Breakdown of Tänään meillä alkaa remontti keittiössä, joten syömme lounaan olohuoneessa.
Questions & Answers about Tänään meillä alkaa remontti keittiössä, joten syömme lounaan olohuoneessa.
Meillä is the adessive case of me (me + -llä), and it often expresses location/“sphere”: at our place, in our household, on our side.
Finnish commonly uses this structure to express “having/there being” with some things:
- Meillä alkaa remontti. = literally “At us a renovation begins.” → natural English: “We’re starting a renovation / A renovation is starting at our place.”
So it’s not a possessive “we have” verb; it’s a location-style construction.
Keittiössä is the inessive case (-ssa/-ssä), meaning in (inside a place):
- keittiö = kitchen
- keittiö + -ssä → keittiössä = in the kitchen
Here it marks where the renovation is happening: a renovation starts in the kitchen.
Finnish word order is flexible and is used to manage emphasis and “what comes first in the sentence” (topic).
Both are possible, but they highlight different things:
- Tänään meillä alkaa remontti… focuses early on “at our place” (setting/context).
- Tänään remontti alkaa meillä… would foreground “the renovation” as the main topic first.
The chosen order sounds natural when you set the scene: Today, at our place, a renovation starts…
With alkaa (“to begin/start”), the thing that begins is typically in the nominative as the grammatical subject:
- Remontti alkaa. = “The renovation begins.”
In Meillä alkaa remontti, remontti is still the subject; meillä is just giving the “location/sphere.”
Remontti is a very common everyday word meaning renovation, remodeling, or repair work (often in a home). It can range from small (painting) to big (kitchen remodel).
In this sentence, remontti keittiössä suggests some sort of kitchen renovation/work.
joten means so / therefore, showing a consequence:
- A, joten B. = “A, so B.”
koska means because, giving a reason:
- B, koska A. = “B, because A.”
So in your sentence:
- Renovation starts → therefore we eat in the living room.
In Finnish, you typically put a comma before coordinating/connecting words like joten when it introduces a new clause. Here you have two clauses:
1) Tänään meillä alkaa remontti keittiössä,
2) joten syömme lounaan olohuoneessa.
The comma helps separate them clearly, similar to English “, so …”.
Finnish verb endings already show the subject, so the pronoun me (“we”) is often omitted unless you want emphasis/contrast.
- syömme = we eat / we will eat (present tense form)
You could say me syömme, but it would sound more emphatic (like “we are the ones eating…”).
It’s present tense, but Finnish present often covers near-future plans too. In context, Today… so we eat lunch in the living room is understood as we’re going to eat (a planned action today).
If you wanted to stress intention, you could also use:
- aiomme syödä = “we intend to eat”
- syödään (colloquial passive) = “we’ll eat / let’s eat”
lounaan is the object form of lounas (“lunch”). With a completed/whole object (“eat the lunch”), Finnish commonly uses the total object, which often looks like the genitive singular:
- syödä lounas (dictionary form)
- syömme lounaan = “we eat (the) lunch” (as a whole meal)
If you were emphasizing an incomplete amount (“some lunch”), you might see the partitive:
- syömme lounasta = “we’re eating lunch” (ongoing / some amount)
Olohuoneessa is also inessive (-ssa/-ssä) meaning in the living room:
- olohuone = living room
- olohuone + -ssa → olohuoneessa = in the living room
It indicates the location where the lunch will be eaten.
Yes, and it’s very common. The meaning shifts slightly:
- remontti keittiössä = “renovation happening in the kitchen” (location phrasing)
- keittiöremontti = “kitchen renovation” (compound noun focusing on the type of renovation)
Both are natural; keittiöremontti is especially idiomatic in everyday Finnish.