Questions & Answers about Ik speel vaak tennis op dinsdag.
Does op always mean 'on' for days of the week?
Yes! Just like in English, you use op before days of the week in Dutch. So, op dinsdag translates perfectly to 'on Tuesday'.
Why doesn't dinsdag start with a capital letter?
In Dutch, days of the week, months, and seasons are written with lowercase letters, unlike in English. They only get a capital letter if they are the very first word of a sentence.
In English we say 'I often play', so why is the word order Ik speel vaak in Dutch?
In English, frequency adverbs like 'often' usually go before the verb. In a standard Dutch sentence, they usually go right after the conjugated verb. That is why it is Ik speel vaak (literally 'I play often').
Could I put op dinsdag at the beginning of the sentence to emphasize it?
Yes, you can! But remember that if you start a sentence with a time phrase like Op dinsdag, the subject and verb have to swap places (this is called inversion). The sentence would become: Op dinsdag speel ik vaak tennis.