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Questions & Answers about Često čitam pismo.
How does the word čitam give us "I read" without using the word for "I"?
In Croatian, the subject is usually built right into the verb ending, so you don't need to use the pronoun ja (I). Čitam comes from the regular -ati verb čitati (to read). To make the "I" form, you drop the -ti from the dictionary form and add -m, giving you čitam.
The dictionary form of "letter" is pismo. Did it change its ending here since it's the object of the sentence?
The ending didn't change, but its grammatical role did! When a noun is the direct object (the thing being read), it takes the accusative case. However, pismo is a neuter noun because it ends in -o. For neuter nouns, the object (accusative) form looks exactly the same as the dictionary (nominative) form.
Why does često (often) come before the verb?
In Croatian, adverbs of frequency like često usually sit right before the verb they describe. This is very similar to English word order, where we say "I often read" rather than "I read often".
Where is the word for "a" in this sentence?
Croatian doesn't have articles like "a", "an", or "the". A single word like pismo simply translates to "a letter" or "the letter" depending entirely on what makes the most sense in the context of the conversation.