Breakdown of El respirar en el sauna es muy relajante.
ser
to be
en
in / on / at
muy
very
respirar
to breathe
Questions & Answers about El respirar en el sauna es muy relajante.
Why do we use el before the verb respirar here?
In Spanish, an infinitive verb can act as a noun. While you can often just say respirar (breathing) at the start of a sentence, adding the masculine article el turns it into an articulated infinitive. This puts slightly more weight or emphasis on the action, treating it conceptually as "the act of breathing" as the subject of the sentence.
Is it grammatically incorrect to leave out el and just say Respirar en el sauna...?
Wait, isn't sauna a feminine noun? Why does it say el sauna?
This is a regional difference. Because sauna is a loanword from Finnish, its gender varies in the Spanish-speaking world. In most of Latin America, it is treated as masculine (el sauna). In Spain, it is feminine (la sauna). Both are correct, but since we focus on Latin American Spanish, we use the masculine form here.
Why use es instead of está for "is very relaxing"? Doesn't relaxing describe a state or feeling?