O veterinário chegou agora.

O is the masculine singular definite article, meaning the.

In Portuguese, it is very common to use the definite article before a specific person or profession when you mean a particular individual. So o veterinário means the veterinarian / the vet.

If the veterinarian were female, you would say a veterinária.

It is masculine because the sentence refers to a male veterinarian, or at least uses the masculine form.

• o veterinário = the male veterinarian / the vet
• a veterinária = the female veterinarian / the vet

The article and the noun have to match in gender:

• o
  • masculine noun
• a
  • feminine noun

Yes. In normal everyday English, veterinário is often translated simply as vet.

So depending on the context, o veterinário can be understood as:

• the veterinarian
• the vet

Both are natural translations.

Chegou is the preterite form of the verb chegar (to arrive).

Here it is:

• chegar = to arrive
• chegou = he arrived, she arrived, you arrived (formal você), or it arrived, depending on context

In this sentence, it matches o veterinário, so it means the veterinarian arrived.

The preterite is used for a completed action in the past.

Because agora can mean now, but with a past verb like chegou, it often has the sense of just now or a moment ago.

So chegou agora is often naturally understood as:

• arrived just now
• has just arrived (in natural English)
• arrived a moment ago

This is a very common use in Brazilian Portuguese.

Not always in exactly the same way English uses now.

Agora usually means now, but its exact sense depends on context:

• with a present-time idea: now
• with a past event: often just now
• in conversation: sometimes at the moment or right now

So in O veterinário chegou agora, agora does not usually mean the person is arriving at this exact second. It usually means the arrival happened very recently.

Yes. The given word order is completely natural:

• O veterinário = subject
• chegou = verb
• agora = time expression

But Portuguese allows some flexibility. You could also hear:

• O veterinário agora chegou
• Agora o veterinário chegou

These can sound more marked or depend on context and emphasis. The most neutral version is the original:

• O veterinário chegou agora

Yes, sometimes. Portuguese often allows the subject to be left out when it is understood from context.

So in conversation, someone might simply say:

• Chegou agora.

That could mean:

• He just arrived
• She just arrived
• The vet just arrived

The full sentence includes o veterinário because the speaker wants to make the subject explicit.

In Brazilian Portuguese, it is roughly pronounced like:

veh-teh-ree-NAH-ryoo

The stressed syllable is ná:

• ve-te-ri-NÁ-ri-o

A few helpful notes:

• the r in -rio is not pronounced like a strong English r
• the final o is usually pronounced like oo in Brazilian Portuguese
• the accent mark tells you where the stress goes

The accent mark in veterinário shows the stressed syllable: ná.

Without getting too technical, the accent helps indicate that the stress does not fall where you might otherwise expect it to. So the word is pronounced:

• ve-te-ri-NÁ-ri-o

Accent marks in Portuguese are very important because they can change pronunciation and sometimes meaning.

Yes. In chegou, the g is pronounced like the g in go, because it comes before o.

So chegou is roughly:

• sheh-GOH

A useful comparison:

• g before a, o, u = usually a hard g
• g before e, i = usually a softer sound, like in French j or the s in measure

Yes. That is another very common way to express the idea that someone has just arrived.

• O veterinário chegou agora = The vet arrived just now / has just arrived
• O veterinário acaba de chegar = The vet has just arrived

Both are natural, but acaba de chegar emphasizes the idea of having just done something a bit more explicitly.

Yes, very natural.

A Brazilian speaker would easily say:

• O veterinário chegou agora.

It sounds normal in everyday speech and would fit many situations, such as at a clinic, a farm, or when talking about a pet appointment.