Breakdown of Otkud ti ovaj stari sat, jesi li ga kupio na buvljaku?
biti
to be (sam, si, je)
on
he
ovaj
this (m) / ova (f), ovo (n)
star
old
li
question particle
sat
watch / clock
na
on, at / to, onto (with motion) / about (thinking about)
kupiti
to buy (perfective)
ti
to you (sg.)
otkud
from where
buvljak
flea market
Questions & Answers about Otkud ti ovaj stari sat, jesi li ga kupio na buvljaku?
How does otkud ti translate to "where did you get"? There is no verb for "get" in the first half of this sentence.
Otkud means "where from." When you pair it with a dative pronoun like ti (to you), it creates a very common colloquial structure that implies acquisition. The verb je (is) is understood but left out. You are literally asking, "From where to you [is] this old clock?"
What case is ovaj stari sat here?
It is in the nominative case. Because the first clause is literally "From where to you [is] this old clock?", ovaj stari sat is the subject of that implied verb "is."
Why is the word ga placed between li and kupio?
Ga is the accusative short pronoun for "it" (referring to the clock). Because it is an enclitic (a short word that leans on others for pronunciation), it must follow strict placement rules. In a yes/no question formed with li, any short pronouns must come immediately after li.
The word for flea market is buvljak. Why doesn't the k change to a c in the locative case (na buvljaku)?
You might expect the rule of sibilarization to apply here, changing k to c. However, masculine nouns ending in -ak often skip this rule in the locative case, especially if changing the sound would make the root word hard to recognize. Therefore, buvljak simply takes the standard -u ending to become buvljaku.
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