Breakdown of Wij hebben veel afwas omdat we thuis koken.
wij
we
thuis
at home
hebben
to have
veel
much / many / a lot of
koken
to cook
we
we (unstressed form of wij)
omdat
because (subordinating)
de afwas
the dishes
Questions & Answers about Wij hebben veel afwas omdat we thuis koken.
Wait, I thought afwas was a separable verb. Why isn't it at the end of the clause?
You are thinking of the separable verb afwassen (to wash up / to do the dishes). But here, afwas is a noun meaning the dirty dishes or the washing up. That is why it comes right after veel (a lot of) as the object of the sentence, not at the end like a verb.
Since the current lesson is about separable verbs, is thuis koken one of them?
No, thuis (at home) and koken (to cook) are two completely separate words here. Thuis is simply an adverb telling you where the cooking happens. If it were a separable verb like thuiskomen (to come home), it would be written as one word in the dictionary, but thuiskoken is not a Dutch verb!
Why is the verb koken at the very end of the sentence?
The word omdat (because) introduces a subordinate clause. In Dutch subordinate clauses, all verbs are pushed to the very end of the phrase. So the order becomes omdat we thuis koken (because we at home cook) instead of keeping the verb right after the subject.
Why does the sentence use wij at the start but we later on?
Wij and we both mean we. Wij is the emphasized form, used here at the beginning to put a little focus on the fact that we (as opposed to someone else) have a lot of dishes. We is the unstressed form, which is used in the second half because no special emphasis is needed there.
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