Breakdown of آیا کسی به شما کمک کرد؟ نه، ما خودمان مشکل را حل کردیم.
ما
we
شما
you (plural)
آیاâyâ
whether (question particle)
نهna
no
Questions & Answers about آیا کسی به شما کمک کرد؟ نه، ما خودمان مشکل را حل کردیم.
Why do we say ما خودمان (we ourselves)? Can't we just say ما?
Yes, you could just say ما مشکل را حل کردیم (we solved the problem). Adding خودمان (khod + emân) makes it emphatic, stressing that we did it ourselves without anyone's help. It acts exactly like the emphatic "ourselves" in English.
Could we drop the ما and just start the second sentence with خودمان?
Absolutely! In spoken and even written Farsi, subject pronouns like ما are often dropped because the verb ending (-im) already tells you who is acting. You will frequently hear خودمان مشکل را حل کردیم which carries the exact same emphatic meaning.
Why is there a به before شما in the first sentence? Doesn't "help you" take a direct object?
In English, you help someone. But in Farsi, the compound verb کمک کردن (to help) literally means "to do help", and it takes the preposition به (to). So you are literally asking "did anyone do help to you?", which is why we cannot use the direct object marker را here.
How does کسی translate to "anyone" instead of "someone"?
The word کس means "person" or "individual". When you add the indefinite ی suffix, it becomes کسی (kasi), which generally means "someone" or "a person". However, just like in English, when you use it in a question (or a negative sentence), it naturally translates to "anyone".