Breakdown of Κοντεύω να τελειώσω την αναφορά, οπότε δεν χρειάζεται να με περιμένεις για πολύ.
δεν
not
να
to
περιμένω
to wait
με
me
Questions & Answers about Κοντεύω να τελειώσω την αναφορά, οπότε δεν χρειάζεται να με περιμένεις για πολύ.
What does κοντεύω να mean here?
Κοντεύω να + verb means I’m close to / I’m about to / I’m nearly doing something.
So:
Κοντεύω να τελειώσω = I’m close to finishing / I’m almost done
A useful thing to remember is that κοντεύω often introduces something that is nearly happening, not something already completed.
Examples:
- Κοντεύω να φύγω. = I’m about to leave.
- Κοντεύει να νυχτώσει. = It’s getting close to nightfall.
Why is it τελειώσω and not τελειώνω?
After να, Greek often uses the subjunctive, and here the form τελειώσω is the aorist subjunctive.
That is very common when the speaker focuses on the action as a whole completed event:
- να τελειώσω = to finish / to get it finished
If you used να τελειώνω, that would sound more like an ongoing or repeated process, which is not the idea here. In this sentence, the speaker means reaching the completed result of finishing the report.
So:
- Κοντεύω να τελειώσω = I’m almost finished
- not so much I’m almost in the process of finishing
Is τελειώσω a future tense?