Learn Finnish: Äiti osti eilen matkamuiston ja korun. - Mother bought a souvenir and a piece of jewelry yesterday.

For two-syllable Type 1 verbs ending in -a, the final -a usually changes to -o in the past tense (like antaa becomes antoi). However, if the verb ends in -staa (like ostaa or muistaa), the final -a drops out completely. We just add the past tense marker -i, resulting in osti.

Why do both matkamuiston and korun end in an -n?

They are the direct objects of the sentence, meaning they are the things being bought. Because the action is affirmative and complete (she bought the whole souvenir and the jewelry), we use the accusative case. For singular words, the accusative ending is -n, which looks exactly like the genitive case.

Is matkamuiston a compound word?

Yes! Its base form is matkamuisto, which is made up of matka (trip or journey) and muisto (memory). A "trip-memory" is the logical Finnish way of saying "souvenir".

The English translation says "a piece of jewelry", but the Finnish sentence just has korun. Where are the words for "a piece of"?