Breakdown of Na voor het kruispunt te hebben geremd, moeten we optrekken.
hebben
to have
voor
to (time), before
moeten
to have to, must
we
we (unstressed form of wij)
te
to (infinitive marker)
het kruispunt
the intersection
na
after (preposition)
remmen
to brake
optrekken
to accelerate / to pull away
Questions & Answers about Na voor het kruispunt te hebben geremd, moeten we optrekken.
Wait, starting with Na voor... looks like a typo ("After for"). How does this work?
It looks strange to English eyes, but it makes perfect sense when you break it down! Na (after) introduces the entire clause. Inside that clause, the action is voor het kruispunt remmen (braking for the intersection). The word voor belongs to het kruispunt, not to na.
Why is the word order te hebben geremd instead of geremd te hebben?
Both are actually correct! In a perfect infinitive clause, you can place the auxiliary verb (hebben or zijn) either right before or right after the past participle. You will hear and read both te hebben geremd and geremd te hebben in Dutch, so you can use whichever feels more natural to you.
Why does the second part of the sentence say moeten we instead of we moeten?
This is the classic verb-second (V2) rule in action. The entire phrase before the comma (Na voor het kruispunt te hebben geremd) acts as the first block of information in the sentence. Therefore, the conjugated verb (moeten) must take the second position immediately after the comma, which pushes the subject (we) into the third position.
Just a quick refresher: why does the past participle geremd end in a -d and not a -t?
This follows the 't kofschip (or soft ketchup) rule! If you take the infinitive remmen (to brake) and remove the -en, you get the stem rem. Because the letter m is not one of the consonants in 't kofschip, the past participle gets a -d at the end.
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