Breakdown of Vaikka väsyttää, jatkamme eteenpäin rauhallisesti.
Questions & Answers about Vaikka väsyttää, jatkamme eteenpäin rauhallisesti.
Both are grammatically correct, but they feel a bit different.
- Vaikka väsyttää uses the verb väsyttää, which literally means to make (someone) feel tired / to feel tired. It’s a very common, natural way to say I’m tired / we’re tired in everyday Finnish.
- Vaikka olemme väsyneitä uses the verb olla (to be) plus the adjective väsynyt (tired). That sounds a bit more neutral or textbook-like.
So:
- Vaikka väsyttää, … ≈ Even though (we) are feeling tired, … (very natural, slightly more colloquial, focuses on the feeling)
- Vaikka olemme väsyneitä, … ≈ Although we are tired, … (perfectly fine, more straightforward “to be + adjective” structure)
In actual speech and writing, Finns very often prefer väsyttää for this kind of “feeling tired” statement.
Literally, the verb väsyttää needs an experiencer in the partitive case:
- Minua väsyttää. – I am tired / I feel tired.
- Meitä väsyttää. – We are tired.
In Vaikka väsyttää, jatkamme…, the experiencer is omitted because it is understood from the main clause: jatkamme is we continue, so the reader/listener naturally understands that we are also the ones who are tired.
You could make it explicit as:
- Vaikka meitä väsyttää, jatkamme eteenpäin rauhallisesti.
Leaving meitä out is very typical when context already tells you who is involved.
Väsyttää is a so‑called “psychological” or “experiencer” verb in Finnish. It literally means something like to cause tiredness (to someone), but it is normally translated as to be tired / to feel tired.
Key points:
- It is in the 3rd person singular: (se) väsyttää – it tires / it makes (someone) tired.
- The person who feels the emotion is in the partitive:
- Minua väsyttää. – I’m tired.
- Häntä väsyttää. – He/She is tired.
- Meitä väsyttää. – We are tired.
This pattern is used with many other similar verbs:
- pelottaa (to feel scared), huvittaa (to feel like / be amused), harmittaa (to be annoyed), huolestuttaa (to be worried), etc.
In Finnish, personal pronouns are often dropped because the person and number are already shown by the verb ending.
- jatkaa = base form (to continue)
- jatka-mme = we continue
So:
- Me jatkamme eteenpäin rauhallisesti.
and - Jatkamme eteenpäin rauhallisesti.
both mean We continue forward calmly. The version without me is completely normal and often preferred unless you need to emphasize we.
In this sentence vaikka is a conjunction meaning although or even though:
- Vaikka väsyttää, jatkamme… = Although we are tired, we continue…
Other common uses of vaikka:
even if / even when
- Tule vaikka sataisi. – Come even if it rains.
for example / at least / even (more colloquial, often with a partitive)
- Ota vaikka kahvia. – Have some coffee, for example / at least take some coffee.
In comparisons or emphatic expressions
- Odotan vaikka koko päivän. – I’ll wait even the whole day.
So vaikka is quite flexible, but in your sentence it is clearly the “although / even though” meaning.
The sentence consists of two clauses:
- Vaikka väsyttää – a subordinate clause introduced by vaikka (although)
- jatkamme eteenpäin rauhallisesti – the main clause
In Finnish, a comma is normally used between a subordinate clause and the main clause, just like in English:
- Vaikka väsyttää, jatkamme…
- Jatkamme eteenpäin rauhallisesti, vaikka väsyttää.
Both orders are possible, and there is normally a comma between the clauses in either case.
Eteenpäin literally combines:
- eteen = to the front
- päin = towards
Together, eteenpäin means forward or onwards.
- Jatkamme. = We continue. (general “we keep going”)
- Jatkamme eteenpäin. = We continue forward / we move on.
You can omit eteenpäin if the idea of “continuing” is already clear from context, but including it adds the sense of physical or metaphorical movement forward.
Rauhallisesti is an adverb meaning calmly / in a calm way.
It is formed from the adjective rauhallinen (calm, peaceful):
- rauhallinen → rauhallisesti
This is a very regular pattern in Finnish:
- hidas (slow) → hitaasti (slowly)
- nopea (fast) → nopeasti (quickly)
- selkeä (clear) → selkeästi (clearly)
So -sti is the typical ending used to form many adverbs from adjectives.
Yes, Vaikka meitä väsyttää, jatkamme eteenpäin rauhallisesti is fully correct and natural.
- Adding meitä explicitly marks we as the experiencer of väsyttää.
- Leaving meitä out (Vaikka väsyttää, …) is also natural when context already shows who is involved.
The version without meitä is a bit more compact and slightly more colloquial; the version with meitä is a bit more explicit and can feel slightly more careful or formal in some contexts. Both are good Finnish.
Yes, that is also correct and natural.
- Vaikka väsyttää, jatkamme eteenpäin rauhallisesti.
- Jatkamme eteenpäin rauhallisesti, vaikka väsyttää.
They mean the same thing. The difference is mostly in emphasis:
- Starting with Vaikka väsyttää slightly emphasizes the difficulty or condition first.
- Starting with Jatkamme… emphasizes the action and determination first, adding vaikka väsyttää as an afterthought (…even though we’re tired).
All are correct, but they carry different nuances:
Vaikka väsyttää, …
- Very natural everyday Finnish
- Focuses on the feeling of tiredness as something affecting you
- Slightly more colloquial/idiomatic
Vaikka olen väsynyt, … / Vaikka olemme väsyneitä, …
- Clear, direct be + adjective structure
- Slightly more neutral or formal in tone
- Good for writing where you want less “emotional-verb” style
In normal conversation, väsyttää is extremely common for “I/we are tired”; in a simple learner-style or more formal sentence, olla väsynyt is also perfectly fine.