Breakdown of Is deze verbinding rechtstreeks, of moeten we hier overstappen?
zijn
to be
hier
here
deze
this / these
moeten
to have to, must
Questions & Answers about Is deze verbinding rechtstreeks, of moeten we hier overstappen?
Where does the place adverb hier go in a sentence like this?
In Dutch, the second verb in a sentence (like the infinitive overstappen) gets pushed to the very end. Any adverbs, such as the place adverb hier, sit in the "middle field" before that final verb. If you also wanted to add a time adverb like straks (later), it would go before hier following the Time-Manner-Place rule.
I learned that overstappen is a separable verb. Why isn't it split up here?
You only split a separable verb when it is the main, conjugated verb in a standard present or past tense sentence (like wij stappen hier over). In this sentence, the modal verb moeten (must/have to) is the conjugated verb. This forces overstappen to remain together in its full infinitive form at the end of the sentence.
Why does the second half of the sentence start with the verb moeten?
The word of (or) simply links two sentences together without changing their word order. Because the second half is a brand new yes/no question, it uses the standard question word order: Verb + Subject (moeten we).
Why do we use deze for verbinding instead of dit?