Breakdown of Minusta tulee kirjanpitäjä ennen kesää.
minä
I
kesä
summer
ennen
before
tulla
to become
kirjanpitäjä
the accountant
Questions & Answers about Minusta tulee kirjanpitäjä ennen kesää.
Why does the sentence use the 3rd person tulee instead of tulen if the meaning is "I become"?
In this specific 'becoming' construction, you don't literally say "I become". Instead, Finnish phrases it as "Out of me comes an accountant". Because the new identity (kirjanpitäjä) is grammatically the subject doing the "coming", the verb is always in the 3rd person singular (tulee), no matter who is transforming.
Why is the pronoun minä put into the elative case (minusta)?
The elative ending -sta normally translates to "out of" or "from inside". The Finnish way to express someone becoming a profession or changing states is literally "Out of [person] comes [new state]". Therefore, "out of me" becomes minusta.
Why is the word for summer (kesä) in the partitive case (kesää)?
It is triggered by the word ennen (before). In Finnish, ennen acts as a preposition, and it strictly requires the noun that follows it to be in the partitive case.
How do we know this means "I will become" if there is no future tense verb here?
Finnish does not have a separate future tense. We use the present tense verb tulee, and the future meaning is made obvious by the context of the time phrase ennen kesää (before summer).
Learn Minusta tulee kirjanpitäjä ennen kesää and more in Finnish
All course content and exercises are completely free — no paywalls, no trial periods, no signup needed.
- ✓ Practice with interactive exercises
- ✓ Track your progress with spaced repetition
- ✓Learn at your own pace — completely free