Viime vuonna kuusi haettiin myöhään, ja se koristeltiin vasta yöllä.

Last year the tree was fetched late, and it was decorated only at night.

Breakdown of Viime vuonna kuusi haettiin myöhään, ja se koristeltiin vasta yöllä.

• ja: and
• se: it
• viime vuonna: last year
• myöhään: late
• yöllä: at night
• vasta: only
• hakea: to fetch
• koristella: to decorate
• kuusi: the spruce

Questions & Answers about Viime vuonna kuusi haettiin myöhään, ja se koristeltiin vasta yöllä.

How can kuusi mean both six and spruce / Christmas tree? How do I know which one it is here?

Finnish often uses the same word for several meanings, and kuusi is one of them:

• kuusi = six
• kuusi = spruce (tree), and by extension Christmas tree

You know which one is meant from context and grammar:

• If it’s a number before a noun, it’s six:
  
  • kuusi taloa = six houses
• If it’s standing alone as a noun, especially in a Christmas context, it’s a spruce / a Christmas tree:
  
  • Kuusi haettiin myöhään = The (Christmas) tree was fetched late

In this sentence, because fetching and decorating are mentioned, kuusi clearly means Christmas tree, not six.

Why is it kuusi haettiin and not kuusen haettiin?

This is about how objects behave in the Finnish passive.

• In a normal active sentence with a subject, a total object is usually in the genitive:

  • Me haimme kuusen myöhään.
    = We fetched the tree late.
    (kuusen = genitive singular of kuusi)

• But in the passive, a total object is usually in the nominative form:

  • Kuusi haettiin myöhään.
    = The tree was fetched late / We fetched the tree late.

So:

• haimme kuusen (active, subject me, genitive object)
• haettiin kuusi (passive, no subject mentioned, nominative object)

That’s why you see kuusi (nominative), not kuusen (genitive), after the passive verb haettiin.

What exactly is haettiin? Is it like was fetched or we fetched?

Haettiin is the past passive form of hakea (to fetch, to get).

• Dictionary form: hakea
• Present passive: haetaan = is fetched / people fetch
• Past passive: haettiin = was fetched / people fetched / we fetched

Finnish passive is actually more like an impersonal:

• It does not say who did the action.
• In English it can be translated:
  • with a true passive: The tree was fetched late.
  • or with an unspecified subject like we, they, or people:
    • We fetched the tree late.
    • They fetched the tree late.
    • The tree got fetched late.

Context decides how you best render it in English. In a family-story context, we fetched the tree late is common.

And what about koristeltiin – what form is that?

Koristeltiin is also a past passive form, from the verb koristella:

• Dictionary form: koristella = to decorate (often with a sense of doing the decorating as an activity)
• Present passive: koristellaan = is decorated / people decorate
• Past passive: koristeltiin = was decorated / people decorated / we decorated

So:

• Se koristeltiin vasta yöllä.
  = It was decorated only at night / We (finally) decorated it at night.

Could you say this sentence with a normal we-subject instead of the passive?

Yes. A natural active version would be:

• Viime vuonna haimme kuusen myöhään, ja koristelimme sen vasta yöllä.

Here:

• haimme = we fetched (1st person plural past)
• koristelimme = we decorated
• sen = it (object pronoun)

Meaning-wise, this is close to the original, but the style changes:

• The passive (kuusi haettiin, se koristeltiin) sounds a bit more impersonal / narrative, like general background information.
• The active (haimme, koristelimme) explicitly says we, which feels more personal and direct.

Both are correct; it’s a stylistic choice.

Why is there a comma before ja in ..., ja se koristeltiin vasta yöllä? In English we often don’t put a comma before and.

Finnish comma rules are different from English.

In Finnish:

• Two independent main clauses joined by ja usually do get a comma:
  • Kuusi haettiin myöhään, ja se koristeltiin vasta yöllä.
    
    • Kuusi haettiin myöhään = full main clause
    • se koristeltiin vasta yöllä = full main clause

So you join them with , ja.

In English, you normally write:

• The tree was fetched late and it was decorated only at night.
  (no comma in normal style)

So the comma here is just following Finnish punctuation rules, not English ones.

What does myöhään mean exactly? How is it different from myöhemmin or myöhässä?

All three relate to lateness, but they’re used differently:

• myöhään = late (in the day / in time)

  • Describes how late something happens.
  • Kuusi haettiin myöhään. = The tree was fetched late.

