groei ("to grow") and val ("to fall") look, to anyone who knows Dutch or German, like textbook cases for the auxiliary "be": a plant becomes taller, a glass moves downward, and these are exactly the change-of-state and motion verbs that take zijn / sein in those languages. Afrikaans does not care. Its perfect tense is built with het for virtually every verb, and groei and val are no exception: het gegroei, het geval. They are on this page precisely because they are the hardest cases — if you can resist the pull of is here, you have internalised the rule everywhere. (For the system as a whole, see het vs is in the perfect; this page is about these two verbs specifically.)
Core forms
Both verbs are short and take the ordinary ge- participle. One present form serves every person.
| Form | groei (grow) | val (fall) |
|---|---|---|
| Infinitive | (om te) groei | (om te) val |
| Present (all persons) | ek / jy / hy groei | ek / jy / hy val |
| Perfect (past) | het gegroei | het geval |
| Future | sal groei | sal val |
| Imperative (sg.) | Groei! | Val! |
Die plant het in een seisoen amper 'n meter gegroei.
The plant grew almost a metre in a single season.
Hy het van die fiets af geval, maar gelukkig niks gebreek nie.
He fell off the bike, but luckily didn't break anything.
groei: growing in size, number and abstraction
groei covers physical growth (a child, a plant, hair) and figurative growth (a town, a business, a problem, a friendship). It is intransitive — the thing grows by itself — and its perfect is het gegroei.
My seun het die afgelope jaar so vinnig gegroei dat niks meer pas nie.
My son has grown so fast this past year that nothing fits anymore.
Die maatskappy het van vyf werkers tot vyftig gegroei.
The company has grown from five workers to fifty.
Hulle vriendskap het oor die jare net sterker gegroei.
Their friendship has only grown stronger over the years.
A close everyday cousin is groot word ("to get big / grow up"), used especially of children growing up: Die kinders het gou groot geword. It is worth knowing alongside groei, though it describes the reaching of size rather than the process.
Die kinders het so gou groot geword — gister was hulle nog babas.
The children have grown up so fast — yesterday they were still babies.
val: falling, literally and figuratively
val is the prototypical motion-downward verb, and that is exactly why the het feels wrong to Dutch ears. Resist it. The perfect is het geval, whether someone trips, an object drops, prices drop, or night falls.
Sy het in die water geval toe die bootjie skommel.
She fell into the water when the little boat rocked.
Die glas het van die tafel af geval en gebreek.
The glass fell off the table and broke.
Pas op — moenie op die nat vloer val nie.
Be careful — don't fall on the wet floor.
val also reaches into the figurative: prices, temperatures and standards can val (drop). Note that "rise," the opposite of this figurative val, is styg — also perfectly regular with het: het gestyg.
Die temperatuur het oornag skerp geval.
The temperature dropped sharply overnight.
Pryse het die laaste maande gestyg, nie geval nie.
Prices have risen in recent months, not fallen.
Why this is the hard case for Dutch speakers
In Dutch, the choice between hebben and zijn is grammatically alive, and the two clearest triggers for zijn are (1) a change of state — de plant is gegroeid — and (2) a change of location — hij is gevallen. groei and val hit both triggers squarely, so a Dutch speaker's instinct screams is. Afrikaans simply abolished the distinction: over its history the het-perfect generalised to nearly every verb, and these high-frequency motion and change verbs went with it. The result is that the verbs where Dutch is most confident about zijn are the verbs where Afrikaans is most reliably het. That inversion is what makes groei and val the perfect stress test — see Dutch-transfer perfect errors for the wider pattern, and change-of-state verbs for more of the family.
The handful of genuine Afrikaans is-perfects (mostly is gebore, "was born") are a tiny closed set and do not include any of the verbs on this page.
Common mistakes
❌ Die plant is vinnig gegroei.
Dutch-transfer error — groei takes het, not is, despite being a change-of-state verb.
✅ Die plant het vinnig gegroei.
The plant grew quickly.
❌ Hy is van die trap af geval.
Dutch-transfer error — val takes het, not is, even though it is a motion verb.
✅ Hy het van die trap af geval.
He fell down the stairs.
These two are the single most common Dutch-transfer mistakes in the whole perfect system, precisely because Dutch insists on zijn here. The cure is the flat rule: het for both.
❌ Pryse is die afgelope jaar gestyg.
Same error with the opposite verb — styg (rise) also takes het: het gestyg.
✅ Pryse het die afgelope jaar gestyg.
Prices have risen over the past year.
❌ Die kinders is groot gegroei.
Two errors — wrong auxiliary (use het), and 'grow up' of children is groot word: groot geword.
✅ Die kinders het groot geword.
The children have grown up.
Key takeaways
- groei ("grow") and val ("fall") both take het in the perfect: het gegroei, het geval — never is.
- They are the hardest cases for Dutch and German speakers, because those languages take "be" for exactly these change-and-motion verbs.
- The figurative opposites behave the same: styg ("rise") → het gestyg; val ("drop") → het geval.
- For children growing up, the everyday phrase is groot word → het groot geword, alongside groei for the process.
- The only common true is-perfect, is gebore ("was born"), is a closed exception and includes none of these verbs — see het vs is in the perfect.
Now practice Afrikaans
Reading grammar gets you part of the way. The exercises are where it sticks — free, no signup needed.
Start learning Afrikaans→Related Topics
- Change-of-State Verbs: word, raak, verander, groeiB2 — A lookup table of Afrikaans inchoative verbs — word, raak, verander, groei, verbeter, versleg — that all mean 'become X' and all, despite expressing change and movement, build the perfect with het rather than is.
- Choosing the Perfect Auxiliary: hetB1 — Afrikaans uses het as the perfect auxiliary for every active verb — there is no hebben/zijn or haben/sein split — and the only is + participle you ever meet is the passive, not an active perfect.
- Dutch Transfer: is vs het in the PerfectB1 — Dutch speakers reflexively use is (zijn) for motion verbs in the perfect — Afrikaans uses het for every active perfect and keeps is only for the passive.