Motar ta tsaya awa ɗaya saboda ruwa ya yi yawa a hanya.

The car stopped for an hour because there was a lot of water on the road.

Breakdown of Motar ta tsaya awa ɗaya saboda ruwa ya yi yawa a hanya.

• ruwa: the water
• saboda: because
• yi: to do
• mota: the car
• hanya: the road
• a: on
• ɗaya: one
• yawa: much
• awa: the hour
• tsaya: to stop

Questions & Answers about Motar ta tsaya awa ɗaya saboda ruwa ya yi yawa a hanya.

In Motar ta tsaya, why do we have both motar and ta referring to the car? Can't we just say Motar tsaya or Ta tsaya?

In Hausa, the normal clause structure uses a subject pronoun (or agreement marker) before the verb, even when there is a full noun phrase.

• Motar ta tsaya
  Literally: The car, it stopped.

Here:

• motar = the car (full noun phrase, topic)
• ta = she/it (feminine subject pronoun, agrees with mota)

You cannot say Motar tsaya – that is ungrammatical, because the verb tsaya needs the subject pronoun before it.

You can say Ta tsaya awa ɗaya if the subject is already clear from context (e.g. someone already asked about the car). Then ta alone is enough.

Why is it motar and not just mota at the beginning of the sentence?

Mota is the basic form meaning a car.
Motar ends with -r, which here marks it as a specific/definite car, roughly like “the car” in English.

• mota = a car (any car, or car as a general concept)
• motar = the car (a particular one we already know about in the conversation)

Hausa often adds -r / -n to nouns that end in a vowel when they are definite or when they are in a genitive (possessive/“of”) construction. In this sentence, Motar ta tsaya is naturally understood as “The car stopped …”.

Why is the pronoun ta (she) used for the car, not ya (he/it)? In English, car is “it”.

In Hausa, every noun has grammatical gender: masculine or feminine. This is not about biological sex; it’s just grammar.

• mota (car) is grammatically feminine, so it takes ta.
• ruwa (water) is grammatically masculine, so it takes ya.

So:

• Motar ta tsaya … = The car (feminine) stopped …
• Ruwa ya yi yawa … = The water (masculine) was a lot …

Think of this like in languages such as French or Spanish, where objects have gender (e.g. la voiture is feminine in French).

Does ta tsaya awa ɗaya mean “stopped for one hour” or “stopped after one hour”?

In this sentence, ta tsaya awa ɗaya means “it stopped / stayed stopped for one hour”.

The structure is:

• ta tsaya = it stopped / it stood / it remained (there)
• awa ɗaya = one hour

Putting the time expression directly after the verb like this usually gives a duration reading: it did X for Y time.

To say “it stopped after one hour” (i.e. it was moving and only later stopped), you would normally need to make that clearer, for example:

• Bayan awa ɗaya, motar ta tsaya.
  After one hour, the car stopped.

Why is there no word for “for” before awa ɗaya? In English we say “for one hour”.

Hausa typically does not need a preposition like for before a bare time expression showing duration. You simply put the time phrase after the verb:

• Ta jira ni minti goma.
  She waited (for) ten minutes.
• Na yi barci awa biyu.
  I slept (for) two hours.

So:

• Motar ta tsaya awa ɗaya
  literally: The car stopped one hour
  meaning: The car stopped for one hour.

If you want to be very explicit, you can add tsawon (length/duration):

• Motar ta tsaya tsawon awa ɗaya.
  The car stopped for a duration of one hour.

But tsawon is optional here.

What exactly does ruwa ya yi yawa mean? How does yi yawa work?

Ruwa ya yi yawa is a very common pattern in Hausa.

Breakdown:

• ruwa = water
• ya = he/it (masculine subject pronoun, agreeing with ruwa)
• yi = to do, to make, to become (very common “light verb”)
• yawa = much, plenty, a lot

The expression yi yawa together means something like “to become many / to be too much / to be a lot”.

So:

• ruwa ya yi yawa ≈ the water was too much / there was a lot of water / the water level was high.

You can use the same pattern with other nouns:

• Mutane sun yi yawa.
  There are too many people / the people are many.
• Kuɗi sun yi yawa.
  There is a lot of money / the money is plenty.

Why do we use ya with ruwa instead of ta? Is ruwa masculine?

Yes. In Hausa, ruwa (water) is a masculine noun, so it takes the masculine singular pronoun ya.

• Ruwa ya yi yawa. = The water was a lot / too much.
• If the noun were feminine, you would use ta, e.g.
  Iska ta yi ƙarfi. = The wind (fem.) was strong.

So in the full sentence:

• Motar ta tsaya awa ɗaya (feminine noun mota → ta)
• saboda ruwa ya yi yawa (masculine noun ruwa → ya)

Is a hanya necessary? Could I just say saboda ruwa ya yi yawa?

You can say just:

• Motar ta tsaya awa ɗaya saboda ruwa ya yi yawa.

That would mean: The car stopped for one hour because there was a lot of water.

However, a hanya specifies where the water was: on the road / on the way.

• a = in/on/at (general preposition for location)
• hanya = road, way, path

So:

• ruwa ya yi yawa a hanya = there was a lot of water on the road / on the way.

Without a hanya, the listener has to infer the location from context. In this sentence, a hanya explains clearly why the car had to stop (because the road itself was flooded or covered with water).

What is the difference between a hanya and a kan hanya? Could I say saboda ruwa ya yi yawa a kan hanya?

You can say saboda ruwa ya yi yawa a kan hanya, and it is also correct.

Subtle difference:

• a hanya
  often more general: on the road, along the road, in the way/route.
• a kan hanya
  more literally: on top of the road, on the surface of the road, and can sound slightly more physically on the road.

In many everyday contexts, they can be used interchangeably, and both would be understood as “on the road.”

In your sentence:

• … saboda ruwa ya yi yawa a hanya.
• … saboda ruwa ya yi yawa a kan hanya.

Both can be used to mean that there was too much water on the road.

Could the sentence start with the reason, like Saboda ruwa ya yi yawa a hanya, motar ta tsaya awa ɗaya?

Yes, that word order is perfectly natural in Hausa.

You can say:

• Motar ta tsaya awa ɗaya saboda ruwa ya yi yawa a hanya.
  The car stopped for an hour because there was a lot of water on the road.

or:

• Saboda ruwa ya yi yawa a hanya, motar ta tsaya awa ɗaya.
  Because there was a lot of water on the road, the car stopped for an hour.

Both are grammatical. Moving the saboda… clause to the front just shifts the emphasis slightly to the reason first, much like in English.

What aspect/tense does ta tsaya express here? Could we say Motar tana tsayawa awa ɗaya instead?

Ta tsaya is in the perfective aspect: it presents the event as completed. In context, it normally means:

• Motar ta tsaya awa ɗaya
  = The car stopped / was stopped for one hour (this is told as a completed past event).

If you say:

• Motar tana tsayawa awa ɗaya,

this sounds odd in this context. tana tsayawa (imperfective) suggests an ongoing or habitual action, like:

• The car (regularly) tends to be stopping for an hour (which doesn’t match the usual meaning here).

To talk naturally about a specific event that happened (the car had to stop and remained stopped for an hour), ta tsaya awa ɗaya is the right choice.