Learn Hardcore Indonesian: Di akhir rapat, kami tertawa bersama di ruang tamu. - At the end of the meeting, we laugh together in the living room.

Both are correct. In everyday speech and writing, di akhir is very common and sounds natural. Pada akhir can feel a bit more formal or written, but the difference in meaning here is minimal.

Is di here a preposition or the passive prefix di-?

Here, di is a preposition, not a prefix.

As a preposition, di stands alone and is written separately from the next word:
- di akhir – at the end
- di ruang tamu – in the living room
As a passive prefix, di- is attached to a verb:
- ditulis – is/was written
- dilihat – is/was seen

So:

di akhir (with a space) = “at the end”
diakhiri (no space, different word) = “is ended” / “is brought to an end”

Why is there a comma after rapat? Is it required?

The comma in:

Di akhir rapat, kami tertawa bersama di ruang tamu.

is used to separate the fronted time phrase (Di akhir rapat) from the main clause (kami tertawa bersama di ruang tamu).

It’s:

stylistically nice and common in writing,
helpful for clarity when a time/place phrase comes first.

You can write it without a comma in informal contexts, but for standard written Indonesian, keeping the comma here is recommended:

Di akhir rapat, kami tertawa bersama di ruang tamu. ✅ (preferred in writing)
Di akhir rapat kami tertawa bersama di ruang tamu. ✅ (informal text, still understandable)

What is the difference between kami and kita, and why is kami used here?

Both mean “we”, but:

kami = we (excluding the person spoken to)
kita = we ( including the person spoken to)

So if the speaker is talking to someone who was not part of the meeting or the laughing group, kami is correct:

Di akhir rapat, kami tertawa bersama…
“At the end of the meeting, we (but not you) laughed together…”

If the speaker is talking to someone who was there and included in that “we”, they would normally use kita:

Di akhir rapat, kita tertawa bersama di ruang tamu.
“At the end of the meeting, we (including you) laughed together in the living room.”

What does tertawa mean, and is it different from ketawa?

Both mean “to laugh”.

tertawa
- more standard and neutral
- used in writing, formal speech, and also in everyday speech
ketawa
- more informal / colloquial
- very common in casual spoken Indonesian

In this sentence, tertawa is slightly more formal or neutral. A casual version could be:

Di akhir rapat, kami ketawa bareng di ruang tamu.

Here bareng is a slangy alternative to bersama.

What does bersama add to tertawa? Is tertawa bersama like a fixed phrase?

bersama means “together (with)”.

tertawa = to laugh
tertawa bersama = to laugh together

It’s not a fixed idiom; it’s simply verb + adverb:

makan bersama – eat together
belajar bersama – study together
jalan-jalan bersama – stroll / go out together

You can also say bersama-sama to emphasize “togetherness” a bit more:

kami tertawa bersama-sama – we laughed together (with more emphasis on “all of us”)

But tertawa bersama is already natural and clear.

Could the word order be changed, like Kami tertawa bersama di akhir rapat di ruang tamu?

Indonesian word order is quite flexible for time and place phrases. All of these are grammatical:

Di akhir rapat, kami tertawa bersama di ruang tamu.
– Time phrase at the front (as in your sentence).
Kami tertawa bersama di akhir rapat di ruang tamu.
– Both time (di akhir rapat) and place (di ruang tamu) at the end.
Kami tertawa bersama di ruang tamu di akhir rapat.
– Place first, then time.

They all basically mean the same thing. The typical neutral pattern is:

[Subject] + [Verb] + (other info: time, place, manner)
Kami tertawa bersama di ruang tamu (di akhir rapat).

Putting Di akhir rapat at the beginning just emphasizes the time frame “At the end of the meeting”.

What does ruang tamu literally mean? Is it exactly the same as “living room”?

Literally:

ruang = room
tamu = guest

So ruang tamu = “guest room”, but in Indonesian it usually refers to:

the front room where you receive guests,
often the same space that in English is called a living room.

Other related terms:

ruang keluarga – family room (more private, for the family)
ruang duduk – sitting room (less common)

In many homes, ruang tamu is the main sitting/living area, so translating it as “living room” in this context is natural.

How do we know this sentence is in the past? There’s no past tense marker.

Indonesian does not have verb tenses like English (no -ed, -s, etc.). Time is usually understood from:

time expressions:
- tadi (earlier), kemarin (yesterday), besok (tomorrow), etc.
context.

In:

Di akhir rapat, kami tertawa bersama di ruang tamu.

Di akhir rapat gives a clear time frame: the end of a meeting that is being talked about as a completed event. In context, this is naturally understood as past:

“At the end of the meeting, we laughed together in the living room.”

If you really want to make the past explicit, you could add tadi or barusan:

Di akhir rapat tadi, kami tertawa bersama di ruang tamu.
“At the end of the meeting earlier, we laughed together in the living room.”

Could we say Pada akhir rapat kami tertawa bersama di ruang tamu without the comma and still be correct?

Yes, that’s still grammatical:

Pada akhir rapat kami tertawa bersama di ruang tamu.

Two points:

Pada instead of di
- Pada akhir rapat is slightly more formal than Di akhir rapat, but both are acceptable.
No comma
- In informal writing, leaving the comma out is common.
- In more careful or formal writing, it’s better style to include the comma after that fronted time phrase:
  Pada akhir rapat, kami tertawa bersama di ruang tamu. ✅

So, it’s correct without the comma, but with the comma it matches standard punctuation norms better.