Kare mai ƙarfi yana tsaye a bakin ƙofa.

to be

Breakdown of Kare mai ƙarfi yana tsaye a bakin ƙofa.

• ƙofa: the door
• tsaya: to stand
• kare: the dog

Questions & Answers about Kare mai ƙarfi yana tsaye a bakin ƙofa.

Does kare mean a dog or the dog?

Hausa does not have separate words for a and the the way English does. A bare noun like kare can usually be understood as either a dog or the dog, depending on context.

• In isolation, kare mai ƙarfi yana tsaye a bakin ƙofa can be translated as either:
  • A strong dog is standing at the door, or
  • The strong dog is standing at the door.

If you really need to make it clearly definite, you can add something like nan (here/this), for example:

• Karen nan yana tsaye – This/the dog here is standing.

What exactly does mai ƙarfi mean, and how is it working in the sentence?

mai ƙarfi literally means one who has strength or possessor of strength, but in use it functions like the adjective strong.

So:

• kare mai ƙarfi – a strong dog
• mace mai ƙarfi – a strong woman

This mai + noun pattern is very common in Hausa to create describing words:

• mai hankali – sensible, reasonable (lit. having sense)
• mai kyau – beautiful / good-looking (lit. having goodness/beauty)
• mai arziki – rich (lit. having wealth)