Learn Hardcore Indonesian: Asal tidak hujan, kami akan bermain bulu tangkis di lapangan sore ini. - As long as it doesn’t rain, we will play badminton on the court this afternoon.

asal introduces a condition that feels like a requirement:
- Asal tidak hujan, ... → As long as it doesn’t rain / Provided it doesn’t rain, ...
kalau and jika both mean “if” and can usually replace asal here:
- Kalau tidak hujan, kami akan bermain ...
- Jika tidak hujan, kami akan bermain ...

Nuance:

asal sounds like: this one condition must be met, then it’s okay.
kalau is the most common everyday “if”.
jika is more formal, often used in writing or formal speech.

All three are grammatical in this sentence; only the tone/formality changes slightly.

Why is it asal tidak hujan and not something like asal hujan tidak?

Indonesian negation normally follows this basic pattern:

tidak + verb/adjective

In weather expressions, hujan (“to rain / rain”) acts like a verb or a state, so you negate it as:

tidak hujan = “it is not raining / it doesn’t rain”

Putting tidak at the end (hujan tidak) is ungrammatical in this context. You need tidak directly before what it negates:

✅ tidak hujan
❌ hujan tidak (wrong here)

Is there an invisible subject in asal tidak hujan? Why is there no word for “it”?

Indonesian commonly omits pronouns when the subject is obvious or impersonal.

For weather, Indonesian simply says:

hujan = “it is raining”
tidak hujan = “it is not raining”
panas = “it is hot”
mendung = “it is cloudy”

There is no separate word for “it” as a dummy subject like English has. The verb or adjective itself is enough. So asal tidak hujan literally feels like “as long as not-raining”, and that is completely natural in Indonesian.

Why is tidak used here and not bukan or jangan?

Indonesian has several negators, and they have different uses:

tidak negates verbs and adjectives:
- tidak hujan (not raining)
- tidak besar (not big)
bukan negates nouns or equational sentences:
- Itu bukan buku saya. (That is not my book.)
jangan is for prohibitions / commands:
- Jangan pergi. (Don’t go.)

In tidak hujan, hujan functions like a verb/state, so tidak is the correct negator:

✅ tidak hujan
❌ bukan hujan (would sound like “it is not rain” as a noun)
❌ jangan hujan (would sound like you are telling the rain not to fall)

Why is kami used instead of kita? Both mean “we”, right?

Both mean “we”, but they differ in inclusiveness:

kami = we (not including the person spoken to)
→ speaker + other people, but excludes the listener.
kita = we (including the person spoken to)
→ speaker + listener + possibly others.

In this sentence, kami suggests:

The speaker and their group will play badminton,
The listener is not part of that group.

If the speaker wants to include the listener (e.g. inviting them), they would say:

Asal tidak hujan, kita akan bermain bulu tangkis di lapangan sore ini.
→ As long as it doesn’t rain, we (you and I) will play badminton on the court this afternoon.

Is akan necessary to show the future here? Can it be omitted?

akan is a future marker meaning roughly “will / going to”, but in everyday Indonesian:

The time expression (here: sore ini = “this afternoon”) often makes the future clear without akan.
So you can say either:
- kami akan bermain bulu tangkis sore ini
- kami bermain bulu tangkis sore ini

Both are understood as future because of sore ini.

Nuance:

akan can sound a bit more explicit or slightly more formal/neutral.
In casual speech, Indonesians often omit akan when the context already shows it’s future.

Why bermain bulu tangkis? Could I just say main bulu tangkis?

Both are possible:

bermain bulu tangkis
- Uses the full verb bermain = “to play”.
- More complete and a bit more neutral/formal.
main bulu tangkis
- Drops the prefix ber-, which is very common in speech.
- Sounds more casual/colloquial.

The noun for the sport is bulu tangkis (badminton). In conversation you’ll hear both:

Nanti sore saya bermain bulu tangkis. (neutral)
Nanti sore saya main bulu tangkis. (casual)

Your sentence with bermain bulu tangkis is perfectly natural and slightly on the neutral side.

What exactly does lapangan mean here? Is it a field or a court?

lapangan literally means a field / open area, but in sports contexts it also means court / pitch. The exact English equivalent depends on the sport:

lapangan sepak bola → soccer field / pitch
lapangan basket → basketball court
lapangan bulu tangkis → badminton court

In your sentence, di lapangan is understood from context as “on the court/field where we play”. If you want to be more specific, you could say:

di lapangan bulu tangkis = on the badminton court.

Why is sore ini at the end? Can it go somewhere else in the sentence?

Time expressions like sore ini (“this afternoon”) are flexible in Indonesian. All of these are grammatical:

Asal tidak hujan, kami akan bermain bulu tangkis di lapangan sore ini.
Asal tidak hujan, sore ini kami akan bermain bulu tangkis di lapangan.
Sore ini, asal tidak hujan, kami akan bermain bulu tangkis di lapangan.

Placing sore ini at the end (version 1) is very common and natural:
> [Condition] + [Subject] + [Verb + Object + Place] + [Time]

Other positions are possible; they just change the focus slightly (e.g. starting with Sore ini emphasizes the time first).

Does the clause order matter? Can I put the “if” part at the end instead?

You can switch the order of the conditional and the main clause:

Asal tidak hujan, kami akan bermain bulu tangkis di lapangan sore ini.
Kami akan bermain bulu tangkis di lapangan sore ini asal tidak hujan.

Both mean the same thing. Differences:

Starting with asal tidak hujan emphasizes the condition first.
Putting asal tidak hujan at the end makes it sound like an added condition:
“We will play badminton this afternoon, as long as it doesn’t rain.”

Both are natural; Indonesians use both patterns.

How would this sentence sound in more casual, everyday speech?

A very natural casual version might look like:

Kalau nggak hujan, kita main bulu tangkis di lapangan sore ini.

Changes:

asal → kalau (more common casual “if”)
tidak → nggak (colloquial “not”)
kami → kita (including the listener, more inviting)
bermain → main (dropping ber-, casual)

Your original sentence is already good, clear, and neutral; the casual version just matches informal spoken Indonesian.