Breakdown of Kom je zondag om kwart voor twaalf naar het feest?
naar
to
komen
to come
het feest
the party
twaalf
twelve
Questions & Answers about Kom je zondag om kwart voor twaalf naar het feest?
Why is naar het feest at the very end of the sentence?
This sentence follows the golden rule of Dutch word order: Time before Place! The entire time phrase (zondag om kwart voor twaalf) must come before the destination (naar het feest). In English, we usually do the exact opposite and put the place first.
Why does the sentence start with kom je instead of "je komt"?
Because this is a yes/no question! To turn a standard sentence into a question in Dutch, you swap the subject (je) and the verb (kom). So je komt (you are coming) becomes kom je? (are you coming?).
Why isn't there a word for "on" before zondag?
In Dutch, you can just state the day of the week by itself to mean "on" that day. Saying zondag alone perfectly translates to "on Sunday". You could also say op zondag, but dropping the preposition is very common and natural.
Why do we use om before the time?
When talking about a specific time on the clock, Dutch uses the preposition om. Here, om kwart voor twaalf translates to "at a quarter to twelve".
The English translation says "Are you coming" for a future plan, but isn't kom the simple present tense?