Word
بينما تطبخ أمي العشاء، أغسل الطبق والملعقة وأضعهما في المطبخ.
Meaning
While my mother cooks dinner, I wash the plate and the spoon and put them in the kitchen.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Lesson
Questions & Answers about بينما تطبخ أمي العشاء، أغسل الطبق والملعقة وأضعهما في المطبخ.
What does بينما mean here, and how is it used?
بينما means while and introduces an action that is happening at the same time as another action.
In this sentence:
بينما تطبخ أمي العشاء، أغسل الطبق والملعقة...
the idea is:
- while my mother is cooking dinner
- I wash the plate and the spoon...
So بينما sets up a background action, and the main clause tells you what happens during that time.
Why does the sentence start with تطبخ أمي instead of أمي تطبخ?
Arabic often prefers verb + subject order, especially in Standard Arabic.
So:
- تطبخ أمي = literally cooks my mother
- natural English order would be my mother cooks / is cooking
Both تطبخ أمي and أمي تطبخ can be understood, but تطبخ أمي is very natural in MSA.
This is a common pattern:
- كتب الطالب الدرس = the student wrote the lesson
- ذهبت البنت إلى المدرسة = the girl went to school
Why is the verb تطبخ feminine?
Because the subject is أمي = my mother, which is feminine.
The verb طبخ in the present tense changes depending on the subject. For , Arabic uses: