Breakdown of Gaan we zwemmen, of blijven we binnen?
gaan
to go / to go off (of an alarm)
zwemmen
to swim
binnen
inside
blijven
to stay
of
or
we
we (unstressed form of wij)
Questions & Answers about Gaan we zwemmen, of blijven we binnen?
Does the word of change the word order in the second part of the sentence?
No. Words like en (and), maar (but), and of (or) are coordinating conjunctions. They just act like a bridge between two sentences without changing their rules. Here, they link two independent questions.
Why does the second part say blijven we instead of we blijven?
Because the second part is also a yes/no question! In Dutch questions, the verb comes first, followed by the subject. So we have two questions linked together: gaan we...? (are we going...?) and blijven we...? (are we staying...?).
Why use gaan we zwemmen instead of just zwemmen we?
Both are fine, but gaan we zwemmen specifically means "are we going swimming". The verb gaan (to go) is frequently combined with another whole verb (like zwemmen) to show you are going somewhere to do that activity.
What exactly does binnen mean here?
Binnen means inside or indoors. If you wanted to ask if you are staying outside, you would use its opposite, buiten.
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