Questions & Answers about Jam di perpustakaan selalu tepat.
What does jam mean here? I thought jam meant hour.
In Indonesian, jam has a few related meanings:
Clock / watch (the object)
- Jam di perpustakaan = the clock in the library
- jam tangan = wristwatch
The time shown on a clock / o’clock
- jam tiga = three o’clock
An hour (duration)
- dua jam = two hours
In your sentence Jam di perpustakaan selalu tepat, context makes jam mean the clock (the physical object), not hour or o’clock.
Why is it di perpustakaan and not something like pada perpustakaan or ke perpustakaan?
The prepositions have different uses:
- di = at / in (location, where something is)
- di perpustakaan = in/at the library (location)
- ke = to (direction, movement towards)
- ke perpustakaan = to the library
- pada = at / on (more abstract, often for time, people, or formal style)
- pada jam tiga = at three o’clock
- pada saya = to me / with me
In the sentence, we are talking about where the clock is located, so is correct. is ungrammatical in this context, and would mean movement towards the library, which is not the idea here.