Breakdown of Pitkä poika seisoo minun takanani toisessa rivissä.
poika
boy
seisoa
to stand
takana
behind
toinen
other, another; second
Questions & Answers about Pitkä poika seisoo minun takanani toisessa rivissä.
Why does the postposition takana (behind) have -ni at the end in minun takanani?
When a postposition is used with a personal pronoun (like minun), it often takes a possessive suffix that matches the pronoun. Since minun is "my" (1st person singular), you add the 1st person singular possessive suffix -ni to the postposition takana, making it takanani.
Can I drop the word minun and just say takanani?
Yes! For the 1st and 2nd person (me, you, us, you all), you can drop the genitive pronoun. So, takanani by itself is perfectly fine and still means "behind me."
Why are both toisessa and rivissä in the inessive ("in") case?
In Finnish, modifiers like adjectives and ordinal numbers must agree with the noun they describe. Because rivi (row) is in the inessive case (rivissä, "in the row"), the ordinal number toinen (second) must also be in the inessive case (toisessa).
How does the word toinen (second) turn into toisessa?