Ná die stort droog sy haar gesig met ’n skoon handdoek af.

Afrikaans is a verb-second language in main clauses. That means the finite verb usually comes in the second position.

So when Ná die stort is moved to the front for emphasis or to set the time, the verb must come next:

• Ná die stort
  • droog
    • sy ...

If you started with the subject, you could also say:

• Sy droog ná die stort haar gesig met ’n skoon handdoek af.

Both are grammatical, but the original sentence emphasizes after the shower.

The accent in ná helps show that it means after.

Afrikaans often uses an accent to distinguish words or to clarify meaning. In practice, you may sometimes see na without the accent in less careful writing, but ná is the standard way to show the meaning after here.

So:

• ná = after

Here, die stort means the shower.

The word stort can be related to the idea of showering or pouring, but in this sentence, because it has the article die, it is clearly being used as a noun:

• die stort = the shower

So Ná die stort means After the shower.

This is because afdroog is a separable verb in Afrikaans.

The full verb is:

• afdroog = to dry off / to wipe dry

In a main clause, the first part goes to the normal verb position, and the particle af goes to the end:

• Sy droog haar gesig af.

That is very common in both Afrikaans and Dutch-style grammar.

Af gives the idea of off, completely, or drying something off.

Compare:

• droog = dry
• afdroog = dry off / wipe dry

So in this sentence, droog ... af is not just describing something becoming dry; it describes the action of drying the face off with a towel.

Because they do different jobs:

• sy = she here, the subject
• haar = her, showing possession in haar gesig = her face

So:

• sy performs the action
• haar tells us whose face it is

A literal breakdown is:

• droog sy haar gesig ... af
• does she dry her face ... off

Yes. sy can also mean his in other contexts.

For example:

• sy boek = his book

But in this sentence, sy comes in the subject position after the finite verb, so it clearly means she:

• Ná die stort droog sy ...
• After the shower, she dries ...

So the meaning is determined by grammar and position.

Afrikaans usually expresses possession with a possessive pronoun before the noun, just as English does.

So:

• haar gesig = her face
• my handdoek = my towel
• sy boek = his book

Using van would sound different and is not the normal way to say this kind of simple possession.

This phrase tells you how she dries her face.

• met = with
• ’n skoon handdoek = a clean towel

So the phrase means:

• with a clean towel

It is an instrumental phrase: it shows the tool or means used to do the action.

’n is the Afrikaans indefinite article, meaning a or an.

So:

• ’n skoon handdoek = a clean towel

It is usually pronounced as a very weak sound, like uh /ə/, not as a full en sound in normal speech.

Also, unlike English A, ’n is not capitalized, even at the beginning of a sentence. If it starts a sentence, the next word is capitalized instead.

Because Afrikaans adjectives usually come before the noun, just like in English.

So:

• ’n skoon handdoek = a clean towel

This is the normal pattern:

• article + adjective + noun

Afrikaans adjectives sometimes take an -e ending before nouns, but not always. The rules are much simpler than in many other languages, but they still depend on the type of adjective and noun phrase.

In this sentence, skoon stays as skoon:

• ’n skoon handdoek

That is simply the correct form here. Learners often just need to get used to which adjectives stay unchanged and which take -e.

Afrikaans nouns do not have grammatical gender in the same way as Dutch or German.

So gesig is just:

• gesig = face

You do not need to learn masculine, feminine, or neuter noun classes for normal Afrikaans grammar.

Not really in natural English. The best English is:

• After the shower, she dries her face with a clean towel.
• or After showering, she dries her face with a clean towel.

Because droog ... af means dry off / wipe dry, but in English we normally say dry her face, not dry off her face.

So this is a good example where you should understand the Afrikaans structure without translating every word too literally.