Voisitko kertoa miksi olet täällä?

to be

Breakdown of Voisitko kertoa miksi olet täällä?

• täällä: here
• sinä: you
• kertoa: to tell
• voida: could
• miksi: why

Questions & Answers about Voisitko kertoa miksi olet täällä?

I notice that Voisitko ends with -ko. Is that the conditional form plus a question particle?

Yes, voisit is the conditional form of the verb voida (“can”), and -ko is the question particle. When you add -ko to voisit, you get voisitko, which is a polite way of asking “Could you?” in Finnish.

What does miksi mean, and could it be replaced with something else?

Miksi is the Finnish word for “why.” It specifically asks for a reason or cause. If you wanted to ask “how”—for example, “how come you are here?”—you could say miten or kuinka, but that changes the question’s focus from “why” to “how.”

In the phrase miksi olet täällä, is olet simply the second-person singular of olla?

Exactly. Olet is the second-person singular present tense form of olla (to be). In English, this corresponds to you are. Finnish conjugatesverbs for person and number, so we say sinä olet or simply olet without using the pronoun sinä explicitly.

Why do we say täällä instead of tässä or tuolla?

In Finnish, täällä generally refers to a broader “here” (somewhere in the local area), tässä is closer to “right here” (very close proximity), and tuolla means “over there.” Saying olet täällä suggests you’re talking about being in this location in a general sense.

Could I just say Voisit kertoa miksi olet täällä? without the -ko?

You could, but it would sound more like a statement than a polite, direct question. Voisitko kertoa shows a polite request or question form because -ko signals the interrogative. If you remove -ko, it can imply giving a statement or instruction rather than asking politely.