Word
We zijn wezen fietsen en ik moest rechts aanhouden.
Meaning
We went cycling and I had to keep right.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Questions & Answers about We zijn wezen fietsen en ik moest rechts aanhouden.
Why does the sentence use wezen instead of the past participle geweest?
When the verb zijn (to be) is used in the perfect tense with another verb to say you went out and did an activity, its past participle geweest changes into the infinitive wezen. This is why we say We zijn wezen fietsen (We went cycling) instead of using geweest.
Is rechts aanhouden one of the impersonal imperative signs from this lesson?
Yes! On a Dutch road or bike path, you might literally see a sign that just says Rechts aanhouden (Keep right). Because public instructions often use the bare infinitive, the phrase looks exactly the same on a sign as it does here functioning as a standard verb after the modal verb moest (had to).
Is aanhouden a separable verb, and why isn't it separated here?
Yes, aanhouden is a separable verb (aan + houden). However, it does not split here because it acts as the second verb in its clause. The conjugated modal verb moest pushes the full infinitive aanhouden to the end of the sentence, where it stays glued together.
Why does the first half use the present perfect (zijn wezen fietsen) while the second half uses the simple past (moest)?