Breakdown of Ten cuidado con la carga, el cristal está roto.
con
with / just by (+ -ing)
estar
to be (location/state)
tener
to have
romper
to break
el cristal
the glass (material)
el cuidado
the care
la carga
the load
Questions & Answers about Ten cuidado con la carga, el cristal está roto.
Why does the sentence start with Ten instead of Tienes?
Ten is the affirmative command (imperative) form of tener (to have) for tú (informal singular you). It is one of the irregular short commands you are learning in this lesson. You use it to tell someone directly to do something.
The English translation says "Be careful", but doesn't tener mean "to have"? Why not use sé (be)?
In Spanish, you "have care" rather than "be careful". The set phrase is tener cuidado (literally "to have care"). So, to tell someone to be careful, you use the command form of tener and say Ten cuidado.
Why do we use está instead of es for "the glass is broken"?
You use estar to talk about states and conditions that are the result of an action. The glass wasn't always broken; being broken is its current physical state, so we use está instead of es.
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