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Caminamos por el centro de la ciudad.

Caminamos por el centro de la ciudad.
We walk through the city center.
FromLesson 19inHardcore Spanish (Latin America)

Breakdown of Caminamos por el centro de la ciudad.

nosotros
we
caminar
to walk
de
of
la ciudad
the city
por
through
el centro
the center

Questions & Answers about Caminamos por el centro de la ciudad.

Why is caminamos ambiguous between present and past?
caminamos is the first-person plural form for both the present indicative (“we walk”) and the preterite (“we walked”). Without context or time markers, you can’t tell which tense it is.
How can I explicitly say “we are walking through the city center”?
Use the present progressive: estamos caminando por el centro de la ciudad. That makes it clear the action is happening right now.
How do I clarify that the action happened in the past?
Add a time expression, for example Ayer caminamos por el centro de la ciudad. Words like ayer, anoche, or el otro día signal the past.
Why use por instead of en?
por expresses movement through or along something (“through the city center”). en would simply mark location (“we walk in the city center”), without emphasizing going through it.
Can I drop de la ciudad and just say caminamos por el centro?
Yes—if it’s clear from context you mean the city center. Spanish speakers often say el centro alone to mean downtown.
Do I need the pronoun nosotros here?
No. Spanish normally omits subject pronouns because the verb ending (-amos) already shows “we.”
Could I use andar instead of caminar?
Yes. Andamos por el centro also means “we walk through the center.” Just be aware that andar can mean other things (like “to work/function”) depending on context.
How do you pronounce caminamos, and where is the stress?
It has four syllables—ca-mi-na-mos—and, because it ends in -s, the stress falls on the penultimate syllable: ca-mi-NA-mos.
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“How does verb conjugation work in Spanish?”
Spanish verbs change form based on the subject, tense, and mood. Regular verbs follow predictable patterns depending on whether they end in ‑ar, ‑er, or ‑ir. For example, "hablar" (to speak) becomes "hablo" (I speak), "hablas" (you speak), and "habla" (he/she speaks) in the present tense.

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