I’m struggling a bit with finding the right tenses for some of the sentence structures set out in the C1 course so decided to try and write a few for practice. Thanks to Dani Morgenstern for help with the corrections.
- Quando acabei de ler ele já tinha escrito a sequela (when I finished reading he had already written the sequel)
- Enquanto ele tocava bateria, eu preenchia os formulários de divórcio (while he was playing drums, I was filling in the divorce forms)
- Quando chegares a casa, descasca as batatas (when you get home, peel the potatoes)
- Ela disse-me que queria ser primeira ministra quando fosse grande (she told me she wanted to be prime minister when she was big)
- Quando o vírus tivesse passado, ela voltava a treinar (when the vírus had passed she went back to training – I think the sense here is of something that happened repeatedly: she’d get ill every so often and go back to training after each occurrence, hence the imperfect tense)
- Enquanto não leres o texto não estás capaz de responder às perguntas (since you won’t read the text you won’t be able to answer the questions)
- Enquanto os negócios tivessem apoio financeiro não iriam à falência durante a pandemia. (as long as the businesses had financial support, they wouldn’t fail during the pandemic)
- Enquanto o tio Rui não tivesse chegado a casa, a família não começava a jantar* (since Uncle Rui hadn’t arrived at the house the family weren’t starting their dinner)
*It’s probably worth pointing out here that this “a” is a preposition and “jantar” a verb. They hadn’t started to dine. But jantar can also be a noun so I could also have said “o jantar” instead of “a jantar” and the sentence would still work but it would mean “they hadn’t started the dinner”.
- Logo que o comboio parta, telefona-me (as soon as the train leaves, call me)
- Assim que receberes a carta do SNS, marca consulta. (as soon as you get a letter from the SNS, make an appointment)
- No momento em que as cortinas se abrissem, a banda comecaria a tocar (as soon as the curtains opened the band would start to play)
- Mal tivesse aberto a janela, o pisco entraria na sala (as soon as he had opened the window the robin would enter the room)
- Logo que eu acordava tomava um café (as soon as he woke up, he used to have a cup of coffee)
- Assim que enviou a carta, percebeu que se tinha esquecido do selo (Just as he posted the letter he realised he’d forgotten the stamp)
- No momento em que o professor abriu a boca a campainha tocou (at the instant the teacher opened his mouth the bell rang)
- Mal soube as noticias, começou a chorar (As soon as he heard the news he started to cry)
- Antes que te esqueças, faz notas sobre a reunião (before you forget make some notes about the meeting)
- Antes que ligasse ao meu pai, ele enviou-me uma mensagem (Before I called my dad, he sent me a message)
- Antes de abrir a boca vou pensar duas vezes (before I open my mouth I’m going to think twice)
- Depois de nos termos encontrado a minha vida era vazio e sem propósito (Before we met each other, my life was empty and without purpose)
Luso 