Breakdown of Onko sinulla kiire? Minulla ei ole kiirettä.
olla
to be
minä
I
sinä
you
ei
no / not (en, et, ei, emme, ette, eivät)
kiire
hurry
Questions & Answers about Onko sinulla kiire? Minulla ei ole kiirettä.
Why does the sentence use sinulla (on you) when the English translation says "Are you"?
In English, we say "I am in a hurry", but in Finnish, you say you "have a hurry". Since Finnish doesn't have a direct verb for "to have", it uses the adessive case (words ending in -lla or -llä) combined with the verb on (is). So, the question literally translates to "Is on you a hurry?"
Why is it kiire in the first sentence but kiirettä in the second?
This shows the core rule of negative possession! In a positive sentence, the thing you have is often in the basic form, like kiire. But when you state that you do not have something using ei ole, the thing you lack must be in the partitive case. That is why kiire changes to kiirettä.
How does onko work here?
The suffix -ko is a question particle. You attach it to the word you are asking about and place that word at the beginning of the sentence. By adding it to the verb on (is), it turns a statement like "you have" (sinulla on) into the yes/no question "do you have?" (onko sinulla?).
How is the partitive form kiirettä made from kiire?
Nouns ending in -e belong to a special group in Finnish. To form their partitive, you usually add -tta or -ttä. Because the word kiire contains the front vowels i and e, the rules of vowel harmony mean we must use the front-vowel ending -ttä, giving us kiirettä.
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