Spanish word of the week: parar

This week’s Spanish word of the week is parar.

Parar is a verb that means to stop. You can listen to the pronunciation of parar in the audio clip below:

Parar is a very common way of saying to stop in different contexts:

A la subida tuvieron que parar varias veces. They had to stop several times on the way up.

El tren no para aquí. The train doesn’t stop here.

A medio camino paramos para comer. Halfway there, we stopped to eat.

El policía nos indicó que parásemos. The police officer gestured or indicated to us to stop.

Parar + de + infinitive means to stop doing something:

Por fin paró de llover. It finally stopped raining.

Cuando le gusta un tema se emociona y no para de hablar. When he’s interested in a subject he gets carried away and doesn’t stop talking.

Come back next week for another insight into Spanish vocabulary!

Other Articles

Spanish words of the week: tinta or tinto?

Another opportunity to look at the commonest senses of some similar-looking nouns with different endings and genders and ink in their differences. This week’s words are tinta (feminine) and tinto (masculine), and perhaps we should throw in tinte… Read More

Spanish words of the week: manto or manta?

Here we go: a chance to put to bed the differences between another pair of similar-looking but differently used Spanish nouns. This time it’s the turn of manto (masculine) and manta (feminine). Read More

Spanish words of the week: fosa or foso?

Today we’re digging into the commonest meanings of another pair of potentially confusable Spanish nouns. These are fosa (feminine) and foso (masculine). The two words have rather similar meanings in that they both refer to pit- or trench-like spaces. However, the feminine… Read More