Breakdown of Afinei o desviador com cuidado.
com cuidado
carefully
o
the
o desviador
a bicycle derailleur
afinar
to adjust a mechanism precisely
Questions & Answers about Afinei o desviador com cuidado.
What does afinei mean here, exactly?
Afinei is the 1st person singular form of the verb afinar in the pretérito perfeito simples (simple past).
So it means:
- I tuned
- I adjusted
- I fine-tuned
In this sentence, afinar does not mean to make thin. Here it means to adjust something so it works properly or precisely. With desviador, it usually means something like I adjusted the derailleur.
Why is there no eu in the sentence?
Portuguese often leaves out the subject pronoun when the verb already makes the subject clear.
- Afinei already tells you the subject is I
- So Eu afinei o desviador com cuidado is possible, but Eu is unnecessary unless you want emphasis or contrast
Examples:
- Afinei o desviador. = I adjusted the derailleur.
- Eu afinei o desviador, não ele. = I adjusted the derailleur, not him.
This is very common in Portuguese, including European Portuguese.
What tense is afinei, and why is it used here?