Diary Entry (Original, B1)

A diary is a near-perfect teaching text, because it does two grammatical things at once and keeps them visibly separate. To report what happened today, you reach for the perfect (het + participle); to reflect on how you feel about it, you switch to the present. On top of that, a diary is written to yourself in the most informal register — full of jy, dis, and short fronted time phrases that flip the word order. This page presents a short original diary entry (composed for this guide, not quoted from anywhere) and annotates exactly how the past-for-events / present-for-feelings split works, how time adverbs trigger inversion, and what makes the register so casual. Read the entry first.

The diary entry

Liewe dagboek,

Vandag was 'n lang dag. Vanoggend het ek laat opgestaan, want my wekker het nie afgegaan nie. Ek het my koffie gemors en amper my bus gemis. By die werk het my baas my gevra om die hele verslag oor te doen. Dis nie lekker om dit te hoor nie, maar ek dink hy is reg. Snaaks genoeg voel ek nie meer so kwaad nie. Vanmiddag het Sannie my gebel en ons het lank gesels. Sy is 'n goeie vriendin — dis altyd lekker om met haar te praat. Vanaand het ek pasta gemaak en 'n fliek gekyk. Nou is ek moeg, maar tevrede. Môre gaan ek vroeër opstaan en alles beter doen. Slaap lekker, dagboek.

Translation: Dear diary, Today was a long day. This morning I got up late, because my alarm didn't go off. I spilt my coffee and almost missed my bus. At work my boss asked me to redo the whole report. It's not nice to hear that, but I think he's right. Funnily enough, I don't feel so angry anymore. This afternoon Sannie phoned me and we chatted for a long time. She's a good friend — it's always nice to talk to her. This evening I made pasta and watched a film. Now I'm tired, but content. Tomorrow I'm going to get up earlier and do everything better. Sleep well, diary.

The perfect reports the day's events

Everything the writer did today is in the perfect — het plus a past participle — because Afrikaans has no separate simple past for ordinary verbs (the full picture is at the past tense overview). So the events line up as a chain of het + participle:

Look at the participles: opgestaan (separable opstaan, with ge- tucked inside, op-ge-staan), gemors, gemis, gemaak, gekyk. Each is paired with het, and each lands at the end of its clause, with the rest of the sentence bracketed in between. The one important exception is wees ("to be"), which keeps a real simple past: the entry opens with Vandag was 'n lang dag — was, not "het gewees" — because background states use was.

The present carries reflection and feeling

Now watch the tense switch to the present every time the writer stops reporting and starts reflecting. Feelings, opinions and timeless truths are in the present, not the past:

ek dink (I think), hy is reg (he's right), voel ek (I feel), is ek moeg (I'm tired) — all present, all reflection. The event (my baas het my gevra om die verslag oor te doen) is in the perfect; the reaction to it (Dis nie lekker nie... ek dink hy is reg) is in the present. That is the diary's natural rhythm: a past-tense report, then a present-tense feeling about it.

The plan for tomorrow uses yet another tense — gaan + infinitive for the near future:

Note the orthography: môre ("tomorrow") carries a circumflex on the ô, which distinguishes it from the unrelated word more. Getting that little hat right is part of writing the word correctly.

Time adverbs trigger inversion

A diary is organised by time, so it is full of fronted time adverbs: Vandag (today), Vanoggend (this morning), Vanmiddag (this afternoon), Vanaand (this evening), Nou (now), Môre (tomorrow). And every time one of these opens the sentence, the verb inverts to second position — verb before subject. This is the verb-second rule, and a diary drills it on almost every line:

In Vanmiddag *het Sannie..., the time word is first, so *het comes before its subject Sannie. In Nou *is ek moeg, *Nou is first, so is comes before ek. Compare the neutral order Ek is nou moeg (subject first, no inversion) with the fronted Nou is ek moeg (time first, inverted). A diary, organised around when, makes this inversion constant — which is exactly why it is such good practice.

Here the fronted Vanoggend inverts the main clause (het ek...), while the want-clause ("because") that follows keeps normal subject–verb order — want is a coordinating "because" and does not send its verb to the end (unlike omdat).

The informal register: jy, dis, and short sentences

A diary is the most private register there is — you are writing to yourself — so it is thoroughly informal. Three features mark that register (the full account is at formal vs informal register):

The contraction dis. Dis is the casual contraction of dit is ("it is"), and it is everywhere in relaxed speech and writing:

In a formal report you would write Dit is...; in a diary, Dis.... The contraction is one of the clearest informal-register signals in Afrikaans, on a par with English "it's" versus "it is."

The pronoun jy. Afrikaans distinguishes informal jy/jou ("you") from formal u ("you", polite). A diary, addressing an intimate "you" or quoting casual speech, uses jy, never the stiff u. (The entry addresses the diary itself, but the same informal world is signalled throughout by dis, by short sentences, and by the warm sign-off Slaap lekker — "sleep well.")

The everyday lexicon. Words like lekker ("nice, pleasant"), snaaks ("funny, odd"), fliek ("film, movie") and kwaad ("angry") are the warm, casual vocabulary of daily life. fliek in particular is pure spoken register — a formal text would write film. Choosing fliek over film, lekker over aangenaam, is itself a register decision.

Common mistakes

Key takeaways

• A diary splits cleanly by tense: the perfect (het
  • participle) reports the day's events, the present carries reflection and feeling — often switching within one sentence — see the past tense overview.
• wees keeps a real simple past (was) for background states; the near future uses gaan
  • infinitive (Môre gaan ek...).
• Fronted time adverbs (Vandag, Vanoggend, Vanmiddag, Nou, Môre) trigger V2 inversion — verb before subject — which a time-organised diary drills constantly.
• The register is informal: the contraction dis (= dit is), informal jy (not u), and an everyday lexicon (lekker, snaaks, fliek) — see formal vs informal register.
• Mind the orthography: môre takes a circumflex, and the contraction is dis (never "dit's").