Minyak lorong membuat lorong boling itu licin.

Lane oil makes that bowling lane slippery.

Breakdown of Minyak lorong membuat lorong boling itu licin.

• itu: that
• membuat: to make
• licin: slippery
• lorong boling: a bowling lane

Questions & Answers about Minyak lorong membuat lorong boling itu licin.

What is the basic structure of this sentence?

The sentence follows this pattern:

Subject + membuat + object + adjective

So here:

• Minyak lorong = the thing causing the effect
• membuat = makes
• lorong boling itu = the thing affected
• licin = the resulting quality

So membuat lorong boling itu licin means makes that bowling lane slippery.

A useful pattern to remember is:

X membuat Y + adjective = X makes Y + adjective

For example:

• Hujan membuat jalan itu basah = Rain makes that road wet.

Why is lorong used twice?

Because it belongs to two different noun phrases:

• minyak lorong = lane oil
• lorong boling itu = that bowling lane

So the first lorong describes what kind of oil it is, and the second lorong is the actual lane being talked about.

It may look repetitive in English, but in Malay this is completely normal.

What does membuat mean here?

Here membuat means to make in the sense of to cause something to become a certain way.

So it does not mean to manufacture here. It means:

• membuat ... licin = make ... slippery

This is a very common Malay use of membuat.