Voted Best Answer
Feb 11, 2015 - 10:48 AM
Hi Jeff
I see what the confusion is.. The given answer (die, instead of Sie) is indeed correct. In the first sentence you are substituting "die" for "Sie", which makes sense because they both can mean "they." However "Sie" is used when speaking about people. I would imagine if you said "Sind Sie teuer", it would be confusing because it would be as if you were asking "if the people were expensive." You would use "die" because you are speaking of the tickets.
So looking at the sentence:
Are they expensive?" This sentence is a shortened way of asking: "Are the tickets expensive"
Sind die teuer?" This is another shortened way (auf Deutsch) of asking "Sind die Karten teuer?" But in German as in English, we can shorten the thought and take out the noun as it is implied. You wouldn't say "Sind Sie Karten teuer" because that would be incorrect. We would use "die" as the correct article because the noun is plural. I hope this helps! I can see how it is confusing
-Mike
I see what the confusion is.. The given answer (die, instead of Sie) is indeed correct. In the first sentence you are substituting "die" for "Sie", which makes sense because they both can mean "they." However "Sie" is used when speaking about people. I would imagine if you said "Sind Sie teuer", it would be confusing because it would be as if you were asking "if the people were expensive." You would use "die" because you are speaking of the tickets.
So looking at the sentence:
Are they expensive?" This sentence is a shortened way of asking: "Are the tickets expensive"
Sind die teuer?" This is another shortened way (auf Deutsch) of asking "Sind die Karten teuer?" But in German as in English, we can shorten the thought and take out the noun as it is implied. You wouldn't say "Sind Sie Karten teuer" because that would be incorrect. We would use "die" as the correct article because the noun is plural. I hope this helps! I can see how it is confusing
-Mike