Ek ken haar nie goed nie, maar die vrou lyk vriendelik.

Afrikaans usually uses double negation. In a normal negative sentence, you often get:

• the first nie after the part being negated
• the second nie near the end of the clause

So:

• Ek ken haar goed = I know her well
• Ek ken haar nie goed nie = I do not know her well

This is one of the most important sentence patterns in Afrikaans.

Because goed is the part being negated here. The sentence means I don’t know her well, not necessarily I don’t know her at all.

So the structure is:

• Ek ken haar goed = I know her well
• Ek ken haar nie goed nie = I do not know her well

The negation wraps around the idea goed. In practice, Afrikaans often puts the first nie before an adverb like goed, and then adds the second nie at the end of the clause.

This is a very common learner question.

In Afrikaans:

• ken = to know a person, place, or something through familiarity
• weet = to know a fact, piece of information, or answer

So:

• Ek ken haar = I know her
• Ek weet dit = I know that
• Ek weet die antwoord = I know the answer

You use ken for knowing a person. That is why Ek ken haar is correct.

Because haar is the object form of she/her, while sy is the subject form.

Compare:

• Sy lyk vriendelik = She looks friendly
• Ek ken haar nie goed nie = I do not know her well

So:

• sy = she
• haar = her

English does the same thing:

• She looks friendly
• I know her

Afrikaans often repeats the noun instead of switching immediately to a pronoun, especially when the speaker wants to be clear or slightly more descriptive.

So both of these are possible in context:

• ..., maar die vrou lyk vriendelik = ..., but the woman looks friendly
• ..., maar sy lyk vriendelik = ..., but she looks friendly

Using die vrou makes the reference explicit. It can sound a bit more observational, as if the speaker is talking about a woman they have noticed but do not know well.

Die is the definite article in Afrikaans, meaning the.

So:

• die vrou = the woman
• ’n vrou = a woman

In this sentence, die vrou refers to a specific woman, not just any woman.

Lyk means look or seem.

In this sentence:

• die vrou lyk vriendelik = the woman looks friendly / seems friendly

It is used a lot with adjectives:

• Hy lyk moeg = He looks tired
• Dit lyk goed = It looks good
• Sy lyk gelukkig = She looks happy

So lyk is a very useful verb for describing appearance or impression.

After a verb like lyk, Afrikaans usually uses the plain adjective form.

So:

• Die vrou lyk vriendelik = The woman looks friendly

But before a noun, Afrikaans often uses -e:

• ’n vriendelike vrou = a friendly woman

Compare:

• Die vrou is vriendelik = The woman is friendly
• Die vrou lyk vriendelik = The woman looks friendly
• die vriendelike vrou = the friendly woman

So vriendelik is correct here because it comes after lyk, not directly before the noun.

Yes, very closely. Maar means but and connects two contrasting ideas.

Here the contrast is:

• Ek ken haar nie goed nie = I do not know her well
• maar die vrou lyk vriendelik = but the woman looks friendly

So the speaker is saying: even though I do not know her well, my impression is that she seems friendly.

Afrikaans main clauses usually follow a verb-second pattern. That means the finite verb tends to come early in the clause.

In this sentence:

• Ek ken haar nie goed nie
• die vrou lyk vriendelik

The verbs ken and lyk both come in the normal main-clause position.

This is similar to many straightforward English sentences, but Afrikaans word order becomes especially important when you add things like time phrases, subordinate clauses, or negation.

Yes. Vriendelik most directly means friendly, but depending on context, English translations like nice, kind, or pleasant may sometimes fit.

Still, for learners, the safest basic meaning is:

• vriendelik = friendly

So the sentence suggests a positive impression of the woman, even though the speaker does not know her well.

Here goed is functioning more like an adverb, meaning well.

Compare:

• Dit is goed = It is good
• Ek ken haar goed = I know her well

English also does something similar with good and well, though the forms are different. In Afrikaans, goed can cover both ideas depending on context.

So in this sentence, goed means well, not good.

That would sound unusual in normal Afrikaans. The natural order is:

• Ek ken haar nie goed nie

The object haar normally comes right after the verb ken, and then the negation pattern follows. So for learners, it is best to stick with the standard word order used in the sentence.