Learn Hardcore Croatian: Sada, kad usporedim svoje stare bilješke i nove rečenice, vidim da je moja nada imala smisla. - Now, when I compare my old notes and new sentences, I see that my hope made sense.

Both are grammatically correct. Kad is very common in speech and in informal writing; kada sounds a bit more formal or emphatic, but the difference is small.

Why are there commas around kad usporedim svoje stare bilješke i nove rečenice?

Because that whole part is a subordinate clause inserted into the main sentence.

Structure:

Main clause: Sada … vidim da je moja nada imala smisla.
Inserted time clause: kad usporedim svoje stare bilješke i nove rečenice

So we get:

Sada, kad usporedim svoje stare bilješke i nove rečenice, vidim da…

Croatian uses commas to set off such inserted subordinate clauses, similar to English:

Now, when I compare my old notes and new sentences, I see that…

What exactly is usporedim (tense, person, aspect, infinitive form)?

Usporedim is:

1st person singular
present tense
perfective aspect
from the infinitive usporediti (“to compare” – one completed act of comparing)

Basic pattern:

infinitive: usporediti (pf.)
present: usporedim, usporediš, usporedi, usporedimo, usporedite, usporede

The corresponding imperfective verb (ongoing / repeated) is uspoređivati:

infinitive: uspoređivati (impf.)
present: uspoređujem, uspoređuješ, …

Could we say kad uspoređujem svoje stare bilješke instead of kad usporedim svoje stare bilješke? What’s the difference?

You can say both, but they’re not identical in meaning.

kad usporedim (perfective)
– focuses on the completed act of comparison
– roughly: “when(ever) I have compared…” / “once I compare…”
– suits a situation where you see the result after you finish comparing
kad uspoređujem (imperfective)
– focuses on the ongoing process of comparing
– roughly: “while I’m comparing…” / “when I’m (in the process of) comparing”

In your sentence, kad usporedim is more natural, because the next action (vidim… – “I see”) logically comes after the comparison is done.

Why is it svoje stare bilješke and not moje stare bilješke?

Because svoje is the reflexive possessive pronoun, used when the possessor is the subject of that clause.

In the clause kad usporedim svoje stare bilješke…, the (implicit) subject is ja (“I”):

subject: (ja)
object: svoje stare bilješke (“my own old notes”)

Since the notes belong to the subject ja, Croatian prefers svoje instead of moje:

more natural: kad usporedim svoje stare bilješke
possible but less natural here: kad usporedim moje stare bilješke

Using svoj is very typical whenever the subject’s own possession is meant; moj is more neutral and does not require the possessor to be the subject.

Does svoje also belong to nove rečenice, or should it be repeated (svoje stare bilješke i svoje nove rečenice)?

Yes, svoje logically applies to both nouns:

svoje stare bilješke i nove rečenice
= “my old notes and (my) new sentences”

In Croatian, you don’t have to repeat the possessive if it clearly applies to both items in a list. Repeating it is possible but usually unnecessary:

svoje stare bilješke i svoje nove rečenice – correct, a bit heavier
svoje stare bilješke i nove rečenice – normal, natural

What case are bilješke and rečenice in, and how can I tell?

They are in the accusative plural, functioning as direct objects of usporedim.

verb: usporedim – “I compare” (takes a direct object)
objects: (svoje stare) bilješke and (nove) rečenice

For feminine nouns ending in -a in the singular (like bilješka, rečenica), the nominative plural and accusative plural often look the same:

nominative pl.: bilješke, rečenice
accusative pl.: bilješke, rečenice

So you identify the case by function in the sentence, not by form here: as direct objects, they must be accusative.

In vidim da je moja nada imala smisla, why is je placed after da, not after nada?

Because je is a clitic (an unstressed short word) and Croatian clitics normally go into second position in their clause.

The clause is:

da je moja nada imala smisla

Order of elements:

da – conjunction (first position)
je – clitic form of biti (“to be”), goes to the second position
moja nada imala smisla – the rest of the clause

Placing je later, like da moja nada je imala smisla, sounds wrong to native speakers because it breaks the second‑position rule for clitics.

How is the past tense formed in je … imala, and why is imala feminine?

Croatian perfect tense (the normal past) is formed with:

auxiliary biti (“to be”) in the present: sam, si, je, smo, ste, su
plus the past participle of the main verb

In your clause:

auxiliary: je (3rd person singular)
main verb: imati → past participle: imao / imala / imalo / imali…
subject: moja nada – feminine singular

So we match the participle to the gender and number of the subject:

moja nada je imala smisla
– nada is feminine singular → imala

If the subject were masculine plural, you’d say:

Moji prijatelji su imali pravo. – “My friends were right.”

Why is it imala smisla (genitive smisla) and not imala smisao (nominative smisao)?

Both smisao and smisla are forms of the noun smisao (“sense, meaning”), but they’re used differently:

imati smisla (genitive) – idiomatic expression meaning “to make sense / to be meaningful / to be justified”
- moja nada je imala smisla = “my hope made sense / was justified”
imati smisao (nominative) – more literally “to have a meaning” (e.g. a word, a symbol, a text)
- Ta riječ ima smisao ‘pomoć’. – “That word has the meaning ‘help’.”

In your sentence, the idiomatic genitive smisla is the natural choice.

Why is imala in the past tense while vidim is in the present?

Because you’re describing:

a present observation: vidim – “I see (now)”
about something that was true in the past: moja nada je imala smisla – “my hope made sense / was justified (back then)”

So the time sequence is:

now: I compare my notes and sentences → I see…
before (when I had that hope): that hope actually did make sense

If you said vidim da moja nada ima smisla, it would mean “I see that my hope makes sense now” (still valid in the present), which is a slightly different idea.

Why is it moja nada, not svoja nada, in vidim da je moja nada imala smisla?

Because svoj refers to the subject of its own clause, and here the subject of the da‑clause is moja nada, not ja.

Clause structure:

main clause: vidim – subject = ja (I)
subordinate clause: da je moja nada imala smisla – subject = moja nada

If you used svoja nada inside the da‑clause, svoja would refer to the subject of that clause, i.e. to nada itself (its own hope), which doesn’t make sense:

✗ da je svoja nada imala smisla – literally “that its own hope had made sense”

You want to say that your hope made sense, so you correctly use moja nada.

Can I say sad instead of sada?

Yes. Sad is a shorter, very common colloquial form of sada (“now”).

Sad, kad usporedim…
Sada, kad usporedim…

Both are correct. Sad is what you’ll hear most often in everyday speech; sada can sound a bit more formal or careful, but it’s also used in normal conversation.

Is there any difference between nada and nadanje?

Both relate to “hope,” but they’re used a bit differently:

nada – the abstract noun “hope” as a feeling or state
- Moja nada je bila velika. – “My hope was great.”
nadanje – more like “the act/process of hoping”, somewhat more formal or stylistic
- Njegovo nadanje je trajalo godinama. – “His hoping lasted for years.”

In your sentence, moja nada is the normal, idiomatic way to say “my hope”. Using moje nadanje would sound more literary and less natural in everyday language.