Learn Finnish: Meidän odotuksemme oli pitkä.

It uses the -us suffix, which is the focus of this lesson for turning verbs into nouns describing the action. We start with the verb odottaa (to wait / to expect). The stem used for this derivation is odot- (notice the consonant gradation from tt to a single t). Adding the suffix gives us odotus (a wait / an expectation).

Why does odotus change to odotukse- before adding the -mme suffix?

Nouns ending in -us or -ys that are derived from verbs almost always have a stem ending in -ukse- or -ykse- before case endings or possessive suffixes are attached. Therefore, the basic word odotus changes its stem to odotukse- before the possessive suffix -mme is added.

Why do we need the -mme at the end of odotuksemme if we already have the word meidän?

In standard written Finnish, possessive structures for "we", "you (plural)", and "they" require both the genitive pronoun (like meidän) and the matching possessive suffix on the noun (like -mme). While spoken Finnish often drops the suffix (saying just meidän odotus), correct standard Finnish requires this "double possession".

Can odotus mean anything else besides "a wait"?