Questions & Answers about Koira etsii ruokaa puistossa.
Why is "food" written as ruokaa instead of its basic form ruoka?
The verb etsiä (to look for) is a partitive verb. This means that the object of the action—the thing you are looking for—must always take the partitive case. To make that form, we add an -a to the end of ruoka, giving us ruokaa.
Where is the word for "for" in this sentence?
In English, we say "is looking for," but Finnish doesn't use a separate word for that preposition here. The verb etsiä already means the complete action of "to look for" or "to search." You just follow it directly with the partitive object.
What is the dictionary form of the verb etsii?
The dictionary form is etsiä. Because the subject is a third-person singular noun (koira, the dog), we take the verb stem etsi- and double its final vowel to create etsii (looks for / is looking for).
What does the -ssa ending do in the word puistossa?
The -ssa suffix is a location ending that means "in" or "inside of." By attaching it directly to the basic dictionary word puisto (park), you get puistossa (in the park).