Questions & Answers about Sutra idemo kod zubara.
- sutra = tomorrow
- idemo = we go / we are going (1st person plural present of ići, to go)
- kod = at / to (the place of)
- zubara = (of) the dentist (genitive singular of zubar, dentist)
So a very literal breakdown is: Tomorrow we-go to-the-place-of the-dentist.
Croatian often uses the present tense to talk about a planned future, especially when there is a time word like sutra (tomorrow), večeras (this evening), sad (soon/now), etc.
Sutra idemo kod zubara is completely natural and means Tomorrow we’re going to the dentist (a fixed plan).
You can also use the future tense (Sutra ćemo ići kod zubara), but it often feels slightly more formal or less like a fixed arrangement in everyday speech.
Both mean Tomorrow we will go to the dentist.
- Sutra idemo kod zubara – very common, sounds like a concrete, arranged plan.
- Sutra ćemo ići kod zubara – grammatically fine, but can sound a bit more neutral, formal or less immediate in everyday talk.
In spoken Croatian, for near and certain future plans, the present (idemo) is more frequent than the future (ćemo ići).
kod literally means at the place of / at someone’s place.
You use kod for:
- people: kod zubara (at the dentist’s), kod prijatelja (at a friend’s place)
- some locations: kod kuće (at home)
So idemo kod zubara is more like we’re going to the dentist’s (office / place), not just to the person in the abstract.
The preposition kod always takes the genitive case.
The noun zubar (dentist) in the masculine singular has genitive zubara.
So:
- nominative: zubar (a dentist)
- genitive: zubara (of the dentist)
Because of kod, you must say kod zubara, not kod zubar or kod zubaru.
You might hear ići (k) zubaru or ići zubaru with the dative (zubaru), but it sounds more like we’re going to the dentist (as a person), focusing on visiting that person.
Idemo kod zubara is more standard and neutral, and it naturally implies the place (the dentist’s office).
For everyday use, idemo kod zubara is the safest and most common choice.
ići (to go) in the present tense is irregular:
- ja idem – I go / I am going
- ti ideš – you go (sg., informal)
- on/ona/ono ide – he/she/it goes
- mi idemo – we go
- vi idete – you go (pl. or formal)
- oni/one/ona idu – they go
idemo is the we form (1st person plural).
You don’t need the pronoun mi.
The verb ending -mo in idemo already shows that the subject is we.
- Sutra idemo kod zubara – normal, natural.
- Mi sutra idemo kod zubara – also correct, but mi adds emphasis, like We are going to the dentist tomorrow (not someone else).
Yes, word order in Croatian is flexible, and all of these are grammatically correct:
- Sutra idemo kod zubara – neutral, very common.
- Idemo sutra kod zubara – also neutral, maybe slightly more focus on idemo.
- Idemo kod zubara sutra – possible; sutra gets a bit more emphasis at the end.
- Kod zubara idemo sutra – puts strong focus on kod zubara, as in It’s to the dentist that we’re going tomorrow.
The basic meaning doesn’t change; word order mainly affects emphasis.
You negate ići by adding ne in front of the verb:
- Sutra ne idemo kod zubara. – Tomorrow we are not going to the dentist.
Note that ne is separate from idemo, not attached to it.
You usually keep the same word order and just change your intonation (rising tone):
- Sutra idemo kod zubara? – Are we going to the dentist tomorrow?
If you want a more explicitly marked question, you can add li:
- Idemo li sutra kod zubara? – also Are we going to the dentist tomorrow? (a bit more formal / neutral).
sutra specifically means tomorrow, the next day.
For in the future in general, you would say u budućnosti or use adverbs like kasnije (later), jednog dana (one day).
So in Sutra idemo kod zubara, it clearly refers to the next calendar day.
It can correspond to both, depending on context:
- with idemo – we are going to the dentist’s (destination)
- with smo – Mi smo kod zubara = We are at the dentist’s (location)
The core idea of kod + person is at the place of that person.