Breakdown of Ek het geen tyd om siek te wees nie, want die eksamen is binnekort.
Questions & Answers about Ek het geen tyd om siek te wees nie, want die eksamen is binnekort.
In Afrikaans you often wrap a noun in a double negation. Geen precedes the noun to show “no/none,” and a closing nie goes at the end of the clause. So
• Ek het geen tyd nie = “I have no time.”
Dropping either part weakens or changes the meaning:
• Ek het nie tyd nie works colloquially as “I don’t have time,” but formally you’ll see geen … nie around a noun.
To negate an om … te infinitive, place nie at the very end:
• om (to) + siek (sick) + te wees (to be) + nie (not) = “to not be sick.”
Without that final nie, the clause would remain positive (“to be sick”).
Afrikaans has two forms of the verb “to have”:
• hê = the infinitive (e.g. ek wil hê “I want to have”)
• het = present tense (e.g. ek het “I have”).
So in Ek het geen tyd nie, het is simply “I have.”
Both translate as “because,” but they behave differently:
• want is coordinating: it keeps normal word order in the next clause.
– … want die eksamen is binnekort. (subject-verb order)
• omdat is subordinating: it pushes the finite verb to the end.
– … omdat die eksamen binnekort is → die eksamen … is at the end of that clause.
Yes. Afrikaans often says Ek het geen tyd nie, literally “I have no time.” English speakers naturally say “I don’t have time.” You could mirror that by saying either:
• Ek het geen tyd nie om siek te wees. (“I have no time…”)
• Ek het nie tyd om siek te wees nie. (“I don’t have time to be sick.”)
Both convey the same idea; the first is a bit more emphatic.
No. In Afrikaans negatives you must close each negation:
• With geen … nie, the closing nie cannot be omitted.
• With an infinitive negation (om … te …), nie always goes at the end.
Omitting it would make the clause positive again.
In an om … te construction, adjectives precede the verb. The pattern is:
• om + [adjective] + te + [verb]
So om siek te wees = “to be sick.” You can’t flip it to om te wees siek—that would be ungrammatical.