Breakdown of عندما زرت مصر، كانت عندي سيارة أوتوماتيكية.
سيارةsayyâra
car
يi
my / me (after a preposition)
عند'inda
at / to have
مصرmisr
Egypt
زارzâra
to visit
كانkâna
to be
عندما'indamâ
when (not in questions)
أوتوماتيكيôtômâtîkî
automatic
Questions & Answers about عندما زرت مصر، كانت عندي سيارة أوتوماتيكية.
Why do we use كانت before عندي to say I had?
In Arabic, there is no direct verb for to have. In the present tense, you just say عندي (at me). To make this past tense, you add a form of the verb to be (كان). So, كانت عندي literally means there was at me.
Why is the feminine verb كانت used here instead of the masculine كان?
The thing you own is actually the grammatical subject of the sentence. Because سيارة (car) is a feminine noun, the verb to be must match it and take the feminine form كانت. If you owned a masculine object like a book (كتاب), you would use كان عندي.
Could I use the word متى instead of عندما to say When I visited?
No, because متى is only used as a question word (like When did you go?). When you are making a statement connecting two events in time, you must use a conjunction like عندما, which functions as the statement form of when.
The word أوتوماتيكية looks like a foreign word. How does Arabic handle adjectives borrowed from other languages?
Arabic often treats foreign concepts as root nouns and adds a nisba suffix (the ending ـيّ or ـيّة) to turn them into working Arabic adjectives. Here, the feminine ending ـيّة is added so it correctly matches the feminine noun سيارة.
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