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Questions & Answers about Olen hieman sairas tänään.
What does hieman mean and what part of speech is it?
Hieman is an adverb meaning “a little” or “slightly.” It modifies an adjective or another adverb—in this case it modifies sairas (“sick”) to indicate a mild degree of illness.
Why is sairas in the nominative case instead of the partitive?
After the verb olla (“to be”), predicate adjectives always take the nominative case to agree with the subject. That’s why you say olen sairas rather than olen sairasta.
Why is there no subject pronoun like minä before olen?
Finnish verb forms encode person and number. Olen already means “I am,” so the pronoun minä (“I”) is optional and usually dropped in everyday speech.
Why are there no articles like “a” or “the” in Finnish?
Finnish doesn’t have definite or indefinite articles. Definiteness or indefiniteness is understood from context, so you simply say olen hieman sairas for “I am a bit sick.”
What is tänään and why does it look like that?
Tänään is an adverb of time meaning “today.” It’s derived from tänä päivänä (“on this day”) but has its own standalone form. Adverbs of time in Finnish are indeclinable—they don’t change form for case.
Can I change the word order, for example to Tänään olen hieman sairas?
Yes. Finnish word order is quite flexible, especially with adverbs. Putting tänään first emphasizes the time—“Today, I am a bit sick”—but the core meaning remains the same.
What’s the difference between sairas and kipeä? Both can translate as “sick.”
Sairas generally means “ill” or “diseased,” often implying a diagnosable condition. Kipeä means “aching,” “sore,” or “unwell,” often used for milder pains (e.g. selkä kipeä “my back hurts”). In everyday contexts you can often use either, but sairas is more general.
Is there a nuance between hieman and vähän?
Both adverbs mean “a little” or “a bit.” Hieman is slightly more formal or precise, while vähän is very common in spoken Finnish. Saying olen vähän sairas works just as well in casual conversation.
How would you negate this sentence to say “I am not sick today”?
You’d use the negative verb en plus ole, giving en ole sairas tänään. If you want to emphasize “not at all,” you can add yhtään or lainkaan: en ole yhtään sairas tänään (“I am not sick at all today”).