourists who are strolling in front of the stand.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Breakdown of Nous regardons les touristes qui flânent devant le stand.
nous
we / us (object pronoun)
qui
who
regarder
to watch
devant
in front of
Questions & Answers about Nous regardons les touristes qui flânent devant le stand.
English says "watch the tourists strolling." Why does French use qui flânent instead of the present participle flânant?
With perception verbs like regarder, voir, or entendre, French rarely uses the present participle to show an action in progress. Instead, it uses a relative clause starting with qui followed by a conjugated verb. So, les touristes qui flânent is the most natural way to translate "the tourists strolling" or "the tourists who are strolling."
Could we use the infinitive here and say Nous regardons les touristes flâner?
Yes, absolutely! After perception verbs, you can use either the infinitive or the qui construction. The infinitive (flâner) often presents the action as a complete event ("we watch them stroll"), whereas qui flânent highlights that they are right in the middle of the action ("we watch them as they are strolling").
Is flâner just a synonym for marcher or se promener?
A quick refresher: why do we use devant instead of avant for "in front of"?