Breakdown of Lapset menevät naapurin luo.
lapsi
child
mennä
to go
naapuri
neighbor
luo
(to) someone's place, up to (someone)
Questions & Answers about Lapset menevät naapurin luo.
How would you say "The children go" in spoken Finnish (puhekieli)?
In colloquial Finnish, third-person plural subjects take the third-person singular form of the verb. So instead of the standard Lapset menevät, people usually say Lapset menee.
If we replaced "The children" with "They", how would this sentence change in puhekieli?
In standard Finnish, "they go" is He menevät. But in spoken Finnish, people use ne (the plural "it") for both things and people. Combined with the singular verb rule, you would say Ne menee naapurin luo.
Why is the word for neighbor in the genitive form (naapurin)?
The word luo ("to someone's place") is a postposition. Most Finnish postpositions require the word right in front of them to be in the genitive (the -n ending).
Could I use luokse instead of luo here?
Yes! Luo and luokse mean exactly the same thing: "to someone's place". Just don't confuse them with luona, which means "at someone's place". Since the children are actively moving to the destination, we need the "to" form (luo).
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