el passavolants
“el passavolants” — passer-by in Catalan. Noun, level A1, topic — the city and its places. Masculine, literally 'one who flies past': someone who was walking and walked on. It does not change by gender. In a live sentence: “Un passavolants em pregunta l'hora” — A passer-by asks me what time it is. One of 157 words in the set “the city and its places” in the Catalan course.
In short
| Written in Catalan | el passavolants |
| Translation | passer-by |
| Part of speech | noun |
| Level | A1 |
Why it looks that way
Masculine, literally 'one who flies past': someone who was walking and walked on. It does not change by gender
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- Un passavolants em pregunta l'horaA passer-by asks me what time it is
Nearby words: the city and its places
Street, square, pharmacy, bank. An address is built out of these, and an address is something you have to both say and understand.
- el restaurantrestaurantMasculine. As in Spain, people more often go to el bar: morning coffee, lunch and an evening beer all happen there
- la ciutatcityFeminine, like everything in -tat. Stress at the end: seeyoo-TAT. The mid-dot in tranquil·la nearby is that same dot
- el carrerstreetWith two r's: the first is short, between vowels it trills. Addresses abbreviate it: c/ Major, 12
- la botigashopCatalonia's own word: the Spanish tienda is not used here. Botiga de tot — a shop of a little bit of everything
- el mercatmarketThe covered city market is el mercat; the street market on certain days is el mercadillo — a word that arrived from Spanish
- la farmàciapharmacyLook for the green cross on the sign. The night duty one is farmàcia de guàrdia — the list hangs on every door
- el bancbankThe same word means 'bench', as in Spanish. Both come from the Germanic bench: money changers worked behind one
- l'estacióstationBoth the subway station and the train station: l'estació de metro, l'estació de tren. Before a vowel la shrinks to l'
- el semàfortraffic lightThe same Greek root as semaphore: "carrying a sign". Green is verd, red is vermell: the colors of unit two
- la bicicletabicycleIn speech pressed to la bici. Pista de bicicletes — a bike lane: in Valencia there are more of them than car lanes
Test yourself
Five questions from the same set — “the city and its places”. Recalling a spelling from meaning is harder than knowing a familiar word on sight, and therefore more useful.
- How do you say “passer-by” in Catalan?
Masculine, literally 'one who flies past': someone who was walking and walked on. It does not change by gender
- How do you say “bank” in Catalan?
The same word means 'bench', as in Spanish. Both come from the Germanic bench: money changers worked behind one
- How do you say “street” in Catalan?
With two r's: the first is short, between vowels it trills. Addresses abbreviate it: c/ Major, 12
- How do you say “bicycle” in Catalan?
In speech pressed to la bici. Pista de bicicletes — a bike lane: in Valencia there are more of them than car lanes
- How do you say “pharmacy” in Catalan?
Look for the green cross on the sign. The night duty one is farmàcia de guàrdia — the list hangs on every door
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “passer-by” in Catalan?
«el passavolants». In a live sentence: “Un passavolants em pregunta l'hora” — A passer-by asks me what time it is. Noun, level A1, from the set “the city and its places”.
Why does this word look the way it does?
Masculine, literally 'one who flies past': someone who was walking and walked on. It does not change by gender. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.