Learn Spanish (Latin America): Voluntarios, limpien el parque a las nueve.

Voluntarios, limpien el parque a las nueve.

Volunteers, clean the park at nine.

Breakdown of Voluntarios, limpien el parque a las nueve.

Questions & Answers about Voluntarios, limpien el parque a las nueve.

Why does the verb end in -en (limpien) instead of -an (limpian)?

Because this is a command. When you tell a group of people to do something (the ustedes command), regular -ar verbs like limpiar (to clean) change their ending to -en. If you said limpian, it would just be a statement meaning 'they clean' or 'you all clean'.

Why is it las nueve and not los nueve?

In Spanish, hours are always feminine because they refer to the hidden word horas (hours). Whenever you talk about time on the clock, you use la for one o'clock and las for all other hours.

Could I include the word ustedes in this sentence?

Yes, you could say limpien ustedes el parque. Adding ustedes after the command is optional, but it can make the instruction sound a bit more polite or add emphasis. Here, since we already addressed the voluntarios, the verb limpien is clear enough on its own.

I noticed there are no exclamation marks. Are they optional for commands?