Breakdown of Mai sayar da masara yana tsaye a gefe na kasuwa inda yara ke yi wa iyayensu sallama.
Questions & Answers about Mai sayar da masara yana tsaye a gefe na kasuwa inda yara ke yi wa iyayensu sallama.
Literally, mai sayar da masara is:
- mai – someone who has/does X
- sayar da – to sell
- masara – corn/maize
So mai sayar da masara = “the person who sells corn”, i.e. the corn seller.
In Hausa, mai + (verb / activity / noun) is a very common way to say “the person who does X / has X”:
- mai sayar da littattafai – bookseller
- mai gyaran mota – mechanic (person who repairs cars)
- mai masara – person who has/owns corn (not necessarily selling)
So mai here is not just “owner of”, but more generally “person associated with / who does” the following activity or thing.
In Hausa, the verb for to sell is usually sayar da (literally “to sell with/of”), and it normally takes the thing being sold after it:
- sayar da masara – to sell corn
- sayar da mota – to sell a car
- sayar da kaya – to sell goods
The small word da is part of the verb expression sayar da. You don’t normally drop it; *sayar masara would sound wrong or at least incomplete to a native speaker.
Contrast this with:
- saya – to buy
- saya masara – to buy corn (no da here)
So:
- saya X = buy X
- sayar da X = sell X
Usually no, that would not mean the same thing.
mai masara literally = “person who has/owns corn”
→ someone who possesses corn (a farmer, a householder with corn at home, etc.), not specifically a seller.mai sayar da masara = “person whose activity is selling corn”
→ this clearly describes a seller as a job/role.
So if you want to talk about a corn seller (a vendor at the market), mai sayar da masara is the natural choice. mai masara is ambiguous and does not inherently imply selling.
yana is the progressive/continuous auxiliary: it usually corresponds to English “is/are …-ing”.
Structure:
- (pronoun/subject) + na/na- form + verb / predicate
Examples:
- Yana tafiya. – He is going / walking.
- Suna aiki. – They are working.
- Mai sayar da masara yana tsaye. – The corn seller is standing.
So in yana tsaye:
- yana = he is (in the continuous/progressive sense)
- tsaye = (in a) standing position
Together they give a present continuous state: “is standing” (right now, at this time).
Hausa makes a distinction between:
- tsaya – the verb “to stop / to stand (up)”
- tsaye – an adjectival / stative form meaning “(being) standing; in a standing position”
So:
- Ya tsaya. – He stopped / he stood (up).
- Yana tsaye. – He is standing (i.e. he is in an upright, standing state).
In your sentence, we are describing the current posture/state of the corn seller, not the action of “coming to a stop”, so the stative form tsaye is used with yana:
- Mai sayar da masara yana tsaye…
→ The corn seller is (in a state of) standing…
a gefe na kasuwa breaks down as:
- a – at / in / on (preposition)
- gefe – side / edge
- na – of (genitive linker)
- kasuwa – market
So literally: “at a side of market” → “at the side of the market”.
This X na Y is the normal way to say “X of Y”:
- ƙofar gida / ƙofa ta gida – the door of the house
- bakin titi – the edge of the road
- gefe na tebur – the side of the table
With gefe, you can also see the fused genitive form:
- a gefen kasuwa – at the side of the market
So:
- a gefe na kasuwa and a gefen kasuwa both mean roughly “at the side/edge of the market”.
The version with na feels a bit more “analytic” (literally spelled out “side of market”), but both are natural.
inda means “where” and introduces a relative / locative clause.
The structure here is:
- inda – where
- yara – children
- ke yi wa iyayensu sallama – are greeting their parents
So altogether:
- inda yara ke yi wa iyayensu sallama
→ “where children are greeting their parents”
It functions like English “where …” in:
- the side of the market *where children are greeting their parents.*
You could also say “wurin da yara ke yi wa iyayensu sallama”:
- wuri – place
- wurin da… – the place where…
But in your sentence, inda on its own is enough and very common.
ke here is an aspect marker used with a full noun subject (here: yara) in a focus/relative-like environment (after inda).
Compare:
- Yara suna wasa. – The children are playing. (neutral statement)
- Yara ke wasa. – It’s the children who are playing. (more focused / highlighted)
- inda yara ke wasa – where the children are playing
In your sentence:
- inda – where
- yara – (the) children
- ke – continuous / habitual marker in this kind of clause
- yi wa iyayensu sallama – are doing greeting to their parents
We do not say *yara suna yi here, because after inda (and in many relative/focused structures) Hausa prefers ke rather than the suna form.
You could hear inda yara suke yi… in some speech, but inda yara ke yi… is very standard and idiomatic.
Hausa very often uses the light verb yi (“to do, to make”) together with a verbal noun:
- yi magana – to speak / talk
- yi bacci – to sleep (do sleep)
- yi aiki – to work (do work)
- yi sallama – to greet / say hello/bye
So:
- yi sallama literally = “do greeting”
→ natural equivalent of English “to greet / say hello / say goodbye”
In your sentence you have:
- yi wa iyayensu sallama – to do greeting to their parents
→ “to greet their parents”
While sallama can be related to a verb sense, in ordinary speech this “yi sallama” construction is the normal, idiomatic way to say “greet (someone)”.
wa is a preposition used here to mark the indirect object / beneficiary – the person to whom the action is done.
Structure:
- yi – do
- wa – to/for
- iyayensu – their parents
- sallama – greeting
So yi wa iyayensu sallama = “do greeting to their parents” = greet their parents.
Other examples with wa:
- Ba ni abinci. – Give me food.
- Ba wa yara abinci. – Give food to the children.
- Faɗa masa gaskiya. – Tell him the truth.
- Faɗa wa Malam gaskiya. – Tell the teacher the truth.
In all of these, wa (or a similar form like ma) introduces the person that receives the action.
iyayensu breaks down as:
- iyaye – parents (plural; from uwa “mother” + uba “father”, but as a set it just means “parents”)
- -n- – linking consonant for the genitive/possessive
- su – they / their (3rd person plural pronoun)
When you combine:
- iyaye + -n- + su → iyayensu
Meaning: “their parents”.
Some patterns:
- iyaye na – my parents
- iyayenka / iyayenki – your parents (m/f)
- iyayensa – his parents
- iyayenta – her parents
- iyayensu – their parents
It describes “gefe (na kasuwa)” as a whole.
The structure is:
- [Mai sayar da masara] – The corn seller
- [yana tsaye] – is standing
- [a gefe na kasuwa] – at the side of the market
- [inda yara ke yi wa iyayensu sallama] – where children are greeting their parents
So the meaning is:
- “The corn seller is standing at the side of the market where children are greeting their parents.”
Not:
- “The corn seller is standing at the side of *the market-where-children-are-greeting-their-parents.”*
In other words, the relative ‘where…’ part is attached to “the side (of the market)”, describing that specific place.