• myöhemmin = later

  • Compares times: later than some other time.
  • Haemme kuusen myöhemmin. = We’ll fetch the tree later.

• myöhässä = late, delayed (state of being late)

  • Often used about people, transport, etc.
  • Olemme myöhässä. = We are late.
  • Bussi on myöhässä. = The bus is late.

In this sentence, we’re describing when the tree was fetched, so myöhään is the right word.

What does vasta add in se koristeltiin vasta yöllä?

Vasta here means not until / only (so late as).

• Se koristeltiin yöllä.
  = It was decorated at night. (neutral time statement)
• Se koristeltiin vasta yöllä.
  = It was (only) decorated at night / not until the night.

So vasta implies:

• It happened later than expected.
• There was an implied delay or waiting before the action.

Compare with vain:

• Se koristeltiin vain yöllä.
  = It was decorated only at night (and at no other time)
  Focuses on exclusivity, not lateness.

Vasta = not until,
vain = only (exclusively).

Why yöllä and not something like yössä? What case is it?

Yöllä is the adessive case singular of yö (night).

• yö = night
• yöllä (adessive) = at night

In Finnish, times of day and many time expressions use the adessive to mean “at that time”:

• aamulla = in the morning
• päivällä = in the daytime
• illalla = in the evening
• yöllä = at night
• talvella = in (the) winter

So yöllä is the standard way to say at night.

What is viime vuonna exactly? Why not just viime vuosi?

Viime vuonna literally means “in last year”, and it’s the normal way to say last year as a time expression.

• viime = last
• vuosi = year
• vuonna = in the year (adessive case)

So:

• Viime vuonna kuusi haettiin myöhään...
  = Last year the tree was fetched late...

If you say viime vuosi by itself, it’s usually treated as a noun phrase, not a time adverbial:

• Viime vuosi oli vaikea.
  = Last year was difficult. (here last year is the subject)

But when you mean “when?” (time adverbial), Finnish commonly uses vuonna:

• Viime vuonna = (in) last year
• Vuonna 2020 = in 2020

Why is there a se in ja se koristeltiin vasta yöllä? Could you leave it out?

Se is a pronoun meaning it and refers back to kuusi (the tree).

• Kuusi haettiin myöhään, ja se koristeltiin vasta yöllä.
  = The tree was fetched late, and it was decorated only at night.

You could, in casual speech, sometimes leave it out and say:

• Kuusi haettiin myöhään, ja koristeltiin vasta yöllä.

But:

• Without se, the second clause is less clear and sounds more like “and (something) was decorated only at night”.
• With se, there is no ambiguity: that same tree is what was decorated.

So grammatically, dropping se can be possible, but including it is clearer and more natural in standard written Finnish.

Could I change the word order, like Viime vuonna myöhään kuusi haettiin or Kuusi haettiin viime vuonna myöhään? Does that change the meaning?

Finnish word order is quite flexible, and all of these can be grammatical, but they differ in focus and naturalness.

The original:

• Viime vuonna kuusi haettiin myöhään...
  Neutral, natural order:
  [Time] [Subject-like element] [Verb] [Adverb]

Some variants:

1. Kuusi haettiin viime vuonna myöhään.

   • Also grammatical.
   • Focus is more on the tree first, then you add when and how.
   • Feels slightly more like you’re already talking about the tree and then add details.

2. Viime vuonna kuusi haettiin myöhään.

   • Starts with time, very typical in narratives when you set the scene.

3. Viime vuonna myöhään kuusi haettiin.

   • Still understandable, but the piling of adverbs viime vuonna myöhään before the verb can sound a bit heavy or less natural.
   • Might be used for special emphasis (e.g., specifically late last year), but not the neutral choice.

Meaning doesn’t really change (it’s still the same event), but information structure / emphasis shifts depending on what you put first.

Could we use koristettiin instead of koristeltiin? What’s the difference?

There are two related verbs:

• koristaa = to adorn, to decorate
• koristella = to decorate (do the decorating), to ornament

Their past passive forms are:

• koristettiin (from koristaa)
• koristeltiin (from koristella)

In practice:

• Both can be used of decorating a Christmas tree.
• koristella / koristeltiin often feels a bit more activity-like, as in we did the decorating.
• koristaa / koristettiin can sound slightly more result-oriented (to adorn, to make adorned).

In everyday speech, for a Christmas tree, both are fine:

• Se koristeltiin vasta yöllä.
• Se koristettiin vasta yöllä.

The original choice of koristeltiin is very natural and common.