Tidak Harus?
There is no *tidak harus” in Indonesian (or rather, *tidak harus occurs rarely and only in special contexts). So how do you negate harus? A quick glance at English will help here. In English we have…
English is Changing The Grammar Of Indonesian
If words are flesh and grammar is bones, then the flesh of Indonesian has an unmistakable English flavour by now. What you might not know is that English is shaping the bones of…
Indonesian has no verb “to be”
The basic sentence in Indonesian is often said to consist of a “topic” (the thing or person that is the beginning point for what you want to say) and the “comment” (the information…
How Many Times and Ordinal Numbers
To talk about the number of times an event is repeated you use kali (times). You refer to one-off events, i.e. single occurrences of an event, with sekali or satu kali (once). Sri…
The Many Uses of ‘Sakit’
The word for ‘illness’ and ‘disease’ is penyakit derived from the root word sakit. Penyakit seperti malaria, dan demam berdarah sangat umum di daerah tropis. Diseases such as malaria and dengue fever are…
Supaya, Giving Advice and Making Suggestions
Supaya is used to offer advice or make suggestions. Supaya appears after certain verbs that ask (e.g. minta), recommend (e.g. menyarankan), suggest (e.g. mengusulkan), advise (e.g. menasihatkan) or express a wish (e.g. ingin)….
Kena and Gejala
Kena Another important word when it comes to diseases is kena which means ‘to be adversely affected by something’ or ‘to be struck by something’. Dia kena AIDS. He’s got AIDS. Dia kena…
Making Comparisons and Judgements
1. Lebih (more, -er) Saya kira Pak Wayan lebih ahli. I think Mr. Wayan is more expert. Ibu Maria lebih tua daripada Saudara Nur. Mrs. Maria is older than Miss Nur. Ada lebih…
‘Bapak’ with Capital Letter?
You should note that when the kinship terms bapak (a father) and ibu (a mother) are used as second person pronouns (i.e. meaning “you”) they are written with an initial capital letter, but when they are…
‘Tidak’ and ‘Bukan’ part 2
Tidak is used to negate verbs, adjectives and prepositions and a noun is negated with bukan. Both tidak and bukan can appear in one sentence. Dia bukan seniman. Dia sama sekali tidak pandai…